From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 9292
Date: 2001-09-10
----- Original Message -----From: S.KalyanaramanSent: Monday, September 10, 2001 1:19 AMSubject: [tied] Re: Got wheels?> The cart looks like a sledge on four wheels. This is also similar to the early cuneiform used to connote such a sledge. On what basis has this been adjudged to be a 'wagon' or a 'cart'? Any collateral evidence from the diggings?
Four wheels make it a wagon, not a cart. The Y-(or psi-)shaped draught-pole is a familiar device (for two oxen). The motifs on the pot include a schematic landscape: a zig-zag line that may be a river, some "herring-bone" trees and rectangular fields (or arrangement of houses in a village)? I can't interpret the round object apparently placed on the wagon. There are no contemporaneous finds of wooden vehicle parts so far, but wood does not preserve well in this climate (still, the Flintbek cart ruts look very impressive). Even at Uruk, the early evidence for vehicles is pictographic. There are also other (and later) simple representations of vehicles from the Funnel Beaker area, and a beautifully complete clay model of a wagon from the Baden culture in Hungary.
> Have the signs on the pot been fully deciphered? Quite a few signs look similar to early cuneiform with a lot of short linear strokes apparently indicating some sort of counting -- may be count of 'products' loaded on the sledge?I don't think they have any abstract symbolic value beyond depicting village life.Piotr