Baghdad Battery
A set of Parthian-era clay jars holding a copper cylinder and iron rod, popularly dubbed an 'ancient battery' — a label with no archaeological support.
The artifacts are a small group of ceramic jars, about 14 cm tall, associated with the site of Khujut Rabu near Baghdad and generally dated to the Parthian or Sasanian period (roughly 250 BCE–650 CE). Each contained a rolled copper sheet forming a cylinder, with an iron rod suspended inside, the assembly sealed with asphalt. In 1938 Wilhelm König proposed that such a jar could have acted as a galvanic cell — a ‘battery’ — possibly for electroplating. The objects are genuine artifacts; it is only the function that is disputed.
The galvanic-cell reading was seized on as a classic out-of-place artifact. On Ancient Aliens and within the ancient-astronaut hypothesis, the jars are offered as proof that the ancients commanded electricity — sometimes tied to fanciful readings of Egyptian ‘Dendera light’ reliefs.
The archaeological consensus rejects the battery interpretation. No electroplated object is known from the period, and there is no text, image, wiring, or workshop evidence of electrical practice in Parthian or Sasanian culture. The construction works against the theory, and replica ‘batteries’ produce only a fraction of a volt under ideal modern conditions. The likeliest explanation is mundane — the jars resemble known containers for storing sacred scrolls, the iron rod holding a rolled document inside the copper sleeve.