News from the ancient world
Near East · c. 3300 BC to AD 651 · 8 stories
New discoveries from the ancient Near East: Sumer, Babylon and Assyria, cuneiform tablets, the Hittites, the Levant, the Phoenicians and ancient Persia.
Around 30 Early Bronze Age amphorae lie about 30 metres down near Kekova Island, and some still hold a glossy residue that researchers are now analysing.
Kekova Island seen from the Simena fortress above Kaleköy village, on Turkey's Antalya coast. Photo: Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons
Near East · c. 1915–1595 BC · Beycesultan Höyük, Denizli Province, Turkey
Fire preserved two Bronze Age fragments at Beycesultan Höyük, including the oldest blue-dyed textile known from Bronze Age Anatolia, a study in Antiquity reports.
Near East · c. 740–690 BC · Karaağaç Tumulus, Bozüyük, Bilecik province, Turkey
The elite burial lies more than 100 miles west of the Phrygian capital Gordion, and the study's lead author thinks power in Midas's kingdom was spread among regional centres.
Near East · c. 3200–2800 BC · Tapeh Tyalineh, Kouzaran, Kermanshah province, Iran
Rubbish pits at Tapeh Tyalineh in Kermanshah province held sealings, figurines and tokens from 3200–2800 BC, with designs paralleled at sites from Susa to eastern Turkey.