Longer than Ganga, older than history: Scientists reveal birthplace of Euphrates river

Scientists have traced the Euphrates to the merger of two ancient river systems reshaped by tectonic forces in southern Turkey. The findings connect deep geological change with the fertile Mesopotamian landscape that later supported early civilisations.

In Short

• Researchers dated the river's origins to between 3.6 and 1.6 million years
• Seismic uncovered buried sediments and hidden channels beneath the eastern Mediterranean
• The work began during a search for possible natural gas reserves

The Euphrates River, the waterway that nurtured some of humanity's earliest civilisations, may have formed millions of years earlier than previously understood, according to a new study that has unravelled the ancient origins of one of the world's most influential rivers.

Stretching roughly 2,800 kilometres from Turkey through Syria and Iraq before reaching the Persian Gulf, the Euphrates is longer than India's Ganga and is the longest river in Southwest Asia.

Its fertile floodplains sustained legendary cities such as Uruk, Babylon, Mari and Ur, helping lay the foundations for agriculture, urban life and the world's first writing systems.

Now, scientists have traced the river's birth back between 3.6 million and 1.6 million years ago, long before the rise of these ancient civilisations.

The research, published in Nature Geoscience, reveals that the Euphrates was formed when two separate river systems merged due to powerful tectonic forces reshaping the Taurus Mountains in what is now southern Turkey.

Using advanced seismic imaging, similar in principle to medical ultrasound scans, researchers examined buried sediments and ancient river channels hidden beneath the eastern Mediterranean. Their investigation began while geologists were searching for potential natural gas reserves beneath the seabed.

What they discovered was remarkable.

HOW WAS THE EUPHRATES RIVER BORN?

More than five million years ago, during a dramatic event known as the Messinian Salinity Crisis, large parts of the Mediterranean Sea dried up. At that time, two massive rivers, ancestors of today's Karasu and Murat rivers, flowed independently across Turkey and Syria into the Mediterranean basin.

Scientists found evidence that intense tectonic activity in eastern Anatolia gradually altered the landscape. One river was diverted eastward toward the Gulf region, while the second eventually joined it, creating a single, powerful river system that evolved into the modern Euphrates.

According to the researchers, these ancient rivers may have carried even greater volumes of water than today's Nile and the combined Tigris-Euphrates system.

The findings help explain not only the geological history of the region but also the environmental conditions that later enabled some of the world's first city-states to flourish.

Over millions of years, sediments carried by the Euphrates and Tigris built the fertile Mesopotamian plain, where agriculture expanded, and cuneiform writing emerged.

The study highlights how dramatic geological forces can reshape entire continents and ultimately influence the course of human history.

Without the tectonic upheavals that redirected two ancient rivers millions of years ago, the cradle of civilisation may never have taken shape.

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