The autumn field campaign of the Togolok Archaeological Project (TAP) in Turkmenistan has recently been completed with great success, the Italian Embassy in Turkmenistan reports.
Togolok 1 is a Bronze Age settlement in the Murghab region, where ancient Margiana (the territory of the modern Mary province) once flourished.
During the expedition, a lot of new evidence and data were obtained, which will be analyzed in the coming months.
These results were made possible thank to the great teamwork led by Barbara Cerasetti and Miroslav Novak (Universitāt Bern), thank the commitment and professionality of each member of the team, and thank to our main partners and sponsors (ISMEO – International Association for Mediterranean and Oriental Studies, German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft), The Society for the Exploration of EurAsia, Max Planck Institute) and the other partners (Freie Universität Berlin, Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Università del Salento, Università di Bologna).
Since 1990, the Italian-Turkmen Archaeological Mission has undertaken numerous research projects in Turkmenistan, including the creation of an archaeological map of the Murghab Delta to study settlements from the Bronze and Iron Ages.
Over the past three decades, the mission has explored an extensive area of more than 20,000 square kilometers, documenting approximately 2,000 sites spanning from the Bronze Age to the Islamic period.
Since 2014, the mission’s focus has shifted to the Togolok-1 site, where they have gathered a vast amount of data on the final stages of life in one of the Murghab region’s most prominent and expansive settlements.
The TAP team’s discoveries will undoubtedly shed light on the cultural and historical evolution of Bronze Age societies in the Murghab region, contributing significantly to our understanding of ancient Margiana.///nCa, 2 December 2023