Jul 21, 2010, 12:51 GMT
Amman - A joint Jordanian-German archaeological team has discovered a statue in Jordan's eastern desert that dates back 6,000 years, media reports said Wednesday.
The discovery shed new light on a little-known ancient Bedouin civilization that once thrived in the desert connecting Jordan, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, the Department of Antiquities was quoted as saying.
The 35-centimetre-high statue, nicknamed 'Dalish,' was found near the Jordanian-Saudi border by the team, which is co-led by Hans Georg Gebel of the Free University in Berlin and Hamzeh Mahasneh of the Jordanian Mutah University.
The statue, which has a long nose and a bearded, abstract face, was part of a burial cairn, a mound of stones marking a burial site from the late Chalcolithic era.
Experts believe hundreds of such burial sites were left behind by the nomadic and semi-nomadic prehistoric communities that once roamed the eastern desert.
The director general of the Department of Antiquities, Ziyad al- Saad, called the find an 'important discovery.'
'We have new discoveries daily, but one such as this is important and tells us more about our culture and history,' he said.
The Jordanian-German team has been working for four years in the Hamad area, a stretch in the north-eastern desert that is home to extensive burial cairns and other remnants from ancient Bedouin life.
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