Sumerian materials found in box at British University

LONDON - The Associated Press

The Sumerian materials discovered in a box in Ur are on display. AP photo

The things you find when you do a good clear out. Bristol University in Britain learned this when researchers discovered a box containing materials from archaeologist Sir Leonard Woolley’s dig of the Sumerian city of Ur tucked away on top of a cupboard.

Researchers determined that the 4,500-year-old contents - consisting of pottery, seeds, and animal bones - had come from a tomb at an excavation in Iraq that was jointly sponsored during the 1920s and 1930s by the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania Museum.

The materials had been analyzed and described in earlier journals - but no one knows how they ended up in Bristol. The materials had been analyzed and described in earlier journals - but no one knows how they ended up in Bristol. Lecturer Tamar Hodos said it’s somewhat like finding a Monet in the attic.