Remnants of what is believed to be part of an 5,000-year-old throne made from adobe have been discovered by archaeologists working at an excavation site in eastern Turkey, and the find could help establish when governmental powers became secularized in that nation.
The base of this purported throne was unearthed during excavations in Aslantepe in the Turkish province of Malatya. According to Discovery News, it consists of a platform made from earth and organic material that was raised by three steps above the surface. Burnt wooden pieces were found on top of the structure as well.
“The burnt wooden fragments are likely the remains of a chair or throne,” Marcella Frangipane from La Sapienza University in Rome, the director of the ongoing excavation, explained. “It’s the world’s first evidence of a real palace and it is extremely well preserved, with walls standing two meters high.”
Frangipane and her colleagues believe that the complex, which includes a pair of temples along with storage rooms, several other buildings, and a large entrance corridor, dates back to between 3350 to 3100 AC (fourth millennium BC). Some of the walls in the complex are decorated with black and red motifs and have geometrical impressed patterns.
Evidence of a shift in power from church to state
“In the past two campaigns we found a large courtyard which can be reached through the corridor. On the courtyard stands a monumental building,” said Frangipane said. It was inside this building that she found the adobe platform, standing within a small room that opened out into the courtyard.
The archaeologists believe that the discovery represents one of the earliest pieces of evidence of the birth of the state-led political system, and that the king or chief would have appeared in this throne room to give an audience to members of the public who had gathered in the courtyard.
A pair of low, small adobe platforms were also discovered in front of the platform believed to be where the throne stood, and the team believes that these were constructed for people to stand on while appearing before the king. These remains, Frangipane told Discovery News, are the first evidence of a transition in power from the church to a secular government.
“This reception courtyard and building were not a temple complex, they rather appear as the heart of the palace. We do not have religious rites here, but a ceremony showing the power of the ‘king’ and the state,” she explained. “The state governing system was already in progress here.”
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Feature Image: Marcella Frangipane
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