ONE month after the looting of the National Museum of Iraq in Baghdad, it is clear that the consequences will be devastating. The plunder is already being compared to the legendary destruction of the Great Library of Alexandria centuries ago.

But the losses that will wound archaeologists most deeply are not the stunning sculptures whose photos have filled newspapers since the looting. These great artistic treasures have already been studied closely by archaeologists, and there is little more to learn from them. The greatest loss lies in the mass of information recorded in thousands of cuneiform tablets and other small artefacts that have been reported missing.

These items formed one of the most comprehensive records of the lives and thoughts of Mesopotamian people thousands of years ago. "What's really interesting about this civilisation is not the high art," says Paul Zimansky, a specialist in Mesopotamian antiquities at Boston University. "Most ...