The Dil­mun Bur­ial Mounds, built between 2200 and 1750 BCE, span over 21 archae­o­log­i­cal sites in the west­ern part of the island. Six of these sites are bur­ial mound fields con­sist­ing of a few dozen to sev­er­al thou­sand tumuli. In all there are about 11,774 bur­ial mounds, orig­i­nal­ly in the form of cylin­dri­cal low tow­ers. The oth­er 15 sites include 17 roy­al mounds, con­struct­ed as two-storey sepul­chral tow­ers. The bur­ial mounds are evi­dence of the Ear­ly Dil­mun civ­i­liza­tion, around the 2nd mil­len­ni­um BCE, dur­ing which Bahrain became a trade hub whose pros­per­i­ty enabled the inhab­i­tants to devel­op an elab­o­rate bur­ial tra­di­tion applic­a­ble to the entire pop­u­la­tion. These tombs illus­trate glob­al­ly unique char­ac­ter­is­tics, not only in terms of their num­ber, den­si­ty and scale, but also in terms of details such as bur­ial cham­bers equipped with alcoves.