Built around 3,000 years ago, Khirbat en-Nahas is one of the largest copper mining and smelting sites of the ancient world.[1] It lies in a desert valley between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba, now in Jordan. There is evidence for sophisticated economic and political activity in the valley about 3,000 years ago and archaeologists think it may be the site of an early organized state.[1]
Archaeologist Thomas Levy of the University of California, San Diego heads a dig at Khirbat en-Nahas that has uncovered an ancient copper mining operation on a scale that he says can only have been organized by "an ancient state or kingdom."[2]