Posted on 09/14/2009 9:08:31 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
In May, workers repairing the country's main east-west highway artery struck a treasure trove of urns, tools, and spearheads dating back to the Paleolithic Age of 300,000 years ago and up to the Late Hellenistic Period of the 1st century BC. In one part of the complex, workers found a Mesopotamian cylinder seal used for stamping legal agreements in 300 BC and in another, tiles from the same era reveal the existence of a temple with a ritual hearth, podium, and bread-baking oven... [S]ays Vakhtang Licheli, Prof. of Archaeology, Director of the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology at the Tbilisi State University... "Owing to its location, richness and cultural diversity of finds, and wide chronological limits, Grakliani Gora seems to be one of the most unique and important archeological sites of the Central Transcaucasus. On this hill, we can actually trace back economic, cultural, commercial development of society and their relations to other regions during the course of 7 000 years."
(Excerpt) Read more at web.worldbank.org ...
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To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. |
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Exploring the “-stans”: Review of “Silk Road to Ruin”
March 6, 2008
The ancient trade network between East and West known as the Silk Road is one of history's great melting pots, and the world's most dynamic mixture of culture, language, and knowledge. Frances Wood uses the Silk Road as mostly a conceptual backdrop for more specific historical vignettes here, as a complete history of all the different cultures and societies involved, over the course of at least three millennia, would be prohibitively huge.
Though there is some discussion of actual trade and the goods transported long distance and sold in the area's bazaars, Wood focuses on specific areas of interest, such as the mysterious Xiongnu people of ancient times, or the more modern dramatic journeys of explorers like Sven Hedin.
A nice bonus is a debunking of some of the claims of Marco Polo, who surely traveled through the area but made many dubious descriptions of particular locations he probability didn't really see. Instead we hear the fascinating stories of other less-known but arguably more impressive travelers of the time, like Bento de Goes.
Some of Wood's narratives get worrisomely far away from the Silk Road backdrop, and the tail end of the book is a bit of a slog with tedious coverage of latter-day explorers. However, the general appreciation for the importance of the Silk Road is the larger achievement of this book, and the frequent illustrations and photographs of forlorn landscapes and ancient masterpieces make this book a visual treat as well.
$12.21
Nice map!
The walls of Balkh, Afghanistan
[the “Mother of Cities”]
Joe Sermarini / Ancient Sites
http://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/displayimage.php?pos=-16804
http://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/albums/userpics/10002/Walls%20of%20Balkh.jpg
Thanks, interesting.
Before silk (and that goes back a long time) there was a long-range trade in various stones; lapis lazuli came out of Afghanistan, obsidian came out of several large deposits, amber came out of the Baltic region, and it was all getting swapped and traded around over a massive chunk of the prehistoric world. Later on, the Indus Valley (Harappan) civilization made cool beads, and those show up all over the place. Catal Huyuk (33 acres), which was abandoned about 7500 years ago (5500 BC for the main site; a smaller site across the creek must have been started by refugees, but only sputtered along for 50 years and croaked), was on the obsidian route, and either controlled access to points west, or was itself controlled by some as-yet unidentified city which used Catal Huyuk as its western (? eastern?) gate.
Partly it’s because they’re just doing a lot of digging of late.
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