Tillia Tepe

Tillya tepe, Tillia tepe or Tillā tapa (Persian: طلا تپه‎‎) or (literally "Golden Hill" or "Golden Mound") is an archaeological site in the northern Afghanistan province of Jowzjan near Sheberghan, excavated in 1978 by a Soviet-Afghan team led by the Greek-Russian archaeologist Viktor Sarianidi, a year before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The hoard is often known as the Bactrian gold.

The hoard is a collection of about 20,600 ornaments, coins and other kinds of artifacts, made of gold, silver, ivory etc, that were found in six burial mounds (five women and one man) with extremely rich jewelry, dated to around the 1st century BCE. The ornaments include necklaces set with semi-precious stones, belts, medallions and a crown. After its discovery, the hoard went missing during the wars in Afghanistan, until it was "rediscovered" and first brought to public attention again in 2003. A new museum in Kabul is being planned where the Bactrian gold will eventually be kept.

The heavily fortified town of Yemshi-tepe, just five kilometres to the northeast of modern Sheberghan on the road to Akcha, is only half a kilometre from the now-famous necropolis of Tillia-tepe.

Several coins dated up to the early 1st century CE, with none dated later, suggest a 1st-century CE date for the burial. The burial could correspond to Scythian or Parthian tribes dwelling in the area, or may correspond to the extinction of the local Yuezhi royal dynasty after the conquests of all the other xihou or 'princes' in Daxia by Kujula Kadphises. (See Pre-Islamic period of Afghanistan.)

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