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Ancient Origins Tour IRAQ

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Aerial view of the excavations revealing the Mittani Empire settlement at Kemune with Bronze Age architecture partly submerged in the lake.	Source: © Universities of Freiburg and Tübingen, KAO

Drought in the Tigris River Uncovers Hidden Mittani Empire City

Extreme drought and heat in Iraq has caused the historical Tigris River’s water levels to rapidly drop, revealing a 3400-year-old Mittani empire-era city. Water being diverted. Climate change,...
Ancient Mesopotamian boat unearthed near Uruk. Source: Julia Nador - Deutsches Archäologisches Institut / CC-BY-NC-ND

4,000-Year-Old Mesopotamian Boat Near Uruk Rescued

4,000 years ago, a boat sank onto the bed of a channel of the Euphrates River, near the ancient city of Uruk. Now, archaeologists working in modern-day southern Iraq have been forced to conduct an...
Ubaid Lizardmen Source: CC by SA 4.0

Ancient Reptilians: The Unanswered Mystery of the 7,000-Year-Old Ubaid Lizardmen

It is a commonly accepted view in mainstream archaeology that civilization started in ancient Mesopotamia with the great civilization of Sumer in what is now modern-day Iraq. However, at the...
The so-called Sivatherium of Kish (Field Museum of Natural History/Edwin H. Colbert) compared to a modern representation of a Sivatherium in the Warsaw Museum of Evolution. (Shalom/CC BY-SA 3.0)

The Sivatherium of Kish: Did Sumerians Tame a Prehistoric Giraffe?

The world is big. Even in this modern day and age, we still don’t have a clue about what lurks in the remote corners of this planet. The oceans, vast and enigmatic, have only been partially explored...
The Temple of Allat in Hatra, Iraq. Right: camel relief comparisons.	Source: Photograph courtesy of the Aliph-ISMEO project at Hatra / Antiquity Publications Ltd.

Evidence of Camel Hybridization Found in Ancient Temple in Hatra, Iraq

The Temple of Allat is a well-preserved 2,000-year-old monument located at the site of the ancient market city of Hatra in northern Iraq. Allat was a pre-Islamic Arabian goddess who was widely...
The walls of the ancient Citadel of Erbil in Iraq as seen from the bazaar. Source: Levi Clancy / CC BY-SA 4.0

The Magnificent Citadel of Erbil - A True Archaeological Sandwich

The Iraqi city of Erbil is truly magnificent - and in many ways. With the settlement origins dating back at least 8,000 years, it is one of the world’s oldest continuously inhabited cities in the...
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

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...
Folio from an Arabic manuscript of Dioscorides, De materia medica, 1229 (Public Domain)

Muhammad ibn Zakariya al-Razi: Islam's Medical Genius

Abu Bakr Muhammad Ibn Zakariya Al Razi is not a familiar name to most in the English-speaking world. But he was one of the most notable persons in the history of medicine. He was a renowned Persian...
Babylonian clay tablet shows Pythagorean Triples were used 3,700 years ago.           Source: University of New South Wales

Mathematician Finds Pythagorean Triples On Ancient Babylonian Tablet

A University of New South Wales, Sydney mathematician has discovered the oldest example of applied geometry ever recorded, the university’s newsroom reports . The tablet illustrates the use of...
More “Anti-Ten Commandment” Theft at the Museum of the Bible

More “Anti-Ten Commandment” Theft at the Museum of the Bible

The United States Department of Justice has ordered the forfeiture of a rare cuneiform tablet, seized from Hobby Lobby’s controversial Museum of the Bible back in 2019. The 3,000-year-old...
The so-called Abraham house at the Ur archaeological complex in southern Iraq is said to be the birthplace of the prophet Abraham (Ibrahim in Arabic). The "latest" Mesopotamian city discovered near Tell al-Duhaila is less than 20 miles (31 km) from Ur.      Source: Aziz1005 / CC BY 4.0

4,000-Year-Old Mesopotamian City Discovered In the Shadow Of Ur

A 4,000-year-old urban settlement has been discovered on the road to Ur in modern Iraq. Researchers suspect the discovery represents a lost Mesopotamian city capital that was founded on the ashes of...
Security: The Long History of the Lock and Key

Security: The Long History of the Lock and Key

The modern-era definition states that a lock is a mechanical device or innovation that is used for fastening any physical entity. This lock is triggered and released with the use of an object called...
Neanderthal burials

New Evidence Ends the Neanderthal Burial Debate

There is a longstanding debate about whether Neanderthals buried their dead or if this is a funerary rite unique to our species. However a new study may finally sway skeptics over to the side that...
Assyrian soldiers carry beheaded heads of their prisoners as depicted on a wall in the South-West Palace at Nineveh, during the “First” Fall of Neneveh.          Source: Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin / CC BY-SA 4.0

August 10 612 BC: Nineveh, the Largest City in the World, Fell

On this day, 2,632 years ago, the ancient metropolis of Nineveh fell. “ ABC 3 ” is a historiographical text from ancient Babylonia which records August 10th 612 BC as the date of this dramatic...
The Fall of Babylon

The Monumental Fall of Babylon: What Really Shattered the Empire?

The fall of Babylon is a historical event that occurred in 539 BC. This event saw the conquest of Babylon by the Achaemenid Empire under Cyrus the Great and marked the end of the Neo-Babylonian...
Historic Archive Tells Dark Story Of Death By Meteorite

Historic Archive Tells Dark Story Of Death By Meteorite

Researchers have unearthed the only historically documented case of people being struck by a meteorite. Tales of meteorites falling to Earth are carved on prehistoric stones and featured in the Bible...
Ritual site - cultic platform found under the war god’s temple. Source: British Museum.

Ritual Site Dedicated to Mesopotamian War God Discovered in Iraq

Archaeologists working in Iraq have made an intriguing discovery. They have found a sacred area that was dedicated to a Mesopotamian war god. The site is up to 5,000 years-old and is in one of the...
The oldest board game in the world, the Royal Game of Ur.   Source: Shriram Rajagopalan / CC BY 2.0

Play the Oldest Board Game in the World: Royal Game of Ur - Part 2

In the first part of this article, we attempted to unravel the mystery symbolism on the oldest board game in the world - the Royal Game of Ur. The Heliopolitan creation myth was used to explain how...
The Royal Game of Ur board (or Game of Twenty Squares), found in the Royal Tombs of Ur in Mesopotamia, dating c. 2600-2400 B.C. Source: The Trustees of British Museum / Provided by the author

Deciphering the Patterns of the Royal Game of Ur Board - Part 1

The world’s first known board game was found in Mesopotamia (c. 2600 BC). Despite this, Egyptian beliefs help us best to understand the Royal Game of Ur’s board design, rules and all. Especially the...
The leader of the excavation, archaeologist Daniele Morandi Bonacossi, and one of the Assyrian relief carvings unearthed in the northern Kurdistan region of Iraq.    Source: Alberto Savioli / Land of Nineveh Archaeological Project / University of Udine

3000-Year-Old Assyrian Reliefs Unearthed in ISIS Stomping Ground

Archaeologists have unearthed ancient carved Assyrian reliefs of a king in a procession of gods and goddesses riding on animals and mythical creatures. The Assyrian carvings are almost 3,000 years...
Left: Front angle of the reconstructed Bull Headed Lyre found in the Sumerian Royal Tombs of Ur in Mesopotamia, c. 2500 BC. Source: Penn Museum

Satire in Mesopotamia: Unravelling the Bull Headed Lyre of Ur

Many of us tend to think that the people of early cultures were less sophisticated than us. The wealthiest people may have lived lives of luxury with gold and slaves, but admittedly we cannot really...
A cuneiform tablets (representative image) Source: dimamoroz / Adobe Stock

Controversial Cuneiform Tablets Tell Tales of Security Dogs and a Lost City

An archaeologist has admitted that around 1,400 cuneiform tablets might have been stolen from Irisagrig, a 4,000-year-old lost Sumerian city in modern day Iraq. While the robbers obviously know the...
Mesopotamian seals and cuneiform tablets found in Marad, Iraq.      Source: Universita di Pisa

Cuneiform Tablets and ‘Envelopes’ Tell of Mesopotamian Sophistication

A team of Italian and Iraqi archaeologists has unearthed hundreds of cuneiform tablets in central Iraq. They also uncovered some clay coverings and seals with the tablets. The collection of cuneiform...
Flood tablet from Epic of Gilgamesh has Noah’s Ark being built based on fake news trickery.   Source: www.photostock.am / Adobe Stock

3,000-Year-Old Tablet Has Noah’s Ark Built Based On “Fake News”

A new translation of 3,000-year-old tablet reveals 'fake news' was employed by an ancient Babylonian god to trick ‘Noah’ and his followers into building his ark. The act of ancient trickery was found...

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