The ancient Bronze Age town al-Natah was identified by archaeologists under a Saudi Arabian oasis in the Madinah province, according to a recent study published in the journal PLoS ONE.
The remains are hidden by the walled oasis Khaybar, which is comprised of fertile land surrounded by desert area. Slowly occupied from 2400 BCE until 1500 BCE (at the latest, 1300 BCE), the ancient town was built as the area pivoted from nomadic cattle-herding to permanent settlements.
The town would have been home to roughly 500 residents across 3.7 acres. It contained a central district and nearby residential settlement protected by ramparts. Building foundations at the site were strong enough to support one to two-story dwellings. The city seems to have been abandoned about 1,000 years after it was initially inhabited.
