Semiology of Bronze Age Seals of Southeastern Iran and a Comparative Study with the Cultural Zone of Central Asia

The third millennium BC marked a period of significant cultural, economic, and commercial exchanges between Iran and neighboring regions, including the Indus Valley, Mesopotamia, the Persian Gulf, the Oman Sea, and Central Asia. This article aims to investigate the cultural semiotics and connections between the Bronze Age sites of Southeast Iran, with an emphasis on Shahr-e Sukhteh, Shahdad, and Tepe Yahya. In this research, the seals and seal impressions of sites in the southeast of Iran, including Shahdad and Shahr-e Sukhteh, will be studied and analyzed based on comparative studies with important sites in Central Asia, including Balkh, Merv, Mondigak, Altintepe, Gonor Tepe, Dashlitepe, Tughlaq, and Ordos region. Therefore, in the framework of the signs studied on seals and seal impressions, a suggestion is made that there have been cultural connections between these regions in the Bronze Age. Based on this, the research questions have been raised as follows: What are the similarities between the motifs of pottery and seals? What are the similarities between the cultural artifacts found in the southeastern region of Iran and the Central Asian region? Were the visible similarities connected and serving a common purpose? Knowing the cultural interactions of these societies requires the study of the material evidence left by them. According to the distances between the ancient sites of the third millennium BC, these signs can be the result of a specific and guided thought that appeared in the sites of the eastern half of the Iranian plateau. The transfer of ideas from one place to another has occurred due to extensive commercial connections between societies. This shows that the cultural interactions between Central Asia and the eastern and southeastern regions of Iran and part of the Indo-European culture in the Bronze Age could have originated from common beliefs and ideas.