Barda Balka

Barda Balka is an archeological site near the Little Zab and Chamchamal in the north of modern-day Iraq.[1]

Barda Balka
LocationIraq
TypeSurface site
History
Materialgravels
PeriodsMiddle Paleolithic, Neolithic
CulturesLate Acheulean
Site notes
Excavation dates1951
ArchaeologistsBruce Howe and Herbert E. Wright

The site was discovered on a hilltop in 1949 by Sayid Fuad Safar and Naji al-Asil from the Directorate General of Antiquities, Iraq. It was later excavated by Bruce Howe and Herbert E. Wright in 1951. Stone tools were found amongst a particular layer of Pleistocene gravels that dated to the late Acheulean period. The tools included pebble tools, bifaces and lithic flakes that were suggested to be amongst the oldest evidence of human occupation in Iraq.[1] They were found comparable with tools known to have been made around eighty thousand years ago.[2]

A piece of stone from the archeological site of Barda Balka, modern-day Chamchamal, Iraqi Kurdistan. The Sulaymaniya Museum, Iraq.

Similar material was found in other locations around the Chemchemal valley.[1]

A Neolithic megalith is also located at the centre of the site around which the tools were found.[2]

References
  1. Braidwood, Robert., & Howe, Bruce., Prehistoric Investigations in Iraqi Kurdistan, The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, Studies in Ancient Oriental CIvilization, No. 31, University of Chicago Press, 1960.
  2. Georges Roux (27 August 1992). Ancient Iraq. Penguin Books Limited. pp. 72–. ISBN 978-0-14-193825-7. Retrieved 10 October 2012.
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