Qualla: Shah Tepe: Buried Lives on the Gorgan Plain https://qualla.com/shah-tepe en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:32 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/w/d/shah-tepe-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Shah Tepe: Buried Lives on the Gorgan Plain https://qualla.com/shah-tepe Shah Tepe: Buried Lives on the Gorgan Plain: Introduction https://qualla.com/shah-tepe/ Photo credit User:Fabienkhan, CC BY-SA 2.5. In 1933, Swedish archaeologist T.J. Arne began cutting into an oval mound on the Gorgan Plain, 13 kilometers northwest of the city of Gorgan and 20 kilometers from the Caspian Sea. He dug eight square shafts, each 10 meters on a side, into earth that rose just over 8 meters above the surrounding farmland. What he found was a compressed archive of human existence: 257 skeletons layered through the mound, the oldest dating to the Chalcolithic period, the newest to the Islamic era. Between those extremes lay the Bronze Age, its dead curled on their sides in pits beneath the floors of their own homes, their clay vessels and alabaster jars and copper ornaments placed carefully beside them. Shah Tepe is not monumental. It has no palace, no inscription, no famous king. It has something rarer - the intimate details of ordinary lives lived and ended on this plain across four thousand years.

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Image: User:Fabienkhan | CC BY-SA 2.5

]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/w/d/shah-tepe-wp/tnwd-shah-tepe-buried-lives-on-the-gorgan-plain-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Shah Tepe: Buried Lives on the Gorgan Plain: Reading the Layers https://qualla.com/shah-tepe/ Photo credit User:Fabienkhan, CC BY-SA 2.5. Archaeologists divide Shah Tepe into three periods, numbered from top to bottom in the reverse of time. Shah III, the deepest and oldest layer, belongs to the Chalcolithic period - the Copper Age, when metalworking was new and settlements on the Gorgan Plain were already well est...

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Image: User:Fabienkhan | CC BY-SA 2.5

]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/w/d/shah-tepe-wp/tnwd-shah-tepe-buried-lives-on-the-gorgan-plain-reading-the-layers.mp3 0:06 2 full Shah Tepe: Buried Lives on the Gorgan Plain: The Dead Beneath the Floor https://qualla.com/shah-tepe/ Photo credit User:Fabienkhan, CC BY-SA 2.5. The prehistoric inhabitants of Shah Tepe buried their dead beneath the floors of their houses. This was not unusual in the ancient Near East - many Neolithic and Bronze Age communities kept their dead close, perhaps believing the deceased remained part of the household. Of the 17...

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]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/w/d/shah-tepe-wp/tnwd-shah-tepe-buried-lives-on-the-gorgan-plain-the-dead-beneath-the-floor.mp3 0:06 3 full Shah Tepe: Buried Lives on the Gorgan Plain: The Collective Grave https://qualla.com/shah-tepe/ Photo credit User:Fabienkhan, CC BY-SA 2.5. One burial stood apart from all the others. Five individuals had been placed together in a single grave, their bodies showing signs of mutilation. Offerings of sheep and goats accompanied them. Arne's published account does not elaborate on what kind of violence these five people...

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]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/w/d/shah-tepe-wp/tnwd-shah-tepe-buried-lives-on-the-gorgan-plain-the-collective-grave.mp3 0:06 4 full Shah Tepe: Buried Lives on the Gorgan Plain: A Swedish Expedition on Persian Soil https://qualla.com/shah-tepe/ Photo credit User:Fabienkhan, CC BY-SA 2.5. T.J. Arne's expedition to Shah Tepe was part of a broader Swedish archaeological campaign in Iran during 1932 and 1933. The excavated materials - pottery, ornaments, skeletal remains, field photographs - were shipped to Stockholm, where they are housed today at the Museum of Medi...

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]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/w/d/shah-tepe-wp/tnwd-shah-tepe-buried-lives-on-the-gorgan-plain-a-swedish-expedition-on-persian-soil.mp3 0:06 5 full