Archaeological Results of the 2nd Season of Excavation at Mādābād A, Marvdasht

A part from Prehistoric and historic sites, some Islamic mounds have also been recognized during Archaeological surveys in Kur river basin of which the site of Mādābād A is one of the largest sites of the Islamic period in the Kur River Basin and Marvdasht. This site has been damaged extensively as a result of agricultural and development activities as just small part of it still remains currently. Archaeological finds of the site are abundant, but more than other material a large number of “Psuedo-Prehistoric” potsherds are particularly important and this is against the fact that the painted pottery in Iran after a long history finally became extinct in around the middle of the Parthian period. Unlike the ceramic traditions of the Iranian Plateau and Western Asia which are remarkably painted and glazed, this type of pottery bears a strong resemblance in designs and motifs to the 5th and 4th millennium B.C. Due to stratigraphic ambiguities of this type of pottery-that was only discovered in Iran previously during surface archaeological surveys-we tried to retrieve samples of this pottery from secure context with dateable strata at Madabad and to reconstruct a firm basis for exact chronology and dating. This is also a fact that this type of pottery is discovered in a vast area in western Asia, from north and south Syria, north Jordan, southern Iraq and northern shores of the Persian Gulf. In a paper published in 1987, Donald Whitcomb tried to describe the tradition of making this pottery to the complex social transformations of the mid-Islamic centuries. Outside Iran, this type of pottery was discovered in secure context, but in Iran they only come from haphazard and random surveys. Excavations at the site of Mādābād showed us that there is good possibility that this pottery belongs actually to the late episode of early Islamic centuries. The most important reason for such conclusion is the appearance of Pseudo-Prehistoric pottery accompanying with the characteristic stamped and Moulded and also splashed glazed and incised decoration pottery of Istakhr samples of early Islamic period. In the first season of excavation a satisfying mass of these samples was excavated from Architectural contexts. In the second season, as excavation expanded, architectural remains began to take shape and more archaeological material was recovered from many contexts, including glass, stone, and bone bead, glass armlet, bronze ring and bone objects. Finally it can be concluded that the ceramic finds from the site can be divided into six types: painted, stamped, incised, affixed and relief decorated, glazed and plain, especially molded pottery reminiscent of the city of Istakhr (dating to late Sasanian-Early Islamic Period). It is conceivable that the poverty of architectural material (except for some chineh or mud brick structures) can be attributed to the economic and social hardship of the early Islamic centuries, an important point that can only be explored in light of future excavations. This site has 4 occupation levels, since early Islamic to mid-Islamic period, with no gap in settlement but of which the latter is the best preserved phase.