Tell Sabi Abyad (Arabic: تل صبي أبيض) is an archaeological site in the Balikh River valley in northern Syria.

It lies about 2 kilometers north-east of Tell Hammam et-Turkman.The site consists of four prehistoric mounds that are numbered Tell Sabi Abyad I to IV.

The pottery of Tell Sabi Abyad is somewhat similar to what was found in the other prehistoric sites in Syria and south-eastern Turkey; for example in Tell Halula, tr:Akarçay Tepe Höyük, de:Mezraa-Teleilat, and Tell Seker al-Aheimar.

The question of why the Neolithic inhabitants of Tell Sabi Abyad initially stopped painting their pottery is unanswered for the time being.

[11] Important change took place around 6200 BC, involving new types of architecture, including extensive storehouses and small circular buildings (tholoi); the further development of pottery in many complex and often decorated shapes and wares; the introduction of small transverse arrowheads and short-tanged points; the abundant occurrence of clay spindle whorls, suggestive of changes in textile manufacture; and the introduction of seals and sealings as indicators of property and the organization of controlled storage.

Numerous artefacts were recovered from the burnt buildings; they include pottery and stone vessels, figurines, and all sorts of tools.

[1] A sort of an 'archives' building was found, which contained hundreds of small objects such as ceramics, stone shells and axes, bone implements, and male and female clay figurines.

Particularly surprising were the over 150 clay sealings with stamp-seal impressions, as well as the small counting stones (tokens) -- indicating a very early, well-developed registration and administration system.

Architecture of the 6th-millennium settlement featured multi-room rectangular buildings with round structures called tholoi that were suggested to have been used for storage.

[5] The Fortress structure contained eight rooms with 2.5-metre-wide (8.2 ft) walls constructed of mud bricks and featured a staircase that led to a second floor.

As the cuneiform texts indicate, the Assyrian administrators were still present until the end of the 12th century, although the size of the settlement declined.

In the Halaf period, Tell Sabi Abyad had a fully developed farming economy with animal domestication of predominantly goats, but also sheep, cattle and pigs.

[9] In 2014, Peter Akkermans revealed that the site and some storage facilities had been plundered as the result of the Syrian Civil War.