Home :. News :. New Findings in Backgammon Birthplace
The 151-hectares area of Burnt City has been one of the first major urban centers in prehistory. Researched and excavated since the early 1970s, the archeological site has been settled since 3200 BCE and was evacuated around 2100 BCE, after going up in flames for the fourth time. The backgammon set found there by a group of Iranian archeologists in April 2007, was believed to be the oldest relic of the game, which was previously thought has Ancient Egyptian roots.
Among the 65 figurines most recently found in the Burnt City satellite in Sistan-Baluchestan Province, outstood a small sculpture of a bull, and a pair of a pregnant woman and a man both wearing necklaces. The archeologists, headed by Mehdi Mortazavi, suggest that backgammon playing society that inhabited the area about 5,000 years ago used to worship the cow.
New Findings in Backgammon Birthplace
Recent archeological digs in Shahr-i Sokhta (Persian for the Burnt City), the presumed birthplace of backgammon, may lead to the conclusion that Iran, nowadays an honorary member in the axis of evil, is the cradle of civilization. The new findings include 2 pottery kilns and 65 small sculptures of human and animal figures, which are added to the world's most ancient backgammon board and dice, the first graphic novel and a human skull indicating on preliminary practice of brain surgery found in earlier excavations.The 151-hectares area of Burnt City has been one of the first major urban centers in prehistory. Researched and excavated since the early 1970s, the archeological site has been settled since 3200 BCE and was evacuated around 2100 BCE, after going up in flames for the fourth time. The backgammon set found there by a group of Iranian archeologists in April 2007, was believed to be the oldest relic of the game, which was previously thought has Ancient Egyptian roots.
Among the 65 figurines most recently found in the Burnt City satellite in Sistan-Baluchestan Province, outstood a small sculpture of a bull, and a pair of a pregnant woman and a man both wearing necklaces. The archeologists, headed by Mehdi Mortazavi, suggest that backgammon playing society that inhabited the area about 5,000 years ago used to worship the cow.
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