Jiroft

The Jan/Feb 2021 issue of National Geographic's "History" magazine contains a fascinating article about evidence of a possible lost civilisation near Jiroft in modern-day Iran. I say possible because there is debate about at least some of the items (if they belong to known civs, if any were faked to fool the antiquities market). But the argument for is pretty compelling. And whether the dig site turns out to be the city of Aratta mentioned in Sumerian poems, the kingdom of Marhasi referenced in Akkadian records or neither of those, the people *appear* to have had a unique culture and written language, and I'm excited to learn more about them.

If you can't access the mag, the same basic info (though not as well told and minus the stunning photography) may be found in this Wikipedia entry -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiroft_culture