Our Earth's History

Timeline: Ancient world

3500 BC – 800 BC · 54 articles, earliest first. Browse this era by continent.

  1. 3500 BC · Central AsiaA gold necklace, a lead ingot: Sarazm on the Zeravshan, 1976 or 1979
  2. 3300 BC · West AsiaUruk, the early city whose first writing was bookkeeping
  3. 3000 BC · East AsiaTen dams and a levee before the walls: Liangzhu, 5,100 years ago
  4. 2600 BC · The AmericasHow did the Americas' oldest city rise on cotton, fish and no pottery?
  5. 2560 BC · AfricaThe Great Pyramid's six minutes of arc from true north
  6. 2560 BC · AfricaWho really built the pyramids, and how?
  7. 2500 BC · EuropeHow do we know Stonehenge's Altar Stone came from Scotland?
  8. 2500 BC · South AsiaMohenjo-daro's house drains, street sewers and two brick toilets
  9. 2500 BC · South AsiaSixty-one samples, one genome: the Rakhigarhi woman I6113
  10. 2500 BC · South AsiaTen Indus signs, one signboard: Dholavira and its excavator
  11. 2500 BC · South AsiaThe Indus cities without a visible king
  12. 2500 BC · South AsiaWhy can't anyone read the Indus script?
  13. 2400 BC · South AsiaShips or shadufs: Lothal's 219-meter brick basin in Gujarat
  14. 2300 BC · Central AsiaMillet, wheat and barley in a herders' grave: Begash, 2300 BC
  15. 2300 BC · West AsiaRoom L.2769 at Ebla and the palace archive found in 1975
  16. 2300 BC · West AsiaWho was Enheduanna, the first author whose name we know?
  17. 2279 BC · West AsiaHow was the world's first empire born? Sargon of Akkad in his own inscriptions
  18. 2250 BC · West AsiaNaram-Sin of Akkad, the king his own city made a god
  19. 2100 BC · East AsiaThirteen pillars and a lacquer stick at Taosi, read as a sun calendar
  20. 2000 BC · Central AsiaA reservoir that was never filled: Arkaim, southern Urals, 1987–1991
  21. 2000 BC · OceaniaBananas at 1,550 meters: the drained gardens of Kuk Swamp, New Guinea
  22. 2000 BC · Central AsiaGonur Depe: the Bronze Age city the Karakum desert hid until 1974
  23. 2000 BC · West AsiaHow old is the Epic of Gilgamesh, and how does it end?
  24. 2000 BC · The AmericasTwo crossed-hands reliefs at Kotosh: University of Tokyo digs, 1960
  25. 1900 BC · Central AsiaOnly a local ancestry: the Xiaohe mummies and the 2021 genome study
  26. 1700 BC · EuropeA real godsend, and controversial: Evans's concrete at Knossos
  27. 1700 BC · East AsiaIs Erlitou China's first dynasty, or a city no one can name?
  28. 1600 BC · EuropeAkrotiri: a town under the ash of Thera, and a date no one agrees on
  29. 1600 BC · EuropeDug up July 4, 1999, seized in Basel in 2002: the Nebra Sky Disc
  30. 1550 BC · EuropeA telegram to King George: Schliemann's gold at Mycenae, 1876
  31. 1500 BC · OceaniaMore than 2,000 km of open sea: the Mariana Islands, about 1500 BC
  32. 1500 BC · The AmericasNearly 2 million cubic yards by the basketful: Poverty Point, 1700 BC
  33. 1350 BC · AfricaClay letters to the pharaoh: the Amarna tablets found in 1887
  34. 1323 BC · AfricaWhy did Tutankhamun's tomb hold 130 walking sticks?
  35. 1323 BC · AfricaWhy did Tutankhamun's tomb stay hidden until 1922?
  36. 1300 BC · EuropeCopper, tin and glass off Uluburun: a Bronze Age cargo, 1982
  37. 1300 BC · OceaniaStilt posts in a lagoon: the Lapita village at Talepakemalai, Mussau
  38. 1259 BC · West AsiaA silver tablet in year 21: Ramesses II and Hattusili III make peace
  39. 1200 BC · East AsiaA name on the bronzes: the unlooted tomb of Fu Hao, Anyang, 1976
  40. 1200 BC · East AsiaWho made the bronze giants of Sanxingdui, and why bury them?
  41. 1200 BC · East AsiaWhy were China's oldest records sold as medicine in 1899?
  42. 1190 BC · West AsiaTablets from Ras Shamra, 1929: Schaeffer, Bauer and Ugarit's alphabet
  43. 1177 BC · West AsiaWho were the Sea Peoples? The Medinet Habu year 8 text lists five
  44. 1000 BC · OceaniaA skull in Pot 2: the Teouma Lapita cemetery, Vanuatu, 2004 to 2020
  45. 1000 BC · The AmericasSeventeen heads, five to fifty tons: the Olmec portraits in basalt
  46. 1000 BC · OceaniaWho reached the remote Pacific first, and how did they get there?
  47. 930 BC · OceaniaThe Ferry Berth site: Samoa's one Lapita deposit, under a lagoon floor
  48. 900 BC · The AmericasWhat was the Cascajal Block, the 62-sign stone from Veracruz?
  49. 850 BC · EuropeMust Farm: Bronze Age stilt houses that burned into a river
  50. 800 BC · The AmericasTwenty shell trumpets in a gallery: Chavín de Huántar, 2001 to 2025
  51. 650 BC · Central AsiaArzhan 2 in Tuva: a man, a woman, 14 horses and 40 pounds of gold
  52. 1871 · West AsiaWas Troy real? Nine layers at Hisarlık and a kingdom called Wilusa
  53. 1872 · West AsiaHow a clay tablet shook Victorian Britain, December 3, 1872
  54. 1922 · AfricaWhat did Howard Carter see by candlelight in Tutankhamun's tomb?