For Immediate Release Media contacts: The Field Museum Greg Borzo 312/665-7106 gborzo@fieldmuseum.org Reconciling the past From 1923 to 1933, archaeologists from The Field Museum and Oxford University’s Ashmolean Museum explored several of the 40 mounds at the 9-square-mile Kish site located in the floodplains of the Euphrates River. The artifacts found were divided between the two excavating museums and the Iraq Museum in Baghdad. Ever since, the collections have remained divided, effectively precluding the production of a full site report for this crucial Mesopotamian city and hindering a full understanding of its historical and archaeological significance. The $100,000 NEH grant will allow The Field Museum to: Catalog uncataloged objects; Reconcile the entire collection with excavation records and field notes; Reconcile numbers assigned to the objects in the field with museum numbers; Stabilize at-risk objects; Scan and/or photograph important objects and records, correspondence, etc. Disseminate the information to scholars and others around the world. Work has already begun with The Field Museum’s and Oxford University’s collection. Once political and security risks are resolved in Iraq, the work will continue at the Iraq Museum, which was heavily looted at the start of the war. “The lack of a final, complete site report stands as a significant gap in the archaeological record of Mesopotamia,” said Ben Bronson, Field Museum Curator of Asian Archaeology. “When completed, this catalog will facilitate researchers’ access to all three Kish collections. “Furthermore, it will directly benefit the Iraqi people by providing detailed information on the state, condition and interconnectedness of this important portion of their cultural patrimony, some of which was exported 80 years ago,” Bronson added. During the third millennium B.C., Kish was Mesopotamia’s dominant major regional power. As such, it set the stage for the development for a long succession of important Mesopotamian seats of power, including modern day Baghdad and ancient Babylon (just 7 miles to the west). Continue>>