Nabonidus: History's First Archaeologist

Nabonidus wasn’t a typical king — he was history’s first archaeologist, 2,500 years before

archaeology existed. In ancient Babylon, while other rulers built palaces and fought wars,

Nabonidus did something unheard of: he went exploring. He crossed deserts, dug into forgotten

cities, and documented ruins that were already thousands of years old in his time.

He studied inscriptions, dated artifacts, and even restored ancient temples with notes explaining

who built them centuries earlier. While the world remembers him as the “last king of

Babylon,” his real legacy is stranger and far more modern: He was the first ruler to treat the

past like a puzzle — to ask who came before us and why civilizations rise