We all know that:
- A dromedary (Camelus dromedarius) is built to withstand the desert heat, has thin layers of fat, has one hump and has a short-haired coat. The animal is indigenous to the Arabian peninsula.
- A camel (Camelus bactrianus) is built for cold temperatures, has thick layers of fat, has two humps and has a long-haired coat. This animal is at home in Central Asia.
It is an entirely different type of animal. Of course, the difference is not that important, but it appears that there has now been some news on this topic: dromedaries and camels were cross bred in Hatra (in northern Iraq) during the reign of King Sanatruq I (around 170 AD). Although camels are sometimes attested in the region in this period, we had no idea that people used them for cross breeding.
You can read CNN’s report about the hybrids here and the scientific article by Massimo Vidale et al., which was published in Antiquity, can be found here. However, this information has left me with some questions and I decided to check with a specialist: Lucinda Dirven knows a great deal about Hatran sculpture and is working on a reconstruction of Hatran religion. She has been working as a professor at Radboud University in Nijmegen for a year now and will give her inaugural speech on April 13th.
Two-humped camels flanking a royal portrait in the centre of the lintel (photograph courtesy of the Aliph-ISMEO project at Hatra).
Lucinda, not everybody reads Antiquity. Can you tell us about what has been discovered?
It is a new reading of a relief on a door frame from the Temple of Allat in Hatra, in northern Iraq. This sanctuary was built by King Sanatruq I. In the centre of the relief you can see the bust of a king (presumably Sanatruq himself), who can be recognised by his diadem, with five kneeling dromedaries on either side of him; the ten animals all face the king.
However, the two animals on either side of the king have two humps instead of one. Wathiq al-Salihi, one of the Iraqi archaeologists who carried out research here in the 1980s and 1990s, thinks they are camels. The Italian researchers who are currently conducting a restoration campaign at Hatra, have now claimed that the two animals are in fact not camels but hybrids.
How can they tell?
The crux of the issue is the rather small indentation between the animal’s two humps. Depending on how you want to phrase it, a hybrid has one large hump with a small depression in it, or two humps that are not completely separated. Problematic is that the representation on this door frame is not meant to be naturalistic. What’s more, we don’t have anything to compare it to, or rather, we only have representations of dromedaries from Hatra. We therefore have no idea how a camel or hybrid would have been pictured in Hatra.
Does this mean that you are sceptical about this discovery?
No, not really! But if it is read along these lines, I prefer a more nuanced interpretation. If you look closely, you can see that the animal on the left has thick fur on its front legs, neck and head. The animal on the right is a little more slender and has no extra hair. It’s more like a dromedary with two humps, whereas the animal on the left is more like a camel with a long-haired coat. So, I would rather say that the one on the left is a camel, whereas the short-haired animal on the right is a hybrid.
So we see eight dromedaries, the hybrid that was identified by the Italians and Al-Salihi’s camel?
That seems more probable to me. It also makes more sense that a camel has also been included in this representation. Hybrid animals are stronger than pure dromedaries (which is why they are bred in the first place), but unfortunately they only last one generation. You can’t use them for breeding. You can, however, sell them. If breeding was important in Hatra, a herd of camels would have been essential. Since a camel is so essential to the process, it is logical that this animal is also pictured.
The presence of the two-humped camel can also be explained in another way, however. Although the camel is attested in the Near East in ancient times, it was not indigenous to the region and must have been fairly rare. Perhaps the animal was only pictured out of curiosity or as a status symbol.
Are you sure that it is a camel and a hybrid that have been depicted? Could it be that there were two different sculptors at work?
The representation is obviously not very naturalistic, but you can clearly see that they are meant to be different animals. Unfortunately, there’s a crack in the hump of the hybrid on the right, so I am not one hundred percent certain that the animal actually has two humps. It could still be a dromedary. However, I take it that the researchers who got to see it in person saw a lot more than we can see in the old photographs, and I consequently believe that the animal actually has two humps with a small depression. For me, the question is therefore: Why did the researchers characterise both of these animals as hybrids if they look so differently?
The Italian archaeologists also suggested that cross breeding was a royal monopoly. What are your thoughts on this matter?
I’m sceptical about this suggestion. The fact that the king is present in the relief doesn’t mean that the cross-breeding of hybrids was inextricably linked to him. In Hatra, it was customary to represent the bust of a king (or a god) in the centre of a door frame. Sanatruq I is often depicted in this sanctuary, simply because he commissioned it to be built.
I’m also not so sure whether the city made its fortune by breeding hybrids, as the researchers claim. We have absolutely no clue as to the scale on which breeding happened.
What we do know, is that Sanatruq claimed a relationship with Allat. This goddess was popular among the nomads and it was customary to associate her with dromedaries, which were basically the nomads’ main means of subsistence. But to claim that there was a special relationship between the king, hybrids and the caravan trade is taking things way too far.
You refer to the caravan trade. The Italian researchers assume that the Hatran people started to cross-breed because hybrids were stronger and they could be used for long-distance trade in the desert. Why do you think there was no connection to the caravans?
Because Hatra was primarily a holy city with an important sanctuary. It was the city of the sun god. There is no indication that the city was involved in long-distance trade. We know for certain that there were dromedaries, but the presence of dromedaries doesn’t mean that this was a caravan city, a city that owed its existence primarily to trade. Dromedaries can be used for ploughing, they can produce milk: they have many uses.
Obviously, there was trade in Hatra. This was a regional centre in the Jazirah, so this is to be expected. But the claim that the city owed its wealth to the caravan trade is currently considered to be highly controversial.
If the Hatran people did not breed the hybrids for the long-distance trade, why did they breed them?
I think it’s more likely that the hybrids were bred for the area north of Hatra. And by that I mean the area towards Armenia, and that they were not bred for the long-distance trade along the Silk Road to the far east. The hybrids were not only strong, they were also more resistant to cold weather, which made them more suitable for the mountainous area north of Hatra. It could be extremely cold there.
Hybrids are still being bred to this very day in Eastern Turkey. In fact, hybrids weren’t only used as pack animals. They were also used for military purposes, which is a role that also fits in well with what we know about the history of this area.
Article written by Jona Lendering, originally published in Dutch at the Mainzer Beobachter blog. The photo is from the article in Antiquity.