Archaeological Discovery: Innovative Tomb Patterns Found in Saudi Arabia

Ancient tombs dating back 4,500 years discovered in the northwestern part of the Arabian Peninsula. (SPA)
Ancient tombs dating back 4,500 years discovered in the northwestern part of the Arabian Peninsula. (SPA)
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Archaeological Discovery: Innovative Tomb Patterns Found in Saudi Arabia

Ancient tombs dating back 4,500 years discovered in the northwestern part of the Arabian Peninsula. (SPA)
Ancient tombs dating back 4,500 years discovered in the northwestern part of the Arabian Peninsula. (SPA)

Saudi Arabia is actively exploring its rich archaeological heritage, uncovering treasures that are prompting a reevaluation of the region’s history.

These efforts highlight the Arabian Peninsula’s significant role in human civilization, with many artifacts preserved underground or on rock formations.

Archaeological tombs discovered across Saudi Arabia provide a valuable opportunity to reshape the historical narrative of the Arabian Peninsula’s civilization.

Field research and ongoing exploration enrich these discoveries, led by Saudi researchers Dr. Eid Al-Yahya and archaeologist Dr. Qusai Al-Turki.

Their recent focus includes the “Al-Ajalah” (Wheel) tombs in various regions between Makkah and Madinah, and a unique musical instrument tomb found in Turbah city, near Makkah.

Exploring burial sites in Saudi Arabia is challenging and time-consuming due to the large number of tombs, their varied designs, purposes, and remote locations.

Al-Yahya and Al-Turki aim to uncover these tombs’ intriguing patterns, which often reflect themes of life, the heavens, and the afterlife, showcasing Saudi Arabia’s significant historical role in early civilization.

The researchers have named “Wheel” tombs as such due to their circular design resembling a wheel or a “Star Tomb,” resembling a four-pointed star.

This comparison stems from its pictorial symbolism in early cuneiform and its association with the concept of “star” or “planet.”

Al-Yahya, an anthropologist specializing in Arabian Peninsula civilization, conducted field surveys across thousands of tombs in Saudi Arabia.

This helped him and Al-Turki in identifying hundreds of thousands of such tombs, including the prevalent Wheel tomb pattern found in areas like Al-Mahd and Al-Baqum, and in regions between Makkah and Madinah.

The Wheel is described as a circular structure with pillars, featuring a burial chamber in one of its four sections. Originally intended for four individuals, only one person was buried there, visible as a dark spot in the northeast corner of the wheel, as seen in aerial photographs.

Al-Turki, known for his research on ancient civilizations between Iraq and the Arabian Gulf, noted similarities between Saudi Arabia’s Wheel tombs and tombs dating back to around 4,000 years ago in Mesopotamian writings.

This suggests that these tombs, shaped like wheels or stars surrounded by circles, were originally built in the Arabian Peninsula.

They symbolized connections to the universe, stars, and planets like Mercury, Mars, and Saturn.

Researchers believe that when migrants from the Arabian Peninsula settled in Mesopotamia, they brought this tomb design with them, integrating it into their cultural inventions, including writing.

In another find, coincidence led amateur Saad Al-Subai to discover a unique pattern of ancient tombs in the Bani Hilal area of southwest Saudi Arabia.

This discovery revealed a distinctive style found specifically in Turbah city, resembling a musical instrument with a tall column and a lower oval ring adorned with 17 triangular stone structures resembling strings.

The oval ring measures 50 meters north-south and 40 meters east-west, with a tail length of about 100 meters, width of 2 meters, and height up to 1.50 meters.

These triangular tombs start with an elevated base and slope towards the head, located at the center of the oval ring, marking the primary burial site for the most important individual.

Discoveries like these are reshaping our understanding of Saudi Arabia’s history and civilization.

Al-Yahya and Al-Turki continue their efforts to study and highlight the rich heritage of Saudi Arabia, emphasizing its historical significance as one of humanity’s earliest inhabited regions.



Warsaw Opens a New Modern Art Museum as It Tries to Leave Poland’s Communist Legacy Behind

The Museum of Modern Art in the Polish capital is seen on Thursday, Oct. 24, 2024, in Warsaw, Poland. (AP)
The Museum of Modern Art in the Polish capital is seen on Thursday, Oct. 24, 2024, in Warsaw, Poland. (AP)
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Warsaw Opens a New Modern Art Museum as It Tries to Leave Poland’s Communist Legacy Behind

The Museum of Modern Art in the Polish capital is seen on Thursday, Oct. 24, 2024, in Warsaw, Poland. (AP)
The Museum of Modern Art in the Polish capital is seen on Thursday, Oct. 24, 2024, in Warsaw, Poland. (AP)

A modern art museum designed by American architect Thomas Phifer opens its doors in the Polish capital Friday — a minimalist, light-filled structure that is meant to be a symbol of openness and tolerance as the city tries to free itself from its communist legacy.

The Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw sits like a bright white box on a major city street. Inside, a monumental staircase with geometric lines rises to upper floors, where large windows flood the gallery rooms with light.

City and museum officials say the light and open spaces are meant to attract meetings and debate — and become a symbol of the democratic era that Poland embraced when it threw off authoritarian communist rule 35 years ago.

Warsaw Mayor Rafał Trzaskowski said the museum's opening is a "historic moment for Warsaw" and that the project, which will later include a theater, will help to create a new city center no longer dominated by a communist symbol.

"This place will change beyond recognition, it will be a completely new center," he said Thursday. "There has not been a place like this in Warsaw for decades, a place that would be created from scratch precisely to promote Polish art, which is spectacular in itself."

Warsaw was turned to rubble by occupying German forces during World War II and was rebuilt in the gray, sometimes drab, style of communist regimes across Eastern Europe. But years of economic growth in the post-communist era have produced modern glass architecture, cutting-edge museums and revitalized historic buildings.

The museum was built on the site of a former parking lot near the Palace of Culture and Science, a dominating Stalinist skyscraper. Though long hated by many who saw in it as a symbol of Moscow's oppression, the ornate palace remains an icon of the city today — perhaps even the city's most recognized building.

The museum responds with its bright white minimalism and smaller scale.

"It is very important that this building is located opposite the Palace of Culture and Science and symbolically changes the center," museum director Joanna Mytkowska said. "This is a building dedicated to open, equal and democratic culture."

American and other Western architects are putting their mark on Warsaw. The city skyline includes a soaring luxury tower created by Daniel Libeskind, the renowned Polish American architect. The firm of British designer Norman Foster created the Varso Tower, which at 310 meters (1,017 feet) is the tallest skyscraper in the European Union. A Finnish architectural team designed the city's landmark Jewish history museum.

Phifer's New York-based practice is known in the United States for projects including the North Carolina Museum of Art, the Corning Museum of Glass and the Glenstone Museum expansion in Potomac, Maryland.

Asked by a reporter if he viewed the Warsaw museum as his masterpiece, the 71-year-old did not hesitate with his answer. "Of course," he said.

He said from the time he began working on the museum 10 years ago, he was aware that his work was part of Warsaw's "remarkable renaissance."

The city financed the 700,000 million zloty ($175 million) project. In the first weeks it will hold performances and present several large-scale sculptures and installation pieces by female artists, including Magdalena Abakanowicz, Alina Szapocznikow, Sandra Mujinga and Cecilia Vicuña. The full opening with its larger collection is scheduled for February.

The area around the building is still under construction and will eventually become what the architect calls a "forum space," including a garden and a theater with a black facade, also designed by Phifer.

Not everyone loves the new museum's austerity, and some residents have compared it to a concrete bunker.

Phifer said he believes the critics will feel differently when they enter the building and see its design and how the white background gives space for the art "to come alive."

"The museum is what I would call a magic box. There is a bit of mystery to it," he said. "You don't really understand this work until you come inside and experience it with the art."

Trzaskowski, the mayor, said all ambitious architectural projects are bound to stir up emotions.

"Every large project that has been built from scratch in the world, such as the Pompidou Centre in Paris, the Guggenheim in Bilbao or the pyramid in the Louvre, has stirred up controversy," Trzaskowski said. The real controversies, he added, are yet to come when the avant-garde museum starts staging its exhibitions.