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An archaeologist digging in the rubble of a distant past counts on the conqueror's havoc, nature's upheavals and plain human negligence to have left legacies of unintended value -- like a fragment of a clay tablet bearing archaic writing from an early period of state formation in Greece, more than 3,400 years ago. Had it not been for some inadvertence, the tablet would almost certainly have disintegrated in the rain in a year or two and scattered with the wind as so much illiterate dust. The tablet seems to be a ''page'' from a bookkeeper's note pad. Not meant to be saved as a permanent record, it was not baked in a kiln , but ended up in a refuse dump, where a fire hardened the clay for posterity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

CHICAGO -- One of the stars of the Oriental Institute's new show, ''Visible Language: Inventions of Writing in the Ancient Middle East and Beyond,'' is a clay tablet that dates from around 3200 B.C. On it, written in cuneiform, the script language of ancient Sumer in Mesopotamia, is a list of professions, described in small, repetitive impressed characters that look more like wedge-shape footprints than what we recognize as writing. In fact ''it is among the earliest examples of writings that we know of so far,'' according to the institute's director, Gil J. Stein, and it provides insights into the life of one of the world's oldest cultures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WASHINGTON -- The unlikely journey of 362 cuneiform clay tablets and plaques began in ancient Iraq as far back as 2030 B.C. But they would pass through modern Dubai and Newark, survive a government seizure and the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, before finally winding up back at their birthplace, fittingly, almost nine years to the day after 9/11. In March 2001, the Customs Service was investigating a New York gallery suspected of dealing in illicit art and antiquities when agents got a tip that two boxes containing ''clay objects'' from Syria were being smuggled into the country from Dubai. When inspectors examined the shipment at Newark they found the cuneiform tablets, each one smaller than a deck of cards, and an expert verified that they had been looted from southern Iraq. That summer, the tablets were placed where all seized items were then stored -- in a vault in the basement of the United States Customs House at 6 World Trade Center. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information related to the auction of a 4000-year-old clay tablet, which is said to have been illegally smuggled from Iraq, in Switzerland. Swiss authorities foiled the sale of the clay tablet after receiving a tip from a German archaeologist. According to the authorities, criminal proceedings have been started against the seller--a Zurich resident.

Reports that mobs of treasure hunters are tearing into Iraqi archeological sites, stealing urns, statues, vases, and cuneiform tablets. Age of the artifacts; History of the region; Comments from archaeologists; Artifacts that are being sold; Sites in Iraq that are in danger.