Copper-alloy Belts at Hasanlu, Iran: A Case Study in Hybridization and Heteroglossia in Material Culture

The pitfalls of studying material outcomes of cultural contact as ‘hybrids’ have been well
mapped, from essentialism to the echoes of eugenics. In archaeological research, attention to
‘hybrid’ products of cultural contact through assiduous tracing of ‘foreign’ elements to their
points of origin has often yielded dubious claims regarding the nature of the interaction.
For objects excavated in the Period IVb (1050–800 bc) level at Hasanlu, this approach
has led to assertions of ‘Assyrianization’, proclaiming the site the example par excellence
of the response to Assyrian cultural hegemony in the periphery. Through exploration of
armoured sheet-metal belts found at Hasanlu, an artefact type introduced from the South
Caucasus region and then produced locally, this paper considers the interpretive utility
of the concept of ‘hybridization’—the transformative processes by which disparate visual
elements, materials and ideas about the world react to and perturb each in a particular
environment. We argue that through these processes, relocated exogenous objects and their
endogenous counterparts communicate using multiple, even divergent, voices. This very
multivocality, or heteroglossia, is instrumental in forging new social relationships and
meanings