A’ali is a modern town located in the northeastern direction in Bahrain. A’ali town was known among archaeologists since the nineteenth century for its distinctive more than eighty thousand ancient stone tumuli (burial mounds) mostly located in the northern parts of the Island.
According to archaeological excavations reports, which took place at some burials since the beginning of the last century, most of the tumuli is attributed to the late fourth millennium BC down to the first half of the fourth century AD.
Since then up to present times, numerous archaeological activities took place at this promising town, where new shapes and types of tumuli characterised by circle-shaped wall ran around some of the scattered burials.
These discoveries during excavations convinced some archaeologists that these unique burials mounds might contain the remains of royal families or social elites.
After regular excavations at some of the large burials by Mackay in 1925, he described the results of his excavations as following: “In A’ali town Giant Mounds are located around where a person sees mounds higher than the palm trees. The burial chamber in A’ali cemeteries consist of two rooms, one directly on top of the other. These burials built of dried adobe, plastered on the inside and clad with limestone. The walls of the lower room were perpendicular, while those of the upper room were somewhat inclined near the ceiling. The size of the burial would range from small to large. One specific grave was 40 long, 6 feet wide, and 18 feet high. The burial ground surrounded on the outside by a wall of large rocks located several yards from the base of mound. Archaeologists worked here before believe that these burials mounds were built between 2300-2000 B.C.”
In the year 1977, the writer joined a British Museum team working in Bahrain. While the team was working at Diraz area, an ancient temple, attributed to Dilmun era, was found. The writer concentrated his excavations on two adjacent burials (A and B) located in A’ali town. Both burials seemed to contain two semi-subterranean chambers and their entrances were on the southern side.
Fortunately, the latter burial (B), was less disturbed than the first burial, apart from random pits dug in the eastern direction. As excavation continued inside the two chambers grave goods consisting of two small pottery bowls, a bronze bowl and a very fine Dilmun seal (ca.3rd-2nd) millennium BC were unearthed.
The composition of the seal reveal two bull-men with horned bear, dresses holding a standard on which rests a crescent moon beneath a raid disc standing on either side of a cross-hatched square. In the spaces however, there are filling motives consisting of two flags (banners) a jar and a bird.
In additions to this and that in burial B chambers, some 16 human skull and 38 femurs were found. Those remains were good pointers that at least 20 individuals were buried in those two chambers.
With them 16 stone and glass beads, one gold earring, fragments of 8 bronze bowls, 7 bronze bracelets and pottery sherds were unearthed. They all dated back between 800-500 BC, whereas the upper layer of the area of the two burials attributed to the Eleventh Century AD.
At the end of the season, all the found antiquities and the related regular written reports were hand over to the Bahrain Department of Antiquities.
The Peninsula
