Mesopotamian PRE-history coming up

[Rokcet Scientist]

In Syria, a Prologue for Cities

RICH DISCOVERIES American and Syrian investigators at the site known as Tell Zeidan have already uncovered a tantalizing sampling of Ubaid artifacts, including painted pot fragments. The site could yield discoveries for decades.

Archaeologists have embarked on excavations in northern Syria expected to widen and deepen understanding of a prehistoric culture in Mesopotamia that set the stage for the rise of the world’s first cities and states and the invention of writing.

In two seasons of preliminary surveying and digging at the site known as Tell Zeidan, American and Syrian investigators have already uncovered a tantalizing sampling of artifacts from what had been a robust pre-urban settlement on the upper Euphrates River. People occupied the site for two millenniums, until 4000 B.C. — a little-known but fateful period of human cultural evolution.

Scholars of antiquity say that Zeidan should [...]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/scien ... ef=science