According to a new study published in Cambridge University Press's peer-reviewed magazine Antiquity, researchers unearthed a burial mound in northern Syria that may be the world's oldest battle memorial.The 72-foot high mound known as the White Monument, or Tell Banat North, dates from the third millennium B.C.E. and gets its name from the substance used…
A large mound in Syria might be the world’s oldest war memorial as it was built prior to the year 2300 BC. The mound, which was constructed with soil that was piled up, contains human remains who may have been foot soldiers or charioteers – it’s unclear whether these remains were from the winners or losers of the battle.
Named Tell Banat North (or the White Monument because of the chalky white color that the mineral gypsum gives off), it was discovered back in the 1980s and 90s, but when the Tishrin Dam on the Euphrates River was built in 1999, the mound was submerged in water. It has only been re-examined recently.
An earthen mound in what is now Syria may be the oldest known war memorial in the world, constructed before 2300 BC. The remains of foot soldiers and charioteers were buried in distinct clusters in a monument made of piled-up soil. However, it is.
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May. 28, 2021 3:14 AM
An enigmatic mound built in northeastern Syria some 4,400 years ago may be the oldest known war memorial, hosting the remains of male and child soldiers, some possibly as young as eight, along with their military equipment, archaeologists say.
The earthen memorial was raised just outside Tell Banat, which is the remains of an ancient settlement on the east bank of the Euphrates River that was occupied already 5,000 years ago, at the dawn of the Bronze Age. The artificial knoll built by the settlement may have been an early attempt by an unknown Mesopotamian civilization to honor its war dead and even to assert control over the region by projecting power, reports a study published Friday in the journal Antiquity.