Mace head ca. 4500-2900 B.C. Iran This stone mace head, now broken, would have originally been affixed to a wooden shaft. The lack of decoration suggests it was purely functional in nature. It was excavated in 1937 at a prehistoric site in the vicinity of Nishapur in northeastern Iran. While Nishapur itself was founded by the Sasanian king Shapur I (reigned ca. A.D. 241-272), this object shows that human habitation there goes back to the prehistoric period. Furthermore, the prehistoric pottery from Nishapur has close affinities with ceramic materials from Central Asia rather than with contemporary sites in Iran, meaning that in this period its inhabitants were likely culturally linked to their neighbors to the east. Indeed, a very similar stone mace head was excavated at Anau in Turkmenistan in 1904. Nishapurs location on what later became known as the Great Khorasan Road suggests that it was part of the trade network that facilitated the import of precious stones such as lapis lazuli