Lost Alexandria on the Tigris Emerges from Iraq’s Dust

Earthen ramparts at Jebel Khayyaber, southern Iraq.

February

/ 2026

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A “forgotten Alexandria” on the Tigris is being pulled back into focus by archaeologists using drones and geophysics, revealing what appears to have been a vast, carefully planned metropolis in southern Iraq. The site, known today as Jebel Khayyaber, has long sat in a difficult border region, but new mapping shows streets, temples, industrial zones, canals and blocks so large they may rank among the biggest known from antiquity.

The rediscovery matters because this was not a minor outpost. Researchers argue it functioned for centuries as a crucial hub linking river traffic up Mesopotamia with maritime routes to the Persian Gulf and trade networks reaching toward India and beyond.

Location map for Alexandria/Charax in southern Iraq

Location map for Alexandria/Charax in southern Iraq. (© University of Konstanz / campus.kn)

From Alexander’s Port Vision to Charax Spasinou

The project’s core claim is that the ruins represent Alexandria on the Tigris, founded in the late 4th century BC in the wake of Alexander the Great’s eastern campaigns. Ancient writers describe how sedimentation in southern Mesopotamia steadily reshaped waterways and coastlines, creating a need for a new harbor system, one positioned near the junction of the Tigris and the Karun, close to what was then the Persian Gulf shoreline explains a University of Konstanz release.

Over time, the city is described under later names, including Charax Spasinou (and Charax Maishan), and it appears in Roman-era sources and inscriptions, hints that it remained relevant long after Alexander’s death. That longevity is one reason the team sees it as the Mesopotamian equivalent of Egypt’s Alexandria: a purpose-built gateway city positioned where sea and river systems meet writes Arkeonews.

Remains of pillars at Jebel Khayyaber, southern Iraq. (© Charax Spasinou Project 2022 (Robert Killick) via University of Konstanz / campus.kn)

Mapping a Megacity Without Digging

Modern confirmation began with a mid-20th-century clue: researcher John Hansman noticed massive settlement outlines on Royal Air Force aerial imagery in the 1960s, but decades of instability meant his identification could not be tested properly. The site’s proximity to the Iranian border and its later use during the Iran–Iraq War made sustained archaeology exceptionally difficult.

When foreign teams returned more safely to southern Iraq in the 2010s, they were struck by the scale of the fortification system: an enormous enclosure, still standing high in places, defining the footprint of a city far bigger than expected. Subsequent work combined fieldwalking (documenting pottery and brick fragments), drone photogrammetry, and magnetic prospection to reconstruct the urban plan without immediate large-scale excavation.

One of the most powerful tools has been magnetometry, which can detect subtle variations in Earth’s magnetic field caused by buried walls, ditches, kilns and other features. Using this approach, the team reports clear evidence of streets and a grid plan, alongside later shifts in orientation suggesting multiple building phases and changing land use across the city’s life.

Area A showing main geo-physical features in the 2016 campaign. (Hauser, 2025)

Area A showing main geo-physical features in the 2016 campaign. (Hauser, 2025)

Trade, Industry, and a River That Moved Away

So what did the “new” maps reveal? Reports describe huge residential blocks, temple precincts, workshop districts with firing/smelting installations, canals and an internal harbor area, suggesting a dense urban economy designed around redistribution and manufacturing as well as trade. The city’s function aligns with a period when exchange between Mesopotamia and India intensified, and when major Tigris cities like Seleucia and Ctesiphon flourished as imperial capitals and consumer markets.

That wider Mesopotamian setting is important. Seleucia and Ctesiphon rose as “opposite jewels” on the Tigris - cities whose power and wealth depended on river commerce and shifting imperial control. Alexandria/Charax would have fed into that same world, acting as a southern gateway in the system.

Yet the same landscape dynamics that made the city possible likely helped end it. The sources describe ongoing sedimentation and river movement: the coastline migrated south and the Tigris shifted course westward, gradually cutting the settlement off from the water access it needed to remain a port and shipment center. Without that connection, the city declined and was largely abandoned by late antiquity.

Top image: Earthen ramparts at Jebel Khayyaber, southern Iraq. Source: © Charax Spasinou Project (Stuart Campbell 2017)/via University of Konstanz / campus.kn

By Gary Manners