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Flood begets fortune

In an act of serendipity, long-forgotten ruins have surfaced in Turkey’s Amuq region. A 2003 flood exposed a Bronze Age wall and a storeroom of artifacts, drawing archeologists back to a dig site abandoned 55 years ago. A team including David Schloen, associate professor in the Oriental Institute, re-excavated the deserted site this past fall, uncovering a Hittite period palace and private houses. One of the team’s findings, a 14th- or 15th-century B.C. tomb—unlike any other discovered in the Middle East—contained four sets of human remains, each separated by a plaster layer. Appliqués—cutout decorations likely sewn on garments or a headdress—and jewelry, including gold necklaces, also were inside. Scholars will examine the items to better understand how regional states evolved into empires and then devolved into small kingdoms.—M.L.

Courtesy the Oriental Institute