The ancient Mesopotamian city of Ur was excavated by C. Leonard Woolley between 1922 and 1934. Much of his focus was on the Royal Cemetery, particularly those excavations in the early Dynastic period between ca. 2600 and 2450 BC. Among these interments were 16 'royal tombs' that included evidence of the deaths of retainers—multiple simultaneous burials of people thought to have been sacrificed at the time of the ruler's death. One tomb, called the "Tomb of Death" or "Great Death Pit" held over seventy of these retainers.
This photo essay is on Woolley's excavations, with images provided by the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, in celebration of their 2009-2010 exhibition, Iraq's Ancient Past.
