Russian archaeologists discover 4,000-year-old Sumerian city in Iraq

A Russian team from the Institute of Archaeology of the Academy of Sciences has uncovered a site in southern Iraq's Dhi Qar Governorate that may date back over 4,000 years. The excavation at Tell al-Duhaila revealed a 4-meter-wide temple wall, remains of a maritime port, and artifacts including a bronze arrowhead, tandoor oven traces, and clay camel figurines from the early Iron Age. The site is near the ancient Sumerian city of Eridu, 70 kilometers southwest of Nasiriyah in the Sulaibiya depression. Alexei Jankowski-Diakonoff, head of the Russian mission, stated that work began in April 2021 as the first full research cycle in southern Mesopotamia. He speculated the city could be the capital of a state formed after the political collapse that ended the Old Babylonian period around the mid-2nd millennium BCE. Amer Abdel Razak, director of antiquities in Dhi Qar, noted the area hosts over a thousand archaeological sites, including the Great Ziggurat of Ur and the royal tomb. Ten international missions from Italy, the US, France, Britain, and Russia are expected in Dhi Qar in October. Gaith Salem, professor at Al-Mustansiriya University, emphasized that the discovery helps imagine how the region's ancient geography differed from today's desert landscape. Jankowski-Diakonoff expressed hope to find cuneiform writing in an undisturbed context.