In 1964, Italian archaeologists from the University of Rome La Sapienza under the direction of Paolo Matthiae began excavating at Tell Mardikh.
In 1968, they recovered a statue dedicated to the goddess Ishtar bearing the name of Ibbit-Lim, mentioning him as king of Ebla.
That identified the city, long known from Lagashite and Akkadian inscriptions.
In the next decade, the team discovered a palace (palace G) dating from c. 2500 – 2000 BC.
Finds in the palaces include a small sculpture made out of precious materials, black stones and gold.
Other artifacts included wood furniture inlaid with mother-of-pearl and composite statues created from colored stones.
A silver bowl bearing king Immeya's name was recovered from the "Tomb of the Lord of the Goats", together with Egyptian jewels and an Egyptian ceremonial mace presented by pharaoh Hotepibre.

About 17,000 cuneiform tablet fragments were discovered; when put together, they constitute 2,500 complete tablets, making the archive of Ebla one of the biggest from the third millennium BC.
About 80% of the tablets are written using the usual Sumerian combination of logograms and phonetic signs, while the others exhibited an innovative, purely phonetic representation using Sumerian cuneiform of a previously unknown Semitic language, which was called "Eblaite".
Bilingual Sumerian/Eblaite vocabulary lists were found among the tablets, allowing them to be translated.
The tablets provide many important insights into the cultural, economic and political life in northern Mesopotamia around the middle of the 3rd millennium BC.
They also provide insight into the everyday lives of the inhabitants, and contain information about state revenues, Sumerian-Eblaite dictionaries, diplomatic exchanges with foreign rulers, school texts, hymns and myths.
In 1964, Italian archaeologists from the University of Rome La Sapienza under the direction of Paolo Matthiae began excavating at Tell Mardikh. In 1968, they recovered a statue dedicated to the goddess Ishtar bearing the name of Ibbit-Lim, mentioning him as king of Ebla. That identified the city, long known from Lagashite and Akkadian inscriptions. In the next decade, the team discovered a palace (palace G) dating from c. 2500 – 2000 BC. Finds in the palaces include a small sculpture made out of precious materials, black stones and gold. Other artifacts included wood furniture inlaid with mother-of-pearl and composite statues created from colored stones. A silver bowl bearing king Immeya's name was recovered from the "Tomb of the Lord of the Goats", together with Egyptian jewels and an Egyptian ceremonial mace presented by pharaoh Hotepibre.
About 17,000 cuneiform tablet fragments were discovered; when put together, they constitute 2,500 complete tablets, making the archive of Ebla one of the biggest from the third millennium BC. About 80% of the tablets are written using the usual Sumerian combination of logograms and phonetic signs, while the others exhibited an innovative, purely phonetic representation using Sumerian cuneiform of a previously unknown Semitic language, which was called "Eblaite". Bilingual Sumerian/Eblaite vocabulary lists were found among the tablets, allowing them to be translated. The tablets provide many important insights into the cultural, economic and political life in northern Mesopotamia around the middle of the 3rd millennium BC. They also provide insight into the everyday lives of the inhabitants, and contain information about state revenues, Sumerian-Eblaite dictionaries, diplomatic exchanges with foreign rulers, school texts, hymns and myths.
Ebla