Mysterious tombs discovered on Pamirs Plateau [ interior of China ]

Xinhua ^ | Wednesday, October 12, 2011 | unattributed

[SunkenCiv]

Chinese archaeologists have discovered an unidentified cluster of tombs on the Pamirs Plateau, unveiling a new mystery on the crossroads of the ancient Silk Road.

Eights tombs, each two meters in diameter, were arranged on a 100-meter-long and 50-meter-wide terrace, with lines of black stones and lines of white stones stretching alongside like rays, according to the archaeology team with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences that found the tombs in Xinjiang's Taxkorgan Tajik Autonomous County, a border region neighboring Afghanistan and Pakistan, in October.

"The tombs are peculiar. No similar ones had been detected before on the Pamirs Plateau, or even in all of Central Asia," team captain Wu Xinhua said, adding that the discovery shows a gap between their knowledge and studies, and previous findings along the Silk Road.

Wu believes that the ray-like stone strings might imply sun worship, but he admitted his assumption lacked sufficient evidence.

But the archaeology team is quite certain that people buried in the tombs had dignified social statuses as the black stones were carried from afar and the terrace for the tomb platform would have been a rare land resource in the area.

Located at the intersection of eastern and western cultures, the tomb cluster could reflect a deep historical background, Wu said.

A local archaeologist said local nomads spotted an additional three similar tomb clusters in the township where the archaeology team discovered the tombs with ray-like stones.

[SunkenCiv]

Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, Pamir Plateau on the Pakistan-China border

[SunkenCiv]

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[vladimir998]

Hmmmm... I wonder if the Tocharians got that far.

[ClearCase_guy]

H.P. Lovecraft occasionally discussed the dread Plateau of Leng which was (sometimes) said to be in Central Asia.

That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.

[muawiyah]

The Tocharians undoubtedly went anywhere they wished once they figured out how to USE the Silk Road.

[Mike Darancette]

Plateau of Leng East of Mountains of Madness.

[Bellflower]

But the archaeology team is quite certain that people buried in the tombs had dignified social statuses as the black stones were carried from afar...

Have they dug up graves or found the remains of dead people? The article didn't say so I am not sure how they know that they are tombs. In either event it has been postulated that the Israelites that were scattered abroad from the Northern Kingdom migrated through this area and The Bible says that they were told to place waymarks on the routes that they were taking so that someday they could return back to Israel.

___________________________________________________ Jer 31:21 Set thee up waymarks, make thee high heaps: set thine heart toward the highway, [even] the way [which] thou wentest: turn again, O virgin of Israel, turn again to these thy cities.

___________________________________________________ Isa 43:5 Fear not: for I [am] with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west;

Isa 43:6 I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back: bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth;

[SunkenCiv]

The exiled tribes removed from Israel by the Assyrians were scattered; some were sent into the Crimea, and possibly Colchis (Herodotus remarks about the practice of circumcision there); but the smoking guns of course are the Pillars of Ashoka (3rd c BC) two or three of which are inscribed in Aramaic — in what is now Afghanistan.

[SunkenCiv]

Or came from there?

[blam]

"Or came from there? "

Now you're talking.

[SunkenCiv]