Ancient site · City
Ebla (Tell Mardikh)
Also known as Tell Mardikh
A city southwest of Aleppo in Syria that became the strongest kingdom of the region in the 3rd millennium BCE. In its royal palace Paolo Matthiae's Italian team found an archive of thousands of clay tablets from about 2400–2300 BCE, written in a previously unknown language now called Eblaite.
Its discovery proved that Syria had cities and states as old as those of Egypt and Mesopotamia.
- Dates
- c. 3500 BCE – 7th century CE; archives c. 2400–2300 BCE
- Still standing
- Yes
- Location
- 35.80° N, 36.80° E
How we know
Its own clay-tablet archive, written in cuneiform, names its kings and trade partners.
Nearby sites
- Ugarit (Ras Shamra) c. 7000–1185 BCE; golden age c. 1500–1200 BCE
- Tell Abu Hureyra c. 11,300–5800 BCE
- Palmyra early 2nd millennium BCE – 1932 CE; height 1st–3rd century CE
- Göbekli Tepe c. 9500–8000 BCE
- Karahan Tepe c. 9750–9400 BCE (dates still being refined)
- Tell Halaf c. 6100–5400 BCE (Halaf village); later the Aramaean city of Guzana