ESTABLISHING AN ABSOLUTE CHRONOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK FOR THE LATE CHALCOLITHIC TO EARLY BRONZE AGE IN IRAQI KURDISTAN: RADIOCARBON DATES FROM KANI SHAIE

ABSTRACT The possibility to conduct new fieldwork projects in previously largely unexplored Iraqi Kurdistan during the past decade has reinvigorated research into transformative fifth third millennium BCE (Chalcolithic Early Bronze Age) southwest Asia when human societies grew from small, autonomous villages centralized states with urban centers. Major efforts synchronize stratigraphic sequences various sites order reach a consensus on archaeological periodization and identify absolute chronology of societal transformations necessarily focused available datasets Syria, Turkey, Iran. However, increased understanding differences communities’ adoption, adaptation, or rejection forms technologies social organization demands need for constructing region-specific chronological models comparative analysis. Such work is particularly challenging case where frequently have major hiatuses occupation. site Kani Shaie (Sulaymaniyah Governorate) offers rare opportunity investigate Chalcolithic Age uninterrupted sequence occupation ca. 5500 2500 BCE. This paper presents series fourteen radiocarbon dates, representing every period this timeframe, as first step toward construction regional chronology.