Uruk is where the story of the city begins. Around 3500 BC, on the Euphrates plain in what is now southern Iraq, a settlement grew into a place of tens of thousands of people, with temples, workshops and a priestly administration, and within a few hundred years the people of Uruk had invented writing. The earliest clay tablets, pressed with simple signs for grain, beer and sheep, come from here, and cuneiform grew out of them. The city was also the home, in legend, of Gilgamesh, a king said to have built its walls, which ran for some nine kilometres and which the epic that bears his name describes with pride.
Today, the site is a vast field of low mounds and trenches in the flat desert, a few tens of kilometres from As-Samawah, and it is listed by UNESCO as part of the Ahwar of Southern Iraq. The remains of the White Temple, on a platform raised above the plain, are about five thousand years old, and the huge ziggurat of the god Anu dominates the skyline. The Euphrates once flowed past the city and has long since moved away, leaving the ruins in dry, hard ground that ripples with heat. Wind carries pale dust across the tracks.
The ride is long, flat and exposed. The road from As-Samawah runs across the plain through scrubby farmland and salt pans, with little shade and long straight stretches. Summer temperatures often exceed fifty degrees, and the tarmac is hard on tyres, so travel between November and March. Sandstorms can arise quickly, and in winter the roads can be waterlogged. Before you plan, check travel advice, because access to archaeological sites and security conditions differ and can change.
As-Samawah, a city of about 150,000, is the nearest place for fuel, food and lodging, about thirty-three kilometres away, and the sensible thing is to fill up there and carry water. There are no facilities at the site, and a guard may ask to see permission, so find out in advance how to visit. The marshes of southern Iraq, home to the Marsh Arabs and to water buffalo, lie further east, and make a wonderful side trip if conditions allow.