 | AH Site | AH | In the southeast portion of the mound of Ur, Woolley excavated a large horizontal extent of domestic space roughly 115 x 85m. near the surface he found scattered Neo-Babylonian and Kassite remains and intrusive graves of the late periods but he did not publish these in detail nor are there any extant notes covering them. Instead, Woolley's main goal was to uncover the best preserved floorplans of houses. These he found several meters down, houses of the Isin-Larsa/Old Babylonian period. Because the Old Babylonian period was typically that associated with the potential time of Abraham, Woolley used the abbreviation AH (Abraham's Housing) to refer to this excavation area.
In the course of excavation of the Isin-Larsa/Old Babylonian levels Woolley numbered 27 'houses,' or excavation units. He renumbered the houses for publication based on the overall plan, preserved walls, and doors onto streets. In this way he showed there were 52 individual houses within his 27 excavation areas. However, houses were frequently altered throughout period, as families would knock out walls or block up doors, and thus true house numbers are difficult to establish. Woolley mentions phases of rebuilding, but states that he sought the best preserved floor plan and published the excavation of a particular house based on that plan alone. In some cases he noted deeper remains that may have gone back to the Ur III period. These levels he partially uncovered as he excavated graves beneath the Larsa period floors.
A great deal of baked brick was in use for walls of the Isin-Larsa/Old Babylonian period. Some houses used it in the lowest portion of a wall, but others used it for entire walls up to 3 meters in height. Town planning was not evident, as streets tended to wander in narrow and winding paths. Corners where streets met were often rounded, leading Woolley to surmise that this was to prevent problems with laden donkeys catching their wares on corners.
Many houses had a domestic chapel within, often with family burials beneath the floor. Communal chapels were also noted, at least four being identified in the area. Finally, Woolley believed that some buildings were specifically used for commercial activities (shops), though this is difficult to prove. | (none) |
 | Room 5 | Chapel, Room 5. This was a chapel, and probably the original chapel of the house. It was paved with bricks 0.32 m. sq. and 0.26 m. X 0.17 m.; later on this pavement was covered by a clay floor 0.50-0.60 m. higher, and the two thresholds at the SE end were raised correspondingly. In connection with the later floor there were (1) against the SW wall a narrow trough or bench with burnt brick top and a raised edge of bricks set on end and (2) in the middle of the floor, almost between the two SE doors, a shallow rectangular box-like arrangement, of bricks set on edge with plain earth in the centre, measuring 1.05 m. X 0.55 m. The walls stood to a maximum height of 2.45 m., showing seven courses of burnt brick; in the NE wall, at 1.55 m. east of the doorway to Room 7, there was at 1.95 m. above the pavement a circular beam-hole running right through the mud brickwork of the wall; this was probably a rafter supporting the outer end of a pent-house roof which sheltered the NW end of the chapel. In the SW wall there had been a door to No. 1 Bazaar Alley which had been blocked by a thin screen with seven courses of burnt brick and mud brick above (matching the wall) so as to leave a shallow niche. At the NW end was a brick altar, the front of it plastered with bitumen, and in the wall behind it was an incense-hearth 0.26 m. deep which started on the level of the altar top, 0.45 m. above the pavement. Next to it in the west corner, on a brick base 0.80 m. sq., was a "table" 0.62 m. sq. X 1.05 m. high, of mud brick plastered with mud and decorated with a panel design (PI. 44); at each of the three corners of the base there was a raised lump of bitumen, carefully rounded and smoothed, through which had run a round wooden bar diam. 0.055 m. raised 0.03 m. above the bricks f the base; in the lump at the east corner there were two holes at right angles, in each of the others a single hole, so that there had been a free horizontal rod along the base of each of the exposed sides of the "table"; our Arab workmen at once suggested, on the analogy of the modern mosque, that this was the lower rod of a curtain, which would conceal the "table" and be drawn back when a service was being held (v. Fig. 40B and P1. 44b). By the altar was a broken ring-stand, Type IL. 137, ht. 0.15 m., rim diam. 0.16 m., of green clay, and a terracotta, U.16975, P1. 84, No. 178. | (none) |