Ebla was a major city in northern Syria, now represented by the mound of Tell Mardikh, south-west of Aleppo. In the third millennium BCE it was the centre of a powerful kingdom that controlled trade between Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean. Italian archaeologists led by Paolo Matthiae began excavating the site in 1964, and in the 1970s they found a royal archive of thousands of clay tablets written in cuneiform in a Semitic language, now called Eblaite, which gave a rare view of the economy and politics of the time. The city was destroyed in around 2300 BCE, possibly by the Akkadian kings Sargon or Naram-Sin, a point scholars debate, and was rebuilt before another destruction.
Before and after
- c. 3,000s BCEThe Austronesian expansion begins from Taiwan
- c. 3,000s BCEYamnaya herders spread across Europe and Asia
- c. 3,000 BCECuneiform
- from c. 3,000 BCE to 1,800 BCEIndus Valley Civilization
- from c. 3,000 BCE to 2,240 BCEEbla
- from 30th century BCE to 18th century BCEMari
- from c. 2,890 BCE to 2,686 BCESecond Dynasty of Egypt
- from c. 2,707 BCE to 2,216 BCEOld Kingdom of Egypt
- from c. 2,700 BCE to 539 BCEElam
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The era
This moment belongs to the Ancient civilizations (3,200 BCE to 500 CE), writing, cities and empires. You can also browse everything in the 30th century BCE.