The clay tablets are the first of their kind found in the region and are still being interpreted. Early findings indicate they provide a greater insight about the people who lived there and the significantly consequential events they encountered.

Tiffany Earley-Spadoni, an associate professor of at Â鶹ԭ´´, and a team of researchers have been carefully uncovering culturally significant Middle Bronze Age (1800 BCE) discoveries at Mesopotamian site of Kurd Qaburstan, which is situated in the Erbil region in northeast Iraq.

A significant portion of human development and history may be traced back to the ancient civilization of Mesopotamia, in and around present-day Iraq.

The study of these new tablets could reveal important details about the city’s connections with its neighbors during the Middle Bronze Age and its historical significance. For example, by studying people’s names, word choice and writing styles, scholars may better understand literacy in the region and the city’s cultural identity, Earley-Spadoni says in her .

Hidden History

The Middle Bronze Age in northern Iraq is poorly understood due to limited prior research and the inherent biases of the available historical sources, she says.

“We hope to find even more historical records that will help us tell the story of [the city] from the perspective of its own people rather than relying only on accounts written by their enemies,” Earley-Spadoni says. “While we know a great deal about the development of writing in southern Iraq, far less is known about literacy in northern Mesopotamian cities, especially near Erbil where Kurd Qaburstan is located.”

Mesopotamia, with its dense network of ancient cities in the fertile plains along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers near the Persian Gulf, is often regarded as the birthplace of urban civilization. These cities, preserved as towering tells, mounds formed by centuries of accumulated cultural debris, have captivated scholars for generations.

“We know quite a bit about Mesopotamian cities in the south, and that’s considered the traditional heartland of cities,” Earley-Spadoni says. “When people think about where cities first arose, they imagine cities in southern Iraq, like Uruk. We seek to fill in this gap in the scholarship by investigating a large urban site, one of the few that’s ever been investigated in northern Iraq.”

New Areas Uncovered, New Questions Raised

Earley-Spadoni and researchers have been working in two primary areas: the northwest residential neighborhoods and a newly discovered administrative complex identified as a lower town palace, which was theorized to exist based on findings made in 2022.

Researchers used technologies such as magnetometry, which allows researchers to peer through the ground to see architectural plans, to help excavate the site.

The research is valuable its own right and helps shed light on regional history and worldwide heritage, she says.

“The focus of the research is the organization of ancient cities, and it’s specifically the organization of Kurd Qaburstan,” Earley-Spadoni says. “You may have heard of King Hammurabi, who erected the famous law code. So, this is about that same time almost 4,000 years ago. We decided that this would be an interesting place to investigate what it was like to be an everyday person at a city during the Middle Bronze Age, which has been an understudied topic. People like to excavate palaces and temples, and very few residential areas have been excavated.”

Excavations in the palace revealed monumental architecture, human remains and evidence of destruction, suggesting a significant historical event. The complex, identified through geophysical surveys, is being excavated to establish its characteristics and better understand its function.

In the northwest neighborhoods, exterior courtyards, clay drainpipes, and household refuse were uncovered. Excavated pottery included everyday items such as cups, plates, bowls and storage jars. Some of the pottery was surprisingly well-decorated and carefully made, hinting that private wealth may have been more common than expected, Earley-Spadoni says in her fieldwork summary report.

Animal bones found with the pottery suggest that residents enjoyed a varied diet, including domesticated meat and wild game. This level of variety of diet is unexpected for non-elite populations in Mesopotamian cities, based on limited current evidence.

These findings may challenge ideas about sharp divisions between elite and non-elite lifestyles in ancient cities. The material culture and dietary practices reflect a community where some people lived relatively well and suggests that further research and analysis is needed to answer lingering questions, Earley-Spadoni says.

“We’re studying this ancient city to learn very specific things about the ancient inhabitants,” she says. “First, to what degree did they plan their environment, or was it just the result of an organic process? We also want to know how social inequality worked in this ancient city. Were there very poor people and very rich people? Or was there possibly a middle class?”

Encouraging Findings and a Promising Future

The city’s historical importance could be even greater if it is identified as Qabra, a major regional center referenced in Old Babylonian monuments like the famed Stele of Dadusha, according to Earley-Spadoni.

There are many clues that give credence to the theory that Kurd Qaburstan was the prominent city of Qabra that has been referenced in Old Babylonian steles – or ancient monumental slabs. One such clue is that there are ample signs pointing to Kurd Qaburstan serving as a major regional administrative hub, she says.

“Kurd Qaburstan is believed to be ancient Qabra, an important regional center mentioned in the records of other city-states,” Earley-Spadoni says. “The presence of writing, monumental architecture, and other administrative artifacts in the lower town palace further supports this identification since the site must have been an important city of its time.”

The tablets are still being interpreted but there are some early encouraging findings that help illuminate the greater identity of the people of Kurd Qaburstan and the era they inhabited, she says.

“The first of the three tablets was discovered in a trash-filled deposit along with building rubble and human remains,” she says. “Its context suggests dramatic events, possibly evidence of ancient warfare. We hope our work in 2025 will tell us more about this story.”

The research and excavation efforts are funded through the U.S. National Science Foundation and in partnership with the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. The work occurred from May to July 2024, with previous work conducted from 2013 to 2023 by a team from Johns Hopkins University that included Earley-Spadoni.

Researcher’s Credentials:

Earley-Spadoni joined Â鶹ԭ´´ in 2016 and became an associate professor in 2022. She earned her doctoral degree in near eastern studies in 2015 from The Johns Hopkins University. Earley-Spadoni’s research consists of spatially oriented investigations of expansionary state development in the ancient Near East and she directs the Kurd Qaburstan Project in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq

More specifically, they’re studying Amazonian mud, carefully extracted from a Bolivian swamp and transported back to a laboratory on Â鶹ԭ´´â€™s campus. Their goal is to date the pollen and other biological sediments layered in close to five feet of mud, then match them with samples from pottery sherds excavated from nearby settlements.

“It’s worth getting excited about mud.” – Neil Duncan, Â鶹ԭ´´ doctoral student

By combining the disciplines of paleoethnobotany and archaeology, the project leads hope to paint a comprehensive picture of pre-Columbian agriculture and culture. Because this area is responsible for some of the domesticated plants we still use today, research results could be key to understanding ancient agriculture in other parts of the world. It could also shape modern day agriculture by providing a long-term record of how human interference shapes plants.

“It’s worth getting excited about mud,” says Neil Duncan, Ph.D., who specializes in using plant remains to understand ancient civilizations.

His research partner is John Walker, Ph.D., who is trying to piece together how pre-Columbian farmers grew their crops. The mud is critical to his research because metal and stone tools are rare to nonexistent in this part of the world; other clues like wooden hoe handles, clothes, hammocks and homes constructed from palm branches have rotted away centuries ago.

What is left behind are raised earthworks, some previously undiscovered before Walker used a drone and satellite images to locate them. Whether these earthworks are for irrigation, defensive structures or just garbage piles remains to be determined. But they are yielding bits of ceramic and other non-perishable artifacts.
Those pieces still bear remnants of food and other plant materials that can be carbon-dated and matched somewhere in the strata of the mud samples.

“It’s a chain of evidence. One thing leads to another and eventually you start to get this big picture,” Walker says.

The most recent trip to collect samples is just the first in what Walker and Duncan expect to many more excursions to northeastern Bolivia. Wading waist-deep in mosquito-infested marshes might not be everyone’s idea of a good time. But the potential research results — and the sheer joy of field work — make it worth it for Duncan, Walker and their team of students.

“Field archaeology is far superior to sitting in an office or laboratory,” Duncan says.

Since 2014, Branting has been a principal investigator on a U.S. Department of State project meant to track damage to cultural-heritage sites in war-torn Syria and northern Iraq. It’s a monumental task documenting wanton destruction of ancient sites – some of them thousands of years old – by fighters from the Islamic State and other forces.

“It’s horrific and it’s widespread. Cultural heritage has been specifically targeted – it’s not just collateral damage and not just by the Islamic State,” Branting said. “You look at imagery of Aleppo [Syria] and there are whole blocks that have been leveled by barrel bombs that were sent out of helicopters by [Syrian President Bashar] al-Assad forces. You have Islamic State placing explosives in cultural heritage sites and blowing them up so they can create videos for marketing purposes.”

The ancient Citadel of Aleppo, Syria, shown in 2010 (top) and flanked by bomb craters in 2016.

Branting, an assistant professor in the College of Sciences’ Department of Anthropology, works with a team from the American Schools of Oriental Research. In 2014, the State Department accepted a proposal to collaborate with ASOR to document, protect and preserve cultural-heritage sites in Syria. The project soon expanded to include northern Iraq.

Branting and his team are doing that by melding ancient history with cutting-edge science. They’re examining high-resolution photos taken by satellites to document sites’ current conditions and monitor them for damage.

Branting, who came to Â鶹ԭ´´ from the University of Chicago in 2015, has worked with satellite imagery for years, but obtaining the data from private vendors is expensive for researchers. ASOR is able to scrutinize huge volumes of photos taken from space through its relationship with the State Department. The images are typically very recent, some from the day before. And the State Department also has enough influence to request that satellites be tasked with photographing particular areas.

What they’ve seen is disturbing: The ancient Citadel in Aleppo surrounded by bomb craters. The columns of the Tetrapylon toppled and a portion of the façade of the ancient Roman theater destroyed by ISIS in the desert city of Palmyra, Syria, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

In Palmyra, Syria, the Tetrapylon in December 2016 (top) and with toppled columns a few weeks later in January 2017.

ASOR and Branting have the mission of sounding the alarm about the destruction. But they’re also documenting the sites’ pre-war condition so that “cultural heritage first-responders” can be better prepared to reconstruct or preserve what’s left once the conflict subsides.

The work is important to the future economic solvency of these regions, as archaeological tourism is a significant source of money for governments and residents.

At the same time, there’s a clear national security element to the organization’s mission. While ISIS claims to destroy pre-Islamic sites because it considers them heretical, many sites have been looted of valuable antiquities. For instance, recent satellite images of the nearly 5,000-year-old city of Mari in eastern Syria show the archaeological site pockmarked by hundreds of pits dug by looters. Antiquities sold on the black market have been used to purchase munitions in Syria and fund insurgents in Iraq.

The city of Mari archaeological site in Syria in 2012 (top) and in 2016 pockmarked by pits dug by looters.

The State Department has asked ASOR to study how the antiquities are being removed and the black market trade routes where they’re being sold. The information could also be used for future war-crimes prosecution. Information from the group’s reports has made its way into White House intelligence briefings, Branting said.

“The Department of State wanted to have independent streams of information about this,” Branting said. “The military and other intelligence agencies collect information, but it’s definitely not a top priority for them. They wanted a partner who knew what they were doing, who could adequately look at the cultural heritage and understand its importance.”

ASOR has gathered information about well-known sites such as Palmyra, but also built a database of about 6,000 lower-profile sites in Syria and another 6,000 in northern Iraq. A byproduct of their work is that imagery in the database likely includes formerly unknown sites, or some known but unexplored sites, that could offer years of postwar study for archeologists.

Branting isn’t daunted by the idea of dealing with sites ravaged by war.

“Archeology is constantly dealing with sites that are falling apart, from hundreds or thousands of years ago,” he said. “It’s a question of what’s still left, what can be preserved and what information from the past can be salvaged.”

As a single mother living in Guatemala with daughters 7 and 3 years old, Alison Batres earned just enough money working in a family-owned bakery to pay rent and feed her children.

Fed up and in search of a better life, she moved with her daughters to Miami, where her mother lived and worked as a housekeeper. Becoming a housekeeper herself, she saved enough money to get a place of her own five years later. Although still a modest lifestyle – a two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment in Miami’s predominantly Cuban neighborhood called Little Havana – the move positioned her daughters to attend a school that ultimately led to Kimberly Batres pursuing something no one else in her family had: a college degree.

Batres, now a junior at the Â鶹ԭ´´, is studying both anthropology and Latin American studies to work toward a career in archaeology. She plans to root her future research in Guatemala to discover its unmasked history and to further connect with her heritage.

“One of the things I realized, through my minor in history, is a lot of research and resources accumulated for anthropology either go to Europe or the Middle East,” Batres said. “There isn’t much to document Latin America, and what there is, it’s information from an outsider. I want to bring the perspective of someone from that country.”

Batres wants to help dig up undiscovered Mayan temples and precolonial sites and identify the history behind them.

“With archaeology, we’re out there excavating, documenting everything we find and uncovering history. What people often don’t consider with archaeology is we include the local community people in our work. We also work to preserve cultural identity,” said Amanda Groff, Â鶹ԭ´´ archaeology associate lecturer. “When we involve locals, it gives them a sense of ownership in what we uncover, which can lead to a greater desire to preserve it.”

Batres’ Guatemalan heritage can assist in her archaeology efforts, Groff said. That’s because the locals may be more willing to interact and participate because Batres has an established connection with their community and culture.

Batres’ educational success, which spans from being part of LEAD Scholars, Volunteer Â鶹ԭ´´ and the President’s Leadership Council, began to blossom in 6th grade when an inspiring teacher helped her discover her love of history and opened her eyes to the possibility of attending college. A higher education was encouraged by Batres mother and grandmother but not often discussed, as neither of them had attended college.

Taking every advanced placement course she could in high school, often staying until 9 p.m. to study, plus joining clubs, sports teams and working part-time at Publix to pay for her college applications ultimately led to Batres’ acceptance at Â鶹ԭ´´. Now, a drive to one day help support her mom to thank her for her sacrifices pushes Batres to keep going.

“My mom worked from nothing to having her own apartment and to being comfortable enough to not be starving anymore,” Batres said. “Seeing her hard work has motivated me to work hard, too, and return the favor to her one day.”

Batres also wants to encourage others to pursue their dreams, as she’s seen firsthand how hard work pays off. As part of Volunteer Â鶹ԭ´´, Batres now is coordinating a trip to Charlotte, N.C., to help homeless families get back on their feet through an organization called Charlotte Family Housing. The volunteers also will work with Wings for Kids, an organization that helps low-income elementary and middle school students learn emotional and social intelligence through after-school programs.

Batres and nine other students will spend their spring break, March 12-18, volunteering with the organizations.

“We can give these kids the perspective of what they can accomplish if they continue in school,” Batres said. “I was sort of in their situation, too.”

Pegasus Professors Arlen and Diane Chase were at the Boston Museum of Science to lead about 70 Â鶹ԭ´´ alumni on a special viewing of the largest Maya exhibit ever mounted in the United States. Michael Johnson, dean of the Â鶹ԭ´´ College of Sciences and a Boston native, was also on hand.

Only a portion of the full exhibit is on display in Boston, as it travels around the country, but it includes ample materials unearthed by the Chases and the Â鶹ԭ´´ students who dig alongside them in Belize. The husband-and-wife team have been leading excavations of Maya treasures there since 1979, first at Santa Rita Corozal and since 1985 at Caracol.

The Chases, who came to Â鶹ԭ´´ in 1984 to establish a program in Maya archaeology, work only with Â鶹ԭ´´ students or graduates at Caracol, which at 200 square kilometers is the largest known Maya site. The couple was fresh off their 2015 digging season when they traveled to Boston to point out exhibit highlights for alumni and answer their questions. The Chases consulted heavily on the exhibit.

“We read every label and proofed them,” said Diane of the displays of their work. She serves as Â鶹ԭ´´â€™s vice provost for academic program quality. Arlen is an associate dean in the College of Sciences.

“I already had tickets to come to this exhibit, so I was planning to come anyway,” said Roberto Santamaria ’09, deputy director of public health for the town of Framingham, Mass. “But it’s unbelievable that we can be with the people who actually did the archaeology. It’s a little surreal.”

Ariel Shapiro ’11, a behavior therapist for Southbay Mental Health, said she never thought she’d see a Â鶹ԭ´´ alumni event in Massachusetts. “I thought I’d have to go to Florida,” she said. She was so pleased when she heard of the Museum of Science event, she immediately decided to attend.

Santamaria is Costa Rican, and was thrilled to see his own culture and heritage presented in such depth. And the fact that professors from his alma mater were involved? “That makes it even better,” he said.

More Info

www.caracol.org

In partnership with Belize’s Institute of Archaeology, the Chases have excavated the Maya site at Caracol, Belize for most of their careers. They were among the first researchers to widely use LIDAR (laser) technology to explore ruins at Caracol through the jungle canopy. Their findings have changed our understating of how the ancient Maya lived in a culture that stretched from El Salvador in Central America to the Yucatan Peninsula.

Today you have the opportunity to help the Chases and Belize in the final round of the popularity contest. A winner will be crowned at midnight. The Chases work has already beat other famous sites including Pompeii in Italy, Sterkfontein in South Africa, Petra in Jordan, and the fabled city of Troy in Turkey.

The winner will be announced on Saturday Oct. 18, the day archeologists, anthropologists and dig-site enthusiasts everywhere celebrate International Archaeology Day.

The first of three lectures, “Four Thousand Years of Andean Gold,” will be delivered by Mark Aldenderfer of the University of Arizona. Aldenderfer specializes in the cultural and biological adaptations of societies in high-altitude regions, primarily in the Peruvian Andes. He will be speaking at 7 p.m. Friday, Oct. 23, in room 108 of the Psychology Building.

Anyone who plans to attend Aldenderfer’s lecture should contact Tosha Dupras, associate chair of Anthropology, at 407-823-6725 or tdupras@mail.ucf.edu for parking information and a parking pass.

To read more about the lecture series, click here.