Democracy can't compete with the history of kings From: The Spectator | Date: October 13, 2007| Author: Williams, Hywel | Copyright Spectator Oct 13, 2007. Provided by ProQuest LLC.Copyright information

Archaeology in north-eastern Syria was once a poor relation to the great sites that lie to the south and over the Iraqi border. Southern Mesopotamia is long established as the area that shows the urban roots of advanced civilisation. Ur may or may not be Abraham's birthplace but by the 3rd millennium BC it was certainly the centre of a sophisticated court society.

Nineveh, lying adjacent to modern Mosul, rivals -- and may surpass -- Ur in antiquity and was an Assyrian centre by the e...

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	Dawn of the city: excavations prompt a revolution in thinking about the earliest cities. Science News ; [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] A massive earthen mound rises majestically and rather mysteriously above agricultural fields in northeastern Syria. From a distance, the more than 130-foot-tall protrusion looks like a jagged set of desolate hills. But up close, broken pottery from a time long past litters

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