Description : Ulug Depe is an ancient Bronze Age site in the foothills of the Kopet Dag Mountains in the Karakum Desert of Kaka District (Kaahka) in the Ahal Province of south-eastern Turkmenistan. It covers around 13 hectares and lies on a mound at a height of about 30 meters, displaying the longest stratigraphic sequence of Central Asia, from the Late Neolithic, represented by Jeitun culture, until the pre-Achaemenid period. Excavations in the Late Bronze layers also found a "pressure set" for making soma drink. This set, similar to those found in Gonur Depe, "... consisted of a huge stone mortar and a pestle, a pressing stone with a half-spheric projection in its centre, and next to it a similar one with a half-spheric deepening." Gonur Depe seems to be the central city on the ancient Oxus civilization, also known as the Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex, from about 2000 BCE.
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