Atlit Yam, Israel’s Submerged Neolithic Village
Hanay/Wikimedia CommonsAtlit Yam is an ancient village that was likely abandoned and lost beneath the waters off the coast of Israel around 6300 B.C.E.
Atlit Yam, located near Haifa, Israel, dates back to roughly 7000 B.C.E., making it one of the world’s oldest sunken civilizations. The ancient village once covered nearly 10 acres of land, but today, it sits beneath up to 40 feet of water.
Despite the fact that Atlit Yam has been sitting on the seafloor for some 8,000 years, the settlement is eerily well-preserved. Some of its structures, including a 35-foot-deep well, are still standing. What’s more, the skeletons of Atlit Yam’s ancient residents remain undisturbed in their graves.
The village sat unnoticed and undisturbed beneath the water for millennia. Then, in 1984, marine archaeologist Ehud Galili spotted the ruins of the sunken city while searching for shipwrecks.
Since then, a number of fascinating artifacts have been discovered at the site, ranging from animal bones to massive 1,300-pound stone megaliths arranged in a semicircle. In 2008, the remains of a woman and child who had suffered from tuberculosis were found at Atlit Yam. According to the CDC, these represent the first known cases of the disease.
Overall, Atlit Yam has presented historians with remarkable new insight into ancient life, suggesting that prehistoric humans were more advanced than we think.
