imagery reveals broad expanses of housing at Tell Asmar (Figure 8. 8 ), Mashkan-shapir
and Dahailia (Wright 1981 : 339 , Site 34 ). At Tell Asmar (ancient Eshnunna) and
Dahailia residential architecture is similar in scale in all parts of these urban sites,
although the houses at the new foundation of Dahailia are larger than those at the more
established city of Eshnunna. A similar pattern can be seen at Mashkan-shapir,
although in the northern part of the site, located close to the palace, the domestic
architecture is associated with a regular grid of broad roads, quite unlike the more
organic street pattern seen elsewhere at the site (Stone forthcoming; Figure 8. 6 ).
Identifying specifically early second millennium city walls is not always easy, but the
overall impression is that these surrounded the entire settlement. This was the case at
Mashkan-shapir (Stone and Zimansky 2004 ), Der (Meyer et al. 1971 : 50 – 51 ), Ischali
(Hill, Jacobsen and Delougaz 1990 : 4 ) and Khafajah Mounds C (Hill, Jacobsen and
Delougaz 1990 : 29 ) and D (Hill, Jacobsen and Delougaz 1990 : fig. 30 ) and is certainly
indicated by the somewhat later Kassite map of Nippur (Gibson 1977 : 36 ). Though this
change in the circumvallation of these cities would seem to indicate greater political
unity in the second millennium than in the third, nevertheless there continued to be
differences between the occupations and perhaps even loyalties between those
occupying different parts of the cities (Stone forthcoming).
Only two small sites dating to the later Early Dynastic period could be examined,
but there are many early second millennium examples, both excavated (Baqir 1946 ,
–– Elizabeth C. Stone ––Figure 8.8Early second millennium residential districts at Tell Asmar and
Tell Halawa (imagery courtesy of the Digital Globe Corporation)