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Forget Stonehenge: the first known massive monuments are much older

The Arabian Peninsula is dotted with hundreds of mysterious structures dating to the sixth millennium BC.
Three monumental mustatils

Remnants of three monumental structures called mustatils crown a rocky outcrop on the border of the Khaybar and Al-Ula counties in Saudi Arabia. Credit: AAKSA and Royal Commission for AlUla

Cattle herders on the Arabian Peninsula built the world’s first large-scale monuments some 7,000 years ago, more than 4 millennia before the ancient Egyptians built the pyramids or Stonehenge rose on Britain’s plains.

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Nature 593, 171 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-01158-w

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