The Oxus civilisation
A monumental culture in Central Asia, unknown to archaeology until the 1970s.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 500 years
- Known to
- ± 100 years
- Era
- Bronze Age, Holocene
The Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex, in modern Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Afghanistan, builds heavily fortified rectangular compounds with monumental gates from around 2200 BCE, works gold, silver and lapis, and trades with the Indus, Iran and Mesopotamia. It was essentially unknown until Soviet excavations, and its discovery filled in a major blank on the map between the great river civilisations.