One of the world’s oldest maps was etched into a clay tablet likely sometime between 1500 and 1300 B.C. And ever since its discovery, during an 1899 excavation in what’s now Iraq, scholars have argued over how to read it. A bit larger than an adult hand, the map shows the Mesopotamian city of Nippur. For decades, archaeologists thought it was a fairly imprecise depiction of the city, until aerial photographs and further excavations revealed that the 3,500-year-old tablet depicts the ancient city at scale. But how did its creators pull that off? Learn how its creators achieved this level of accuracy: https://on.natgeo.com/44n9f4m

One of the world’s oldest maps was etched into a clay tablet likely sometime between 1500 and 1300 B.C. And ever since its discovery, during an 1899 excavation in what’s now Iraq, scholars have argued over how to read it. A bit larger than an adult hand, the map shows the Mesopotamian city of Nippur. For decades, archaeologists thought it was a fairly imprecise depiction of the city, until aerial photographs and further excavations revealed that the 3,500-year-old tablet depicts the ancient city at scale. But how did its creators pull that off? Learn how its creators achieved this level of accuracy: https://on.natgeo.com/44n9f4m