Bronze Age Domestic Architecture in Eastern Syria : Familiar, Social and Economic Implications

This paper deals with a PhD project on domestic architecture and society on the Syrian Euphrates region and in the Jezirah during the Bronze Age. The large geographical and chronological framework allowed to collect an important corpus of houses. The analysis of statistical data on their different features allowed interpretations, in particular concerning their functionnal characteristics. The attention is here focused on the crafts and industrial production of the house inhabitants. The contemporary economic system is well known in Southern Mesopotamia, and was there mainly based on official oikoi linked to the temples or to the palace. On the contrary, the analysis of Northern Mesopotamian evidence shows that the economic system in this area was mainly based on private households, the state control probably being there of lesser importance.