Syria's Ancient Treasures and Archaeological Sites Destroyed

"Krak des Chevaliers castle has been shelled by the Syrian army." Image Source: AFP via Archaeology News Network.

The Archaeology News Network reports that important archaeological sites have been destroyed in fighting between rebels and government forces in Syria (see also: The Independent). The Homs museum, and other government museums, have been looted.

As the devastation of the brewing civil war spreads, remnants of the ancient world and relics of classical knowledge are being wiped away. It is almost as if the turn of history is obliterating the very past in which the previous two Millennia were rooted:

The priceless treasures of Syria's history – of Crusader castles, ancient mosques and churches, Roman mosaics, the renowned "Dead Cities" of the north and museums stuffed with antiquities – have fallen prey to looters and destruction by armed rebels and government militias as fighting envelops the country. While the monuments and museums of the two great cities of Damascus and Aleppo have so far largely been spared, reports from across Syria tell of irreparable damage to heritage sites that have no equal in the Middle East. Even the magnificent castle of Krak des Chevaliers – described by Lawrence of Arabia as "perhaps the best preserved and most wholly admirable castle in the world" and which Saladin could not capture – has been shelled by the Syrian army, damaging the Crusader chapel inside. ...

Reports from Syrian archeologists and from Western specialists in bronze age and Roman cities tell of an Assyrian temple destroyed at Tell Sheikh Hamad, massive destruction to the wall and towers of the citadel of al-Madiq castle – one of the most forward Crusader fortresses in the Levant which originally fell to Bohemond of Antioch in 1106 – and looting of the magnificent Roman mosaics of Apamea, where thieves have used bulldozers to rip up Roman floors and transport them from the site. Incredibly, they have managed to take two giant capitols from atop the colonnade of the "decumanus", the main east-west Roman road in the city.

In many cases, armed rebels have sought sanctuary behind the thick walls of ancient castles only to find that the Syrian military have not hesitated to blast away at these historical buildings to destroy their enemies. Pitched battles have been fought between rebels and Syrian troops amid the "Dead Cities", the hundreds of long-abandoned Graeco-Roman towns that litter the countryside outside Aleppo, which once formed the heart of ancient Syria. Syrian troops have occupied the Castle of Ibn Maan above the Roman city of Palmyra and parked tanks and armoured vehicles in the Valley of the Tombs to the west of the old city. The government army are reported to have dug a deep defensive trench within the Roman ruins. ...

There is, of course, a moral question about our concern for the destruction of the treasures of history. Common humanity suggests that the death of a single Syrian child amid the 19,000 fatalities of Syria's tragedy must surely carry more weight than the plundering and erasure of three thousand years of civilisation. True. But the pulverisation and theft of whole cities of history deprives future generations – in their millions – of their birthright and of the seeds of their own lives. Syria has always been known as "the Land of Civilisations" – Damascus and Aleppo are among the world's oldest inhabited cities and Syria is the birthplace of agrarian society – and the terrible conflict now overwhelming the country will deprive us and our descendants of this narrative for ever.

A gold statue of an 8th century BCE Aramaic god was stolen on 14 July 2011 from a museum in Damascus. It was listed on Interpol's December 2011 Most Wanted Works of Art list, but has not been recovered.

The Syrian statue is bottom centre. Image Source: SAFE.