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The Economic Times

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How 4,000 year old business letters helped economists find 11 lost cities

Thousands of 4,000-year-old clay tablets, mostly merchants receipts and complaints about dangerous roads, helped economists estimate where eleven lost Bronze Age cities once stood. Their 2019 study used a standard trade model and found that geography, not farmland, may explain why some cities keep thriving across millennia.

23 Oct 2026 9:07 pm