Dalma culture

[2] As stated by Akbar Abedi, an Iranian archaeologist, Dalma is one of the famous type sites located in north-western Iran.

[1] Excavated evidence indicates that this culture dispersed across central Zagros Mountains, northern Luristan, Urmia basin in Azerbaijan, and some parts of Mesopotamia such as Kirkuk.

[3] The most likely settlement pattern of Dalma people was a small group of nomads moving between villages with which they maintained their connection through kinship.

[1] These vessels must have been produced by regional ethnic groups at the household level and dispersed by the movement of nomadic tribes and their interactions with Dalma villages.

[7][12] The burials in the excavated areas propose that Dalma people were part of a sedentary and farming community with common cultural characteristics.

[12] Settlement patterns do not show signs of social hierarchy and political, economic, or religious structures existent within the Dalma society.

[13] Dalma culture originally began its existence around the Lake Urmia in north-western Iran and was then expanded into the central Zagros region.

[1] Traces of Dalma ceramics have been found in the Caucasus Mountains, and parts of eastern Iraq such as Kirkuk and Jabal Hamarein.

[1] The Chaine Magistrale (Persian: کوه سفید, Kuh-i Sefid) acted as a barrier and stopped the expansion of Dalma tradition towards the west.

[12] All of the routes for Dalma culture's development from the northwest were originated in the Lake Urmia region and intersected the Silk Road.

[7] A series of excavations done by Mahmoud Heydarian in Songhor and Koliyaei Plains of central Zagros from 2004 to 2009 uncovered Dalma potsherds in 9 archaeological sites, namely Khodaei, Sheikh-Jalil, Ab-Naz, Tepe Varz, Kalaavil, QolQole, and Nad Ali Beig.

[9] Since some of the sites are situated at higher altitudes and have colder weather conditions during winter and fall, they were probably occupied by semi-nomadic communities practicing animal husbandry.

[7] Ceramics excavated from Dalma sites were created by hand, and they were mostly made of chaff-tempered clay with small amounts of grit included.

[7][10] As stated by Akbar Abedi, Behrooz Omrani, and Azam Karimifar, Dalma was the final result of the Hajji Firuz tradition development.

[3] With the exception of changes in pottery production, no other aspects of the material culture indicate signs of a discontinuity between Dalma and the preceding Hajji Firuz tradition.

[8] Radiocarbon dating results have indicated that there must have been a transitional period of 400 years between Hajji Firuz and Dalma traditions in this region at the end of the 6th millennium B.C.

[17] Chalcolithic chaff-faced ware appeared in the South Caucasus and Upper Mesopotamia in the first half of the 5th millennium BCE.

According to Catherine Marro (2022), the systematic use of chaff, creating a Chaff-Faced Ware effect, is attested from the beginning of the 5th millennium BCE with the development of the Dalma culture.

Dalma Ceramic Vessel excavated in Iran in 1961 by Robert H. Dyson Jr. Metropolitan Museum
Dalma ceramic sherds excavated in 1961 in Dalma Tepe, Iran, as part of the University of Pennsylvania's Hasanlu project