From the Early to the Middle Iron Age: development of the pottery inventories from the new excavations at Arslantepe

The excavations on the Iron Age levels were resumed in Arslantepe in 2007. On the northern slope of the mound a large area connected with public structures was investigated. A first analysis on pottery production found on these levels was already started during the 2008 excavation season. The analyzed assemblages were characterized by a typical Early Iron Age local production followed by an interesting Middle Iron Age corpus characterized by ceramics linked with regions far from the upper Euphrates valley. The aim of this paper is to analyse the transition between Early and Middle Iron Age at Arslantepe as seen from the development of pottery production