Archaeologists restore ancient tomb

Al Ain: Archaeologists have restored an ancient tomb, dating back to the third millennium BC, in Hili Archaeology Park of Al Ain, in an effort to preserve the findings.

The project took three weeks for a team of UAE and French archaeologists, said Dr Walid Yasin, supervisor of the project and also a senior official of Al Ain Department of Antiquities.

"It is one of the 12 tombs in the necropolis of Hili," he said, adding that they were built during the Umm Al Nar period that started around 2,700 BC and ended around 2,000 BC.

The tombs were discovered some 30 years ago, said Dr Yasin. The tomb is circular in shape with four sections in which the dead were buried crouched. Its diameter is about seven metres and it is covered with a stone-made wall.

Burial

The burial has two entrances. He said old stones and mud were used to restore the tomb.

Dr Yasin said the number of people buried in each tomb increased with time, from tens to hundreds of people by the end of the third millennium. Inhumations took place as people died, over a period difficult to estimate, but which would probably not have exceeded two centuries.

The original excavations produced a huge amount of disarticulated and fragmented human remains mixed with hundreds of pottery vessels and other objects, some of which are now on display in Al Ain Museum.

The village of Hili, which spread over more than 10 hectares, was organised around big towers, made of unbaked bricks and reaching 20 metres in diameter.

As the tombs were very visible in the landscape, he said, they were often dismantled [in order to reuse stones) and robbed.