A huge, 4,300-year-old pyramid-shaped burial mound in Syria, containing 30 individuals believed to be warriors, could be the oldest war memorial ever discovered, said an archaeological team. Ancient inscriptions from Mesopotamia also show that this discovery could be the first example of a particular type of burial mound, where fallen warriors—either allied or enemy—were buried together in an organized structure.
The research, published in the journal Antiquity, describes the monument as a pyramid with layers constructed using dirt and gypsum. The bodies were believed to have been meticulously interred, being deposited as the horizontal stages of the pyramid were being built up. Several of the bones discovered were fragmentary at best, with the archaeologists even being unable to determine its age or if the individual was either male or female.
The researchers believe the monument was an instance of reburial, and that the bones buried there were older remains from places like an old battleground or cemetery. They were believed to have been buried with care and reverence, given the artifacts that were found to have been buried with these individuals. A couple of them were found with pellets beside them; ancient peoples often used pellets fired from slings as weapons in combat, so the researchers believe them to be signifiers that some of the buried were foot soldiers. Others were buried with kunga, “a donkey-like equid breed seen pulling vehicles in ancient art,” according to a statement. These individuals were believed to be wagoneers. Together with other figures discovered on the site, including a model of a wagon and a wheel made out of clay, the evidence led the team to the conclusion that the burial was a war memorial.
The study was done by a team led by Porter and Thomas McClelland, along with a group of undergraduate students, from the University of Toronto, by analyzing evidence from the finds. An earlier expedition between 1988 to 1999 produced the evidence, excavated by a team from the Euphrates Salvage Project, of which the McClellands were members. At the time of discovery, the researchers didn’t fully understand the reason for the burial site; it was only determined decades later by the very same archaeologists that studied them onsite. The site is now flooded and under the reservoir of the Tishreen Dam.
Bibliography
- Jarus, O. (2021, May 31). Pyramid-shaped mound holding 30 corpses may be world’s oldest war monument. LiveScience. Retrieved August 20, 2021, from https://www.livescience.com/oldest-war-monument-discovered-syria.html
- Porter, A., McClellan, T., Wilhelm, S., Weber, J., Baldwin, A., Colley, J., . . . Safi, Z. (2021). “Their corpses will reach the base of heaven”: A third-millennium BC war memorial in northern Mesopotamia? Antiquity, 1-19. doi:10.15184/aqy.2021.58
