Heidelberg Center for Cultural Heritage (HCCH) URUK-WARKA COLLECTION OF THE INSTITUTE OF ASSYRIOLOGY

The Uruk-Warka Collection is a permanent loan from the German Archaeological Institute to Heidelberg University and is one of the largest collections of Mesopotamian artifacts in Germany.

The collection houses artifacts from the former metropolis of Uruk, modern Warka. As recorded by the Sumerians, Babylonians, and Assyrians, this southern Mesopotamian city is still regarded today as the cradle of ancient Near Eastern high culture. It is said to have been not only the seat of the legendary King Gilgameš, but also the place where writing was invented in the earliest period on the आदेश of King Enmerkar.

The objects in the Uruk-Warka Collection come from excavations carried out by the German Archaeological Institute in the 1950s and 1960s. With scientifically significant sculptures, ceramics, seals, jewellery, and a wide range of small finds, the collection conveys a representative picture of the settlement history of the southern Mesopotamian city. A collection of approximately 3,000 cuneiform documents also illustrates, with precision, the more than three-thousand-year history of writing in the Ancient Near East.