Illegal Excavators Sack Iron Age Cemetery of Sang-Tarashan

News Category: Prehistory (from 8000 - 3400 BCE)

LONDON, (CAIS) - Thirty to forty percent of an Iron Age cemetery at the Sang-Tarashan (Stonemasons) region near the southwestern Iranian city of Khorramabad, the capital of Lorestan Province, has recently been plundered by smugglers, the director of a team tasked to save the site announced on Tuesday.

“The cemetery covers an area of one hectare, and our initial studies indicate that the site dates back to the late Iron Age (850-550 BC). The site has been named Sangtarashan because it’s close to a village of the same name in the neighborhood,” Mehrdad Malekzadeh said.

“The graves are accessible at a depth of about 20 centimeters, and this provided an opportunity for the smugglers to loot artifacts buried along with the bodies,” he added.

With numerous archaeological sites, Khorramabad is one of the world's oldest inhabited cities.