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 The
discovery of the burial place of an adult in a jar in
Gohar Tepe of Mazandaran, has faced the archaeologists
active in this area with new questions.
Gohar Tepe in Mazandaran province is one of the most
important historical sites of Iran. Evidence shows that
from 7000 years ago to the first millennium before Christ,
a lot of people lived in the region, enjoying urban life
structures since 5000 years ago; the discovery of
architectural structures and graves in this region are
evidence of continual life during the later centuries
there.
“Previous to this a kind of jar burial was discovered in
the region, with an infant in it. Due to the discovery we
came to the conclusion that the children might have been
buried in jars within the Iron Age (3450 to 2550 years
ago). Now the recent discovery of the skeleton of an adult
man in the jar faced us with new questions,” says Ali
Mahforouzi, head of excavation team of Gohar Tepe in
Mazandaran.
“The clay remains which have been discovered in the
vicinity of this jar burial indicates that they should
have belonged to the Iron Age, but we have not discovered
any kind of adult jar burial during this period so far,”
added Mahforouzi.
Referring to the discovery of Parthian evidence in the
historical site of Gohar Tepe, Mahforouzi explains that
since such method of burial was common during Parthian
era, it is supposed that adult jar burial dates back to
this historical period but the issue has remained a
mystery due to the remains of clays belonging to Iron Age
in the region.
Regarding the anthropological studies on jar burial,
Farzad Forouzanfar, an anthropologist of the Cultural
Heritage and Tourism Organization of Iran says, “This
way of burial goes back to the Iron Age, but since no
adult jar burial was discovered until now, we can not say
for sure.”
Previous to this archaeologists discovered a 3000-year-old
skeleton with a bronze strap and a semicircle bronze
horseshoe from under its head, which raised a lot of
questions for archaeologist about such an unknown burial
method.
A pair of skeletons belonging to a man and a woman, who
were buried in a joint grave, in Gohar Tepe was another
discovery which brought some questions to the
archaeologists.
Discovery of the cow statuettes in the historical site of
Gohar Tepe proved that the people of the region regarded
cows as holy creatures 3000 years ago.
The excavations in the site started 2 months ago. The
region entered the urbanization phase about 5000 years ago
during which it had close trade relations with the
inhabitants of Mazandaran and Golestan provinces.
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