Assyrian site in northern Iraq

Archeologists working in northern Iraq have discovered a new Assyrian site in the vicinity of the historic Arbil city center, the head of the antiquities office in the Kurdish Province of Arbil, Haydar Hassan, was quoted as saying in an Iraqi newspaper.

The Assyrian civilization flourished in northern Iraq between 1000-700 B.C., archeologists were led to discover the site when they exhumed a burial ground, complete with mud brick grave heads.

To further unearth this site the foreign archeological team had to study and remove two more layers of civilization under which the Assyrian structure was buried, according to a report published by Iraq's al-Zaman on Monday.

The excavations have shown that the Assyrian graves were covered by remains belonging to the Sassanid Persian Dynasty that ruled Iraq before being dislodged by Muslim Arab tribes from the Arabian desert in the 7th century A.D., said Haydar Hassan.

So far only the brick arches and corridors of the Assyrian layer have been brought to the surface.

Although archaeological teams from Italy, the U.S., Germany, Holland, Poland and Greece are currently working in northern Iraq, Hassan did not say which foreign archaeologists were working on the newly discovered Assyrian site in Arbil.

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