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Asia

Ancient places can be found all over Asia. Their fascinating histories and impressive artifacts open intriguing glimpses to times past, and open up a window on Asian history. Visiting such historical places in Asia can be an unforgettable experience.

Science is constantly discovering new archaeological places and uncovering more evidence into what we once thought we knew about our history, therefore offering new pieces to the ever changing puzzle of humanity’s past and altering how we interpret it. This section will present the most interesting archaeological sites all over Asia, as well as new discoveries of ancient places that are worth paying a visit.

The altar of the Ateshgah Baku fire temple in the capital of Azerbaijan. Source: vadim.nefedov / Adobe Stock
30 November, 2021 - 00:57 dhwty

The Ateshgah Baku Fire Temple: Built On an Azerbaijan Natural Gas Vent

The Ateshgah Baku fire temple, located in the capital of Azerbaijan, was built over a natural gas vent, and constructed between the late 17th and early 18th centuries AD. There is evidence, however,...
Adi Shankara, 788-820 AD, founder of the Advaita Vedanta, the oldest extant sub-school of Vedānta, a tradition of interpretation of the Upanishads, by Raja Ravi Varma. Source: Raja Ravi Varma / Public domain
29 November, 2021 - 21:57 dhwty

India’s Vedic Sanskrit Upanishads: Foundation of Religions and Karma!

The Upanishads are a genre of texts that form the final and last section of the Vedas. The Upanishads were composed orally in Sanskrit, and the earliest surviving ones dating to the 1st millennium BC...
The analysis of dripstones within the Shennong Cave (main image) and Jiulong Cave provided scientists with evidence related to the collapse of the Liangzhu culture. Source: Haiwei Zhang / Xi'an Jiaotong University
27 November, 2021 - 17:57 Nathan Falde

Fatal Flooding Destroyed China’s Liangzhu Culture 4,300 Years Ago

A thriving metropolis often referred to as “China’s Venice of the Stone Age” was mysteriously abandoned in approximately 2300 BC, leading to the extinction of China’s ancient Liangzhu culture. Now, a...
Volunteer Liel Krutokop with the rare silver Second Temple coin she found at the City of David National Park. Source: Yaniv Berman / City of David
25 November, 2021 - 13:57 Sahir

Rogue Priest Second Temple Silver Coin Found By Girl in Jerusalem

A rare silver Second Temple coin belonging to the second year of the Great Jewish Revolt (67-68 AD) against the Romans was found by volunteers sifting through dirt from an archaeological dig...
A Turkish archaeologist holding up the 1800-year-old iron Roman cavalry mask found at the ancient garrison town of Hadrianopolis, Turkey. Source: YouTube screenshot / DHA
24 November, 2021 - 17:57 ashley cowie

Rare Iron Roman Cavalry Face Mask Discovered At Hadrianopolis, Turkey

An 1,800 year old Roman soldier's cavalry face mask has been discovered at a 3rd century AD military site in Turkey. But this site isn’t located in the heart of the Roman empire, but at a far flung...
St. Sebastian pleads for those afflicted with plague during the 7th century Plague of Justinian in a painting by South Netherlandish painter Josse Lieferinxe. Source: Josse Lieferinxe / Public domain
23 November, 2021 - 21:57 Nathan Falde

Study Demonstrates Terrible Toll of Sixth Century Plague of Justinian

In a new study appearing in the journal Past & Present , Cambridge University history professor Peter Sarris argues that recent scholarship has badly underestimated the true impact of the sixth-...
A Han-era bì , 16 centimetres (6.3 in) in diameter (CC by SA 3.0).
20 November, 2021 - 18:01 Joanna Gillan

The Mysterious Dropa Stones – Fact or Fiction?

The Dropa stones are said to be a set of 716 circular stone discs dating back 12,000 years on which tiny hieroglyphic-like markings can be found. Each disc is said to measure up to 1 foot in diameter...
The outlines of the legendary but lost royal pavilion of Kyoto known as the Tokaden pavilion, which was built in ways that were still different from Tang dynasty Chinese foundations. Source: Kyoto City Archaeological Research Institute
18 November, 2021 - 21:57 ashley cowie

Five Post Holes Reveal Legendary Japanese Empress’s Royal Pavilion.

A team of Japanese archaeologists have discovered what they consider to be the remains of is the legendary Tokaden royal pavilion. Until the early 8th century the Japanese court was peripatetic,...
This Stone Age piece of cloth is the oldest cloth in the world ever, but it took 60 years for science to figure out the material used for the oldest textile known to man, which have recently been published in the Antiquity journal. Source: Antoinette Rast-Eicher / University of Bern
16 November, 2021 - 21:57 Nathan Falde

Anatolian Neolithic Weavers At Çatalhöyük Used Trees to Make The Oldest Cloth

A new study published in the journal Antiquity has revealed some surprising information about the inhabitants of the ancient city of Çatalhöyük, an early Neolithic settlement located in southern...
An aerial photo of the Tel Lachish in central Israel, which was quickly conquered by the Assyrians with their powerful siege ramp in 701 BC. The Assyrian siege ramp is the focus of a new study published in Oxford Journal of Archaeology. Source: The Lachish Expedition / Southern Adventist University
10 November, 2021 - 17:57 Sahir

New Study Reveals How Legendary Assyrian Siege Ramp Overcame Lachish

Israeli archaeologists have revealed the secrets behind the Assyrian siege ramp that conquered the ancient Judean town of Lachish. A recent study published in the Oxford Journal of Archaeology shows...
A view of Shibam’s mudbrick skyscrapers for which Yemen’s ancient mudbrick structures have earned the moniker “the Manhattans of the Desert.” Source: Jialiang Gao / CC BY-SA 3.0
10 November, 2021 - 13:56 dhwty

Ancient Skyscrapers: The Mudbrick Towerblocks of Yemen

Skyscrapers are a common sight in today’s cities. These modern structures trace their history to the late 19th century. Nevertheless, skyscrapers have precedents in earlier times, one of which being...
6 November, 2021 - 17:57 Sahir

Lost Mongol Capital of Karakorum Mapped Properly for the First Time

The city of Karakorum, the 13th century capital of the great Mongol empire was established initially as a camp by Genghis Khan in the Orkhon Valley in 1220, and would be developed by his son and...
Pillar in Gobekli Tepe (Deriv.) (sebnemsanders) with a starry night sky. (CC0) What can be discerned about the site from Gobekli Tepe archaeoastronomy?
5 November, 2021 - 17:08 Freddy Silva

Gobekli Tepe Archaeoastronomy and the Second Hill of Osiris

The naming of places in the ancient world was a serious affair, particularly with regard to temples. A name enshrined the purpose for which the site was intended, or reflected a truth about its...
Excavators work at the site of the archaeological dig on the eastern bank of the Faidi canal, just north of Mosul, where evidence of an Assyrian wine press has been discovered. Source: The Kurdish-Italian Faida and Khinnis Archaeological Project
4 November, 2021 - 13:59 Nathan Falde

2,700-Year-Old Assyrian Wine Press Found in Northern Iraq

A team of Italian archaeologists exploring ruins connected to the legendary Neo-Assyrian Empire have discovered an ancient industrial wine press. Dating to approximately 700 BC, the remains of the...
The Beauty of Loulan, a Tarim Basin Mummy Source: Mummipedia
28 October, 2021 - 19:04 Sahir

Origin Mystery of Controversial Tarim Basin Mummies Was Solved With DNA

Located in northwestern China’s Xinjiang region, the Tarim Basin is a rich confluence of geology, history, and culture. In fact, it is speculated that this region may be one of the last to be...
The Shiyanzi grave robber discovered in China. Source: Zou et. al. / Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences
27 October, 2021 - 18:58 Sahir

“Grave Robber” Found in Cemetery Declared Victim of Murder

While his killer(s) will never be brought to justice, a new study published in Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences has cleared the memory a young man who died 1,300 years ago in the northwest...
Stephen Childs theorizes that Gobekli Tepe was once a site for dramatic funerals and corpse exposure, where vultures and carnivores circled awaiting to play their part. Source: Ezume Images / Adobe Stock
23 October, 2021 - 18:49 Stephen Childs

Corpse Recycling at Gobekli Tepe: The True Purpose of its Ancient Stone Circles?

The following essay is an extract from Stone Circles Explained by Stephen Childs, in which the author offers some original theories regarding the purpose of stone circles. Covering sites from around...
Trialeti Gold Goblet from ancient Georgia, 1700 – 1500 BC, when gold was still in fashion in every way. Source: Steve Batiuk / ASOR Photo Collection
22 October, 2021 - 22:53 Sahir

Caucasus Societies Developed an Aversion to Gold “Bling,” Says Study

New research has shown puzzling evidence of gold going out of fashion for hundreds of years in ancient societies, societies which been at the forefront of technological innovation in gold mining and...
The British Museum’s long misunderstood 3500-year-old Babylonian tablet reveals a male ghost image on the left led by a woman on the right. Source: The British Museum
18 October, 2021 - 18:52 Sahir

3500-year-old Babylonian Ghost Image Discovered in British Museum Vaults!

What is believed to be the world’s oldest depiction of a ghost has recently been found on a Babylonian tablet, neglected in the vaults of the British Museum in London since its acquisition in the...
Prehistoric wooden constructions from the Qujialing culture found at China’s Jijiaocheng Site in Hunan Province. Source: ChinaNews.com
13 October, 2021 - 14:58 Sahir

Neolithic Qujialing Culture Wooden Structures Uncovered in China

Qujialing culture (3400–2600 BC) wooden structures dating back some 4800 years have recently been excavated at the prehistoric Jijiaocheng Site in Changde City in China’s Hunan Province. Some of...
A bronze statue of Lama, Lamma, or Lamassu, an Assyrian protective deity that became one of the Urartian gods. Source: EvgenyGenkin / CC BY-SA 4.0
11 October, 2021 - 14:56 Aleksa Vučković

Who Were The Enigmatic Urartian Gods?

One of the more enigmatic entities of ancient history, Urartu rose to power in the 9th century BC, spreading its influence around illustrious Van Lake in present-day Turkey. From the start, Urartu...
The Graeco-Bactrian Kingdom forged its own Greek identity, far from Greece. Source: Ksenia Tassel / Adobe Stock.
9 October, 2021 - 01:39 dhwty

The Graeco-Bactrian Kingdom: Alexander The Great’s Easternmost Legacy

Alexander the Great was one of the finest and most successful military leaders the world has ever seen. In the 4th century BC he carved out one of the largest empires in history, stretching from...
The ruins of Yamchun Fortress near Pamir, on the border of Afghanistan, where one can still see remains of the ancient classical culture of Bactria. Source: Jonny / Adobe Stock
2 October, 2021 - 14:43 Aleksa Vučković

Bactria - The Bountiful, Sought-after Region of Ancient History

Bactria was one of the more important historic regions of the ancient and classical world. A central point of more than one defining political event, Bactria experienced thousands of years of...
Looking up inside a Yakhchal
1 October, 2021 - 02:03 Caleb Strom

Ancient Advanced Technology: 2,400-Year-Old Yakhchals Kept Ice in the Desert

The ancients were cleverer than some people today assume. They didn’t have rockets or electricity, at least no indisputable proof has been found of such technologies, but they did come up with...

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