Rania Archaeological Project

Archaeological research in the Rania Plain was initiated in 2012 under the auspices of the Netherlands Institute for the Near East (NINO), directed by Jesper Eidem. Since 2018, the project has continued as the Pisa Archaeological Project, supported by the University of Pisa and the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, in collaboration with the Directorates of Antiquities in Sulaymania and Raparin.

The Rania Plain is a roughly triangular area in the foothills of the Zagros mountains, defined by the surrounding peaks and crossed by the Lower Zab river. The river enters the plain through the spectacular gorge at Darband-i Ramkan and exits at Dokan, where the dam was built. The plain holds exceptional strategic significance due to its proximity to the Darband Pass, a natural gateway through the mountain range that has connected Mesopotamia to the Iranian plateau since antiquity.

The Rania Plain attracted the attention of European travellers from the 19th century onwards, who noted the ancient ruined fort at Darband and the earthen "tumuli" scattered across the landscape. The first real archaeologist to visit was Ernst Herzfeld (1879–1948), who in 1916–17, while serving in the German army, conducted extensive surveying with a military detachment. Despite limited time, Herzfeld recorded the names of several sites and sketched their topography with a keen eye.

A few years later, C.J. Edmonds was posted as Assistant Political Officer near the Darband Pass in 1922. Though keenly interested in ancient monuments, he paid little attention to the tells, which revealed little beyond surface sherds. His classic book remains, however, a mine of information on the region's history and people.

High on the mountains south of the Darband Pass lies a long stretch of ancient fortifications, clearly built to defend the Rania Plain from attacks from the east. These ruins were first observed in modern times by Wheildon Brown, an engineer working on the Dokan Dam construction in the late 1950s, who described the walls as "solid dry stone masonry."

In 2019, our project documented these impressive defensive structures, which extend along the ridge of Khal-i Darband. The fortifications remain undated, but their strategic placement—controlling the mountain passes between the Rania and Pishdar valleys—testifies to the enduring military significance of this frontier zone throughout history.

The Rania Plain marked the eastern reaches of Assyrian power at various points in history. At the Darband Pass itself stands Usu Aska, an Assyrian fortress currently being excavated by a team from the British Museum. This site controlled access through the gorge where the Lower Zab cuts through the mountains.

Further evidence of Assyrian presence comes from Tell Basmusian, the largest site on the plain, where Iraqi archaeologists in the 1950s found Middle Assyrian cuneiform tablets. Recent research by our project has identified Basmusian as the likely location of ancient Pakute, an important fortified city mentioned in the annals of Tiglath-pileser I (ca. 1100 BCE).

In 1959, the closure of the Dokan Dam created an artificial lake that inundated a substantial portion of the Rania Plain. Prior to flooding, Iraqi archaeologists conducted surveys and salvage excavations (1955–1959), recording approximately 40 sites. A Danish expedition joined the effort at Tell Shemshara (1957), discovering the famous Archive of Kuwari. However, much of the region's archaeological heritage remained unexplored.

Since then, the annual fluctuation of Lake Dokan—oscillating by as much as 20–25 metres—has caused severe erosion to archaeological sites within the flood-risk zone. At Tell Shemshara alone, an estimated 30,000 cubic metres of deposits have been washed away. Many ancient mounds have lost significant portions of their stratigraphy, while others remain permanently submerged or embedded in lake sediment.

A crucial resource for understanding the pre-flood landscape came to light in 2014, when our project discovered that a set of aerial photographs taken in the early 1950s by the British company "Hunting Aerosurveys" was preserved at the Dokan Dam offices. With support from the Sulaymania Directorate of Antiquities, we obtained high-resolution scans of these images.

These photographs, taken before the dam's construction, provide invaluable views of archaeological sites as they appeared prior to flooding. Our surveyor merged and geo-referenced them to produce a precise map of the pre-flood landscape, guiding us to sites no longer visible on modern satellite imagery.

The Pisa Archaeological Project represents a "second-phase" heritage salvage effort, with the following main objectives:

• Recording and monitoring the ongoing impact of flooding on archaeological sites
• Conducting salvage excavations on fast-eroding remains
• Contextualizing displaced antiquities recovered by local communities
• Reconstructing the settlement history of the region from prehistory through the Islamic period

The project combines excavation and survey work across multiple sites in the Rania Plain and adjacent areas. Fieldwork is conducted primarily in autumn, when lake levels are typically at their lowest, allowing access to otherwise submerged sites. In December 2023, the project co-organised the first "winter survey" conducted in the inundation zone, taking advantage of exceptionally low water levels to document sites rarely accessible.