From an article at the Oregonian:
Posted on May 14, 2003 11:04 AM. Filed under: history & archaeology.Amid the ruined temples of a civilization abandoned 4,000 years ago in southern Iraq, archaeologists on a 1968 expedition noted a striking parallel: Fragments of the long-extinct Sumerian civilization they were unearthing seemed to depict the present-day lives of the nearby tribal people.
They speared fish from slender wooden boats, herded water buffalo and fashioned fantastic vaulted houses from the few building materials the marshes had to offer: reeds, clay and buffalo dung.
Their secluded villages dotted the vast marshes and stream-braided lower reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Dwellings and barns straddled the waters on fixed islands laboriously constructed from layer upon layer of hand-woven reed matting and mud. [continue] [Update: sorry, article no longer available.]