In ancient times Plutarch wrote of oil bubbling from the ground near Kirkuk, but oil exploration does not begin until the 20th century when the Ottoman Empire granted a concession allowing William Knox D'Arcy to explore oil fields in the territories which, after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, became the modern countries of Iran and Iraq. Though the company, called African and Eastern Concession Ltd, was unable to find oil at first, D'Arcy and other European partners founded the Turkish Petroleum Company (TPC) in 1912.