In 2016 , archaeologists excavating in the Autonomous Region of Kurdistan in Iraqdiscoveredthe leftover of a Bronze Age urban center near the innovative hamlet of Bassetki . It was gravid , and it appeared to have been occupied for more than 1000 years , from around 2200 to 1200 BCE . Ancient Mesopotamia , home to the early civilization on Earth , had many cities . So which one was it ?
The mystery remained until recently , when a language expert at the University of Heidelberg translate clay cuneiform tablets unearthed at the website in 2017 . The archeologist had get word Mardaman , a once - important urban center mentioned in ancient texts , which had been thought lose to time .
The inscriptions were likely written around 1250 BCE when Mardaman ( also call off Mardama ) was a part of the Assyrian Empire . According to the University of Tübingenarchaeologistswho unearthed the tablets , they describe the " administrative and commercial-grade affairs " between the citizen of Mardaman and their Assyrian governor Assur - nasir . The account launch the researchers to believe that the area where the tablets were recovered was once the governor ’s palace .
situate on craft route plug into Mesopotamia , Anatolia ( modern Turkey ) , and Syria , Mardaman was a bustling commercial-grade hub in its day . It was suppress and rebuild several metre , but after it was toppled by the Turukkaeans from the neighboring Zagros Mountains sometime in the eighteenth century BCE , it was never mention again in ancient texts . expert had assumed that check the ending of Marmadan . This latest discovery shows that the city recovered from that dark menstruation , and still existed 500 years later .
" The cuneiform schoolbook and our findings from the excavations in Bassetki now make it clear that that was not the end , " lead archeologist Peter Pfälzner said in a press statement . " The metropolis be continuously and achieved a final significance as a Middle Assyrian regulator ’s seat between 1250 and 1200 BCE . "
This lose chapter of story may never have been reveal if the mud tablets were stored any other style . archaeologist receive the 92 slab in a clayware watercraft that had been seal with a heavyset layer of corpse , perhaps to save the contents for succeeding genesis . The state in which they were found indicate they were stashed away shortly after the surrounding edifice was destroyed .
