During the course of the bloody civil war in Syria we have heard of damage to various archaeological sites such as Aleppo and Palmyra. A recent article in The New York Timeshere includes a report specific to Tell Mardikh in northern Syria, about 30 miles SW of Aleppo.

The headline tells the story, “Grave Robbers and War Steal Syria’s History.” An excellent video illustrates what both of these factors (vandalism and war) are doing to destroy the ancient site.

We have previously written about Ebla, and the Ebla tablets, here, and here.

More than 17,000 cuneiform tablets were discovered in 1975. They date to the mid-third millennium B.C. when Ebla was the capital of a great Canaanite empire. Scholars state that there are important affinities between the Eblaite language and biblical Hebrew, both being members of the Northwest Semitic family.

The first golden age of Ebla is dated…