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AlUla Showcases Ancient Artifacts at Exhibition in China 

“Glimpses of the Ancient North Arabian Kingdoms” runs from September 26 to January 5. (SPA)
“Glimpses of the Ancient North Arabian Kingdoms” runs from September 26 to January 5. (SPA)
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AlUla Showcases Ancient Artifacts at Exhibition in China 

“Glimpses of the Ancient North Arabian Kingdoms” runs from September 26 to January 5. (SPA)
“Glimpses of the Ancient North Arabian Kingdoms” runs from September 26 to January 5. (SPA)

The Shang Dynasty Capital Site Museum in Henan Province, China, will host the international exhibition “Glimpses of the Ancient North Arabian Kingdoms” from September 26 to January 5. The exhibition is jointly organized by the Royal Commission for AlUla and the Chinese museum as part of the Saudi-Chinese Year of Culture 2025.

The exhibition highlights the rich heritage of both AlUla and Henan, which host UNESCO World Heritage sites, share histories dating back to around 6,000 BC, and serve as prominent centers of archaeological discovery, reported the Saudi Press Agency on Monday.

It explores the kingdoms of Dadan, Lihyan, and the Nabataeans, which flourished in the northwest of the Arabian Peninsula. The Dadan Kingdom emerged about 4,500 years ago in the fertile AlUla Valley and thrived in the first millennium BC as a powerful city controlling key points along the Incense Trade Route. It rose to prominence by exerting political and cultural influence, leaving behind inscriptions, tombs, and rock carvings.

The Nabataeans, known for their transcontinental trade, established a prosperous kingdom from Petra, whose reach extended deep into the Arabian Peninsula. Hegra, also known as Mada’in Salih, north of AlUla, became their most important southern city and a major commercial hub. In 2008, Hegra was inscribed as Saudi Arabia’s first UNESCO World Heritage site.

The exhibition features 30 artifacts from the Royal Commission for AlUla’s collection, half of which are on public display for the first time. Among the highlights is a massive sandstone sculpture of a Lihyanite ruler in Dadan, dating back to between the fifth and third centuries BC.

The exhibition reflects the historical ties linking China and the Arabian Peninsula since the first millennium BC. (SPA)

Visitors will see human remains left by pilgrims at Umm Daraj and Jabal Dadan, as well as a rare silk piece over 2,000 years old, discovered in a Nabataean burial site. AlUla’s collection is complemented by 10 Chinese artifacts, including camel models, incense burners, cosmetics, and engraved items, underscoring shared artistic traditions and values between the two civilizations.

The exhibition reflects the historical ties linking China and the Arabian Peninsula since the first millennium BC. Both regions witnessed the rise of writing systems, long-distance trade, and early economies. The Nabataeans, along with the Qin and Han dynasties, played a pivotal role in early Eurasian connectivity, laying foundations for the Silk Road.

Chinese interest in AlUla was underscored last year through the exhibition “AlUla, Wonder of Arabia” at the Palace Museum in Beijing, which drew more than 200,000 visitors and was extended for an additional week due to high demand. Travel to AlUla has since become easier for Chinese visitors, with Mandarin-speaking guides, signage, multimedia guides at heritage sites, and a free copy of “AlUla: a Rich History” fully translated into Mandarin.

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Culture

Bones from Iraqi Cave Hint at Violence and Compassion in Neanderthals

The entrance to Shanidar Cave in Iraq's Kurdistan region, a site of important Neanderthal remains, is seen in an undated photograph released on October 15, 2026. Prof Graeme Barker/Handout via REUTERS
The entrance to Shanidar Cave in Iraq's Kurdistan region, a site of important Neanderthal remains, is seen in an undated photograph released on October 15, 2026. Prof Graeme Barker/Handout via REUTERS
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Bones from Iraqi Cave Hint at Violence and Compassion in Neanderthals

The entrance to Shanidar Cave in Iraq's Kurdistan region, a site of important Neanderthal remains, is seen in an undated photograph released on October 15, 2026. Prof Graeme Barker/Handout via REUTERS
The entrance to Shanidar Cave in Iraq's Kurdistan region, a site of important Neanderthal remains, is seen in an undated photograph released on October 15, 2026. Prof Graeme Barker/Handout via REUTERS

The bones of a Neanderthal from a cave in Iraq's Kurdistan region are offering evidence of both violence and compassion in the closest evolutionary cousins of our species, exhibiting a wound apparently from a fatal spear attack as well as signs of an earlier nonfatal injury that may have elicited kindly care.

Researchers have discovered at Shanidar Cave in the Zagros Mountains of northern Iraq a partial skeleton of a Neanderthal, aged in the mid-40s, that included a left shoulder blade, or scapula, with a circular hole six-tenths of an inch (15 mm) wide indicative of a deeply penetrating stab.

The bones of this individual, who they call Shanidar A, were unearthed from under about 25 feet (7.5 meters) of rocks and sediment inside the cave and date to about 75,000 years ago.

The researchers were unable to determine Shanidar A's sex.

According to Reuters, the researchers said the injury's shape suggests it was caused by a forceful thrust using a sharpened wooden spear, a type of weapon Neanderthals are known to have used, rather than a spear with a stone tip. It was a weapon employed in hunting large mammals that were an important food source.

"The ⁠spear would have ⁠gone through the skin and major muscles, especially the pectoralis, as well as the ribcage and muscles between the ribs, and the lung," said biological anthropologist Emma Pomeroy of the University of Cambridge in England, lead author of the study published on Thursday in the journal Scientific Reports.

"The location could be like the kind of 'heart shot' hunters use to kill animals quickly by puncturing the heart, but that is a bit speculative. We do see heart shots as a hunting strategy both today and in the archaeological record. Neanderthals would have known this would lead to a quick death," Pomeroy said.

University of Cambridge archaeologist and study co-author Graeme Barker, who has led Shanidar Cave excavations since 2015, said the likeliest scenario ⁠is interpersonal violence.

The researchers said the violence probably occurred either between members of a particular Neanderthal group or between members of rival Neanderthal groups, calling a Homo sapiens attack or an accidental injury less likely.

The researchers found shards of bone displaced by the weapon. The injury indicated that the spear entered from above with a downward trajectory, penetrating the left chest cavity from the front and traveling through the body before punching the hole in the scapula, causing quick death.

In addition to the scapula, the researchers found some ribs, a nearly complete right hand and seven teeth, mostly from the front of the lower jaw, belonging to Shanidar A. The teeth bore evidence that this Neanderthal had survived brutal injury at least a year before death — a blow to the face resulting in front teeth being smashed and lost. One tooth was split, with half remaining rotated in the mouth and others pushed out of position.

"The pain would have been extreme, and basic needs like eating and drinking would have been difficult, perhaps meaning Shanidar A needed food mashing and being able ⁠to rest. It's likely that Shanidar ⁠A did need some care from members of the group for some basic needs during recovery," Pomeroy said.

Shanidar A was one of five Neanderthals, four adults and one infant, whose bodies were carefully tucked behind a rock pillar in the cave in a burial cluster within a generation or so of each other. The cave was occupied by Neanderthals for tens of thousands of years as a seasonal campsite, and later by Homo sapiens.

Neanderthals were more robustly built than Homo sapiens, with larger brows. They lived as hunter-gatherers and inhabited Eurasia from the Atlantic coast to the Ural Mountains from about 400,000 years ago until a bit after 40,000 years ago, disappearing after Homo sapiens became established in the region.

The two species interbred, with modern non-African human populations bearing residual Neanderthal DNA.

The cave, overlooking the Great Zab river valley, has been a source of information about Neanderthals since the 1950s, with Shanidar A now offering new insight into their behavior.

"We see evidence of two contrasting facets of human nature – care and violence – juxtaposed in the same individual," Pomeroy said.

"We see evidence all around us today that violence and care are both aspects of how we humans behave, and we see this here in Shanidar A, too. Neanderthals were like us in many respects, both the good and the bad, and this find really highlights that, going against stereotypes of Neanderthals as unintelligent, uncaring cavemen and cavewomen," Pomeroy said.

Culture

Riyadh Art Program and Wrth Sign MoU to Strengthen Cooperation in Cultural and Creative Fields

The agreement aims to develop initiatives that bring together contemporary and traditional arts, serve the objectives of both parties, and enhance their cultural impact - SPA
The agreement aims to develop initiatives that bring together contemporary and traditional arts, serve the objectives of both parties, and enhance their cultural impact - SPA
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Riyadh Art Program and Wrth Sign MoU to Strengthen Cooperation in Cultural and Creative Fields

The agreement aims to develop initiatives that bring together contemporary and traditional arts, serve the objectives of both parties, and enhance their cultural impact - SPA
The agreement aims to develop initiatives that bring together contemporary and traditional arts, serve the objectives of both parties, and enhance their cultural impact - SPA

The Riyadh Art Program, one of the programs of the Royal Commission for Riyadh City, signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Royal Institute of Traditional Arts "Wrth" to strengthen cooperation in cultural and creative fields.

The agreement aims to develop initiatives that bring together contemporary and traditional arts, serve the objectives of both parties, and enhance their cultural impact, SPA reported.

The MoU covers the development of joint creative initiatives that bring together contemporary and traditional arts through the exchange of expertise, art residency programs, and seasonal events.

It also includes cooperation to enhance the presence of both parties' projects and programs at relevant international events and forums.

Culture

Van Gogh Work Unseen in Public for 60 Years on Show in Hong Kong

Staff members pose with Vincent van Gogh's "Chataigniers en fleurs" (Chestnut Trees in Blossom) at a media preview ahead of its auction in New York, at Sotheby's in Hong Kong, China, October 13, 2026. REUTERS/Joyce Zhou
Staff members pose with Vincent van Gogh's "Chataigniers en fleurs" (Chestnut Trees in Blossom) at a media preview ahead of its auction in New York, at Sotheby's in Hong Kong, China, October 13, 2026. REUTERS/Joyce Zhou
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Van Gogh Work Unseen in Public for 60 Years on Show in Hong Kong

Staff members pose with Vincent van Gogh's "Chataigniers en fleurs" (Chestnut Trees in Blossom) at a media preview ahead of its auction in New York, at Sotheby's in Hong Kong, China, October 13, 2026. REUTERS/Joyce Zhou
Staff members pose with Vincent van Gogh's "Chataigniers en fleurs" (Chestnut Trees in Blossom) at a media preview ahead of its auction in New York, at Sotheby's in Hong Kong, China, October 13, 2026. REUTERS/Joyce Zhou

Hundreds of people queued on Tuesday outside a Hong Kong gallery to see a Vincent van Gogh painting on public display for the first time in six decades.

The Dutch artist's "Chataigniers en fleurs" ("Chestnut Trees in Blossom") was on show in Hong Kong ahead of its November 18 auction in New York, where it is expected to smash records and fetch around $180 million, according to Sotheby's.

It was one of 12 works owned by late Argentine collectors Nelly Arrieta de Blaquier and Carlos Pedro Blaquier. Others by Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro and Paul Cezanne will also go under the hammer.

The van Gogh, which according to Sotheby's was unseen by the public for over 60 years, portrays a blossoming chestnut tree with a solitary man walking past three women in Japanese attire.

Completed in 1890, it is from the last two months of van Gogh's life.

"It's one of the last, most expressive and hopeful works by van Gogh in this final phase of his career," Scott Niichel, a vice chairman at Sotheby's, told AFP.

It is one of approximately 70 works van Gogh created after leaving the psychiatric asylum of Saint-Remy, where he had created his famous "The Starry Night.”

During these final days of his life, van Gogh was producing at a frantic rate -- averaging around one work a day.

He died shortly after at the age of 37, two days after shooting himself in the chest following well-documented mental health struggles.

"This manic frenzy of paint application suggests he has so much more to give, and he's just racing to put it to canvas," Niichel said, noting the thickness of the paint layers.

"Orchard with Cypresses" set the current record for a van Gogh price point, selling for $117.2 million in a 2022 auction.

Niichel said that "anything is possible" for who might claim the painting in November.

"Our revealing in Hong Kong suggests that Asia is certainly a possibility."