Nisa
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How it came to be
About 18 kilometres west of Ashgabat in Turkmenistan, at the foot of the Kopet Dag mountains, lie two mounds, Old and New Nisa. This was one of the earliest capitals of the Parthians, who dominated Central Asia from the mid-3rd century BC to the early 3rd century AD.
Tradition credits its founding to Arsaces I, and Mithridates I later renamed it Mithradatkert. It was a hub of trade between east and west and north and south, and a barrier to Roman expansion.
Excavations have uncovered richly decorated buildings, mausoleums, shrines, many documents and ivory rhytons, showing a civilisation that mixed its own traditions with Hellenistic and Roman elements. Much of the site is still unexcavated. It was inscribed in 2007.
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