Mesopotamia

Have you ever wondered how ancient civilizations moved water uphill without modern technology? The answer lies in a simple yet very smart device called the Archimedes screw. Named after the brilliant Greek mathematician and inventor Archimedes, who lived in the...

A small 2,800-year-old stone seal depicting Hercules, discovered in the highlands of northern Israel, may be a 'missing link' in the evolution of a common motif that appears in the Bible and Greek mythology, according to a new study. The...

  The first mention of Assyria by ancient Greeks was in the middle of the 7th century BC, although they were not familiar with the exact geographical designation of the country. What ancient Greeks believed was Assyria was a vague geographical...

Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs were commonly etched into stone and used in temples, tombs, and other monuments, with the first fully formed sentence found around 2800 BC. The word "hieroglyphs" comes from the Greek adjective "hieroglyphikos," meaning "sacred carving." Early forms...

A Sumerian palace discovered recently in modern-day Iraq dates back 4,500 years and is considered to contain the key to understanding one of the first civilizations in human history. Since 2015, a team of British Museum-affiliated archaeologists has been excavating...

Using archaeomagnetism encouraged by mud bricks bearing the stamps of the names of Mesopotamian kings, archaeologists have been able to disprove the claim that the monumental Ishtar Gate of Babylon was erected to celebrate the conquest of Jerusalem. The...

A 3,200-year-old Mesopotamian fragrance has recently been recreated in Diyarbakır, Turkey based on a formula left on an ancient clay tablet by a renowned female perfume maker of the time named Tapputi. The perfume formula was discovered by archaeologists on...

Scholars who specialize in the study of ancient Mesopotamia, known as Assyriology, face the challenging task of decoding Akkadian texts written in cuneiform. Cuneiform, named after its wedge-shaped marks made on clay tablets using a reed stylus, is one of...

A tavern dating back to roughly 2,700 BC has been discovered at the excavation site of ancient Lagash in southern Iraq. Lagash was an important city-state in ancient Mesopotamia. The discovery was announced last week by the University of Pennsylvania....

Newly-excavated Bronze Age tombs near the sea in Cyprus revealed the remains of an aristocratic family wearing solid gold necklaces and tiaras, surrounded by grave goods from faraway lands, showing the extensive trade networks of the time. A seal from...