Munchaev R.M., Amirov Sh.N., Suleiman A.

Key words: Tell Hazna I, Kashkashok III, Habur steppe, Ubaid period, Uruk period, Nineveh V period, engraved pottery, cylinder seals, counting tablets.
The article gives a comparative analysis of two contemporaneous settlements from the 4th – first half of the 3d millennia BC in the Habur steppe of Northern Mesopotamia (Northeast Syria). The settlements of Tell Hazna I and Kashkashok III are 30 km apart and their physical and geographical conditions are identical. Both settlements functioned during one and the same period of time. Their status in the settlement hierarchy was that of temple centers, hence the similarities in the planigraphy and architecture. The direct counterparts among the objects of material culture that are found at the two settlements indicate that the similarities were also brought about by the paradigms of cultural evolution as well as by ecological factors.