Heidemarie Koch studied mathematics as her major between 1963 and 1966. Subsequently, she worked was a teacher until 1972 in Hannover.

In 1972, she started Iranian Studies at the University of Gottingen and received her doctorate in 1976. The topic of her dissertation under Walther Hinz was Religious Conditions under Darius I with Reference to the Elamite Tablets of Persepolis. Koch took as her minor subjects Classical Archaeology, Byzantine Art History, and Christian Archaeology.

From 1977 to 1986 she was employed at the Department of Iranian Studies and Near Eastern Archaeology in University of Gottingen. In 1986, at the University of Marburg, she worked on the labor administration and the economy in the Persian heartland at the time of the Achaemenids. Then she taught as a lecturer. In 1990-91 Koch worked on research projects funded by German Research Foundation. Between 1993-94 she taught for two semesters as a substitute professor at the Goethe University in Frankfurt. Since 1995 she is a professor of Iranian Studies in the context of ancient history at the University of Marburg.

Her main subject areas are the Persian history and Persian languages of the pre-Islamic period. She puts special emphasis on the cultural and economic history, the management and the religion. She utilizes both written sources and the archaeological remains. A second research focus is the exploration of Elam and its neighboring regions, especially in terms of the influences that they exerted on the subseq

United Nations General Assembly Resolution 60/7 that established the Holocaust and the United Nations Outreach Programme, also designated 27 January as an annual International Day of Commemoration in memory of the victims of the Holocaust – observed with ceremonies and activities at United Nations Headquarters in New York and at United Nations offices around the world.

NEW YORK, NEW YORK—According to a New York Times report, the Rubin Museum of Art will repatriate to Nepal two wooden sculptures that were determined to have been smuggled from religious sites. The first is the upper section of a seventeenth-century wooden torana, or ornamental gateway, from the Yampi Mahavihara temple complex in Patan, which is located in the south-central Kathmandu Valley. The second, a fourteenth-century wooden carving of a female spirit, or apsara, bearing a garland, was part of an ornamental window at the Itum Bahal monastery in Kathmandu. Both objects had been purchased in private sales. “The proactive response and thoughtful collaboration from the Rubin have positively contributed to Nepal’s national efforts to recover the lost artifacts,” commented Bishnu Prasad Gautam, acting Consul General of Nepal

Published: 12 January ,2022: 09:51 AM GSTUpdated: 17 January ,2022: 12:09 PM GST

Archeologists have uncovered ancient 4,500 year-old highway-like roads in Saudi Arabia that date back to the 3rd millennium BCE where thousands of burial monuments surround the pathways, the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported on Tuesday.

University of Western Australia (UWA) researchers determined that inhabitants of ancient north-west Arabia built long-distance ‘funerary avenues’ that linked oases and pastures, suggesting a high degree of social and economic inter-connectivity.

The findings were published in ‘The Holocene’ journal by the team working under the Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU).

The site was discovered and studied using satellite remote sensing, low altitude aerial photography, ground surveys, excavation and radiometric dating.

The task is being undertaken to “shed light on the lives of the ancient inhabitants of Arabia,” the SPA reported.

The study suggests that complex social horizons existed 4,500 years ago across a huge swathe of the Arabian Peninsula.

An important finding from the study confirms that the densest concentrations of funerary structures are located near permanent water sources.

The direction of the roads suggests that many of these pathways were used to travel between major oases, including those of Khaybar, AlUla and Tayma.

Archeologists discover 4,500 year-old ‘funerary avenues’ and burial monuments in AlUla. (SPA)

Other avenues fade into the landscapes surrounding the oases, possibly meaning that they were used to move herds of domestic animals into nearby pastures during periods of rain, according to SPA.

The UWA team’s work is part of a wider effort that includes 13 archaeological and conservation project teams from around the world collaborating with Saudi experts in AlUla and neighboring Khaybar regions within Saudi Arabia.

“The work done by our archaeological teams in 2021 demonstrates that Saudi Arabia is a home for top-flight science – and we look forward to hosting more research teams in 2022,” declared Amr al-Madani, CEO of RCU.

Projects similar to the UWA team’s work have been ongoing in AlUla for at least three years, according to Dr. Rebecca Foote, Director of Archaeology and Cultural Heritage Research for RCU.

“These articles are just the beginning of many publications that will advance our knowledge of prehistoric to modern times and have significant implications for the wider region,” added Foote.

The new article is the UWA team’s fourth publication in less than a year in a peer-reviewed scientific journal on research at AlUla and Khaybar.

Archeologists discover 4,500 year-old ‘funerary avenues’ and burial monuments in AlUla. (SPA)

In March of 2021, the team reported in the Journal of Field Archaeology that they had discovered the remains of the oldest known domesticated dog in Arabia.

A month later, in April, the team detailed in the journal Antiquity that the monumental structures known as mustatils are much older than previously believed, dating as far back as 5,200 BCE, and appear to have had a ritual function.

In August, in the journal ‘Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy,’ the team dated the pendant-shaped tombs of Khaybar Oasis to the 3rd millennium BCE, marking the first article in a peer-reviewed journal regarding the Bronze Age in Khaybar.

The RCU has embarked on a 15-year working plan to “regenerate AlUla and parts of Khaybar as a leading global destination for cultural and natural heritage,” according to the SPA report.

https://english.alarabiya.net/News/gulf/2022/01/12/Archeologists-discover-4-500-year-old-highways-in-Saudi-Arabia-s-AlUla

According to reports from Iran, floods in fourteen provinces of Iran have caused significant destruction to almost 50% of historical monuments. The flooding has also caused major human and financial losses.

The historical sites and great monuments include some which have been standing for hundreds of years. However, due to a lack of proper care and neglect for the past few decades since the Iranian revolution, they have been damaged and are now further damaged by the effects of floods, earthquakes, and other natural disasters.

Hormozgan Province is one of the provinces affected by the floods. It is said that eight historical monuments have been severely damaged in this province so far. Some of the damaged historical sites include: Hazareh castle, Gorband castle, Kordar castle, Moghayeh castle, the city of Bandar Lengeh, and the Khan castle and bath, which was badly damaged in Bastak city. The Portuguese forts on the island of Hormuz and the Kamiz castle in Rudan have also been damaged by recent rains.

The Anadolu Agency reports that a two-inch marble statuette has been unearthed at central Turkey’s Neolithic site of Çatalhöyük by a team of researchers led by Ali Umut Türkcan of Anadolu University. As many as 8,000 people are thought to have lived at Çatalhöyük, which dates back about 9,000 years. The 8,500-year-old carving looks like a reclining human figure, and similar to artifacts uncovered in previous excavations and identified as depicting a man leaning back on the back of an animal, Türkcan explained. Most of the figurines recovered in this area of the site have depicted women, he added

OSLO, NORWAY—Science Norway reports that a stick and a bone inscribed with runes have been unearthed in Oslo’s Medieval Park, where a carving depicting a king with a falcon on his arm was found last month. The bone, thought to be a piece of a rib from a horse or a cow, bears Norse inscriptions on both sides, according to archaeologist Solveig Thorkildsen of the Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research. The inscription includes a person’s name or nickname, and runes for the word bone, referring to the object itself. Thorkildsen’s colleague, Ingeborg Hornkjøl, was working in wet soil at the site when she discovered the rune stick, which is inscribed on three sides in Latin and in Norse. Runologist Kristel Zilmer of the University of Oslo said that the Latin inscription includes the words manus, or hand, and Domine or Domini, for lord or God, in addition to Bryngjerd, a woman’s name. This inscription may record Bryngjerd’s dedication of her life to the service of God, Zilmer explained. Examination of the artifacts under a microscope should reveal more information, she added.

WROCŁAW, POLAND reports that a team of Polish researchers and specialists from Peru’s National Archaeological Park of Machu Picchu led by Bartłomiej Ćmielewski of Wrocław University of Science and Technology has conducted a lidar survey of the Chachabamba ceremonial complex within Machu Picchu. Several buildings set on a small square, small ritual baths, and a large stone with carved altars, stairs, and a channel for sacrificial liquids are situated in the center of the ceremonial complex. Obtained with a lidar scanning device attached to a drone, the new images of the land surface beneath the cover of tropical forest show several previously unknown structures, according to team member Dominika Sieczkowska of the University of Warsaw. These structures include channels that carried water into the complex from a nearby river and several buildings on the outskirts of the ceremonial complex. “We have a dozen or so small structures erected on the plan of a rectangle and a circle,” Sieczkowska said. “We believe that they were staff residences.” The images suggest these structures had been built with less care than the structures in the center of the complex, she added. Projected water flow through a model of the channels indicates that the supply of water was small and therefore probably for ritual use, Sieczkowska explained. 

https://www.archaeology.org/news/10267-220105-machu-picchu-lidar