Thrashing out Late Chalcolithic Trajectories in the Zagros Foothills

Evidence for the so-called "Uruk Expansion" into northeastern Iraq and western Iran is rapidly growing and serves to revisit this important, but still opaque phenomenon. In this article we present tantalising new evidence from the Rania Plain (Kurdish Region of Iraq), from the sites of Araban and Mullah Shell, located on the east bank of the Lower Zab river (present Lake Dokan). The evidence portrays the contours of very extensive, but today elusive LC 4-5 activity spanning long stretches of the valley terrace, and which may have played a significant role in the "expansion" locally, as well as its further extension.