Archaeological treasures could become casualties; Much of early civilization's history yet undocumented
By ANDREW MARTON FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM
As the war in Iraq marches into its third week, the combined hammering of armored personnel carriers, tanks and thousand-plus-pound bombs could result in an unintended casualty: several millennia worth of both documented and undiscovered archaeological treasures.
Just beneath the war's battlefields lie a honeycomb of archaeological sites that tell a regional history that stretches from prehistoric man of around 500,000 B.C. through 3500 B.C., when the land of Mesopotamia was cultivating its status as the cradle of civilization, and beyond. Scholars estimate that the country has some 500,000 archaeological sites, only 10,000 of which are fully known and cataloged.
"There are so many archaeological sites in Iraq that it's like a dart game -- wherever you throw a dart, you'll hit a site," said Samuel Paley, an ancient Near East specialist and professor of classics at the University at Buffalo, State University of New York. Iraq, with its archaeological sites and its world-class museums, possesses objects that provide some of the very first evidence of civilization -- including tablets on which writing was first recorded some 5,500 years ago. These tablets, documenting everything from commodities transfers to recipes, serve as a priceless mirror on the Sumerian, Akkadian and Babylonian empires.
"These written records give us a wonderful picture of the past that we couldn't acquire any other way," says Frank Hole, professor of anthropology at Yale University. "They constitute a treasure trove of history just lying in the ground, waiting to be excavated."
Several rich archaeological sites, such as at Tell al-Lahm near Ur, at Assur and at Nasiriyah, could be especially vulnerable to war-related damage. Looting of museums of irreplaceable objects also looms as a possibility.
"And remember that south of Baghdad, near today's village of Babylon, you'll find the remains of the ancient sites of the hanging gardens of Babylon and the remains of (Babylonian king) Nebuchadnezzar's palace," said Timothy Potts, director of the Kimbell Art Museum and a specialist in the art and archaeology of ancient Iraq.
Also running the risk of irreparable damage are Iraq's series of above-ground ancient structures. The Assyrian palaces of Nineveh and Nimrud, the standing minarets of Samarra, the 100-foot vaulted brick arch of the 6th-century A.D. palace at Ctesiphon (the ancient world's largest) and Ur's "ziggurat" platform temple tower dating from 2100 B.C. are all in the areas of combat.
"So many of these sites can be seen from miles away and are clearly important places -- I just hope that people steer clear of them," said John Russell, an Iraqi antiquities specialist at the Massachusetts College of Art. "Unfortunately, it just won't take too many heavy bomb shock waves to bring down something that has stood for 1,400 years."
Museums in combat hot spots Basra, Nasiriyah and Mosul contain such varied artifacts as carved ivory, small statues, inscribed bricks and pottery. Also potentially in the line of fire are the important Assyrian bas-reliefs that line the museum at Mosul.
Before the conflict began, many of Iraq's museum inventories were reportedly transferred to underground storage facilities in Baghdad. Many of the monumental sculptural pieces (12-to-15-feet-high, 40-ton limestone figures of lions and bulls with human heads) are attached to some museum walls and, as a precaution, would be sandbagged.
Of particular concern to many in the archaeological community is the fate of Baghdad's Iraq Museum, the national archaeological and Islamic art museum. This world-class museum, whose antiquities holdings rival those of the British Museum, contains a priceless selection of objects including Neanderthal skulls, thousands of the earliest cuneiform clay tablets, a pure copper head of a king dating from 2300 B.C., and a series of 2500 B.C. royal tomb objects.
"Most of us are very concerned about the cuneiform clay tablets that are held in the museum but haven't been translated and published yet," said Elizabeth Stone, a professor of archaeology at the State University of New York at Stony Brook.
If the war destroys any of Iraq's unique archaeological holdings, it will only compound the considerable loss the country suffered during and after the Persian Gulf War of 1991.
Along with some formidable combat destruction, such as the strafing of the majestic ziggurat temple at Ur, mass burning and looting ensued from the '91 war. This resulted in the theft or destruction of an estimated 4,000 priceless objects from nine Iraqi museums in seven cities.
"We are talking about postwar mobs that broke into the museums, smashing or stealing objects," said McGuire Gibson, an archaeological scholar of Mesopotamia at the University of Chicago.
Specialists have given the Pentagon a list of about 4,000 of Iraq's most vital sites in the hopes that military bombers can avoid them.
TREASURES LOST IN WAR
Works of art and architecture have always been among the victims of war. Here are a few significant examples:
In 1687, the Turks' Ottoman Empire and the Venetians were at war, with the Acropolis under siege. The Turks were using the Parthenon, the renowned temple of Athena on the Acropolis, for weapons storage when a Venetian projectile struck the center of the building, causing massive damage.
In 1860, while Beijing was occupied by British and French troops, Britain's Lord Elgin undertook the burning of the Summer Palace, a collection of beautiful historic buildings outside of the city's center.
The exquisite Monte Cassino monastery in Italy was destroyed and rebuilt on four occasions, the last destruction occurring during World War II when it was caught in crossfire and reduced to rubble in a matter of hours. It has since been rebuilt.
Between April and October 1941, German air raids targeted historically significant English cities such as Bath, with its Roman ruins, and Canterbury.
Caravaggio's precedent-setting "St. Matthew and the Angel" was a major fixture of Berlin's Kaiser-Friedrich Museum. It was destroyed near the end of World War II.
Sarajevo's most important mosque, the 16th-century Gazi Husrev-Beg, was struck by more than 80 shells during the war in Bosnia in the early 1990s.
In 2001, Taliban forces destroyed two monumental fifth-century Buddhas carved into the side of a mountain in Afghanistan.
Ancient Greek tomes donated to library
Dan Barr State Hornet April 02, 2003
A donation of more than 70,000 books valued at $5 million will provide the basis for a new Greek studies center in the library. The collection is one of the largest of its kind and was donated by Angelo Tsakopoulos, a developer who has been building the collection for nearly 20 years.
The Tsakopoulos Hellenic Collection will occupy a wing on the third floor of the library. Though not yet open, the library has worked non-stop to get the collection open to the students.
"We're still checking titles and seeing if any need preservation and putting them on our database," said Tamara Trujillo, the Senior Associate Dean at the library. "We're also tattle-taping and bar-coding them. We're hoping to put the collection on a recall basis by the first of May."
Tattle-taping is the process of placing anti-theft devices into the book, and if the collection is put on a recall basis then students could request a book that would be quickly prepared and brought to the student.
"We're trying to get it totally open for the fall semester," Trujillo said.
The recent acquisition of Greek art to decorate the collection is one more step to opening its doors, but there is still a lot of work to be done. A great deal of the collection still waits to be catalogued and preserved, and the collection still needs to be staffed.
"We've been advertising for a librarian for the section," Trujillo said. "We have a national search for someone who is familiar with the subject and the language."
While the library collection starts to take shape, the Department of Special Collections and University Archives is also at working on the collection. The Tsakopoulos Collection includes a sizable collection of antique books, old documents, photographs and a piano. "We have about 3,000 rare books, some as far back as the early 1500s," said Sheilla O'Neill, head of University Archives and Special Collections. "We also have manuscripts, photographs, little artifacts and newspapers."
The antique books take up about four full shelves of space and include two 16th-century commentaries on Homer's "Odyssey" and an edition of the New Testament edited by Desiderius Erasmus. There are also a number of histories, a collection of cartography, ancient dictionaries and many books in Arabic, German and Classic Greek. Most of the rare books have yet to be researched and preserved.
"We're processing manuscripts, arranging, describing and preserving them in archival folders," O'Neill said.
Many of the photos and documents come from old Greek-American newspapers. Some of it is so brittle that it cannot be handled by students.
"We're trying to see if we can digitize them or get them on microfilm for student use," said Trujillo. "Right now we're afraid to touch them." Most of the damaged books have minor wear, but will likely still have steps taken to keep their condition stable.
"Books with slight damage will be put into containers," said O'Neill. "That will be most of the conservation treatment. Some may have bindings replaced."
The library is looking forward to the eventual opening of the collection and is constantly looking for improvements.
"We've gotten Greek art and posters, we're getting signs to put up. This is going to be a really great section," Trujillo said.
http://www.statehornet.com/
Spanish Police Recover Stolen Dali Painting
Thu April 3, 2003 08:35 AM ET
MADRID (Reuters) - Spanish police said they had recovered a painting by surrealist Salvador Dali on Thursday that was stolen four years ago. "The Motionless Swallow," valued at $323,600, was found in an antique shop in Madrid that had acquired the painting "in good faith" from a Barcelona art dealer, police said in a statement.
The work and a number of antiques had been stolen from a private home in Girona province in the northeastern region of Catalonia, not far from Dali's home town of Figueres.
The painting had been taken to several European countries. Police said the suspects, three Spaniards and two French, would be detained shortly.
One of the suspects attempted to auction the work in London on June 25 last year through Sotheby's auction house, police said.
Dali, one of Spain's greatest painters of the 20th century along with Pablo Picasso and Joan Miro, was also known for his showmanship and flamboyant handlebar mustache. He died in 1989 at age 84.
http://reuters.com/
Hacking through the politics of Angkor
Robert Turnbull The New York Times Friday, April 4, 2003
SIEM REAP, Cambodia Ask visitors to Angkor to name their favorite temple and the answer is invariably Ta Prohm. Built by King Jayavarman VII in the 12th century to honor his mother, this most romantic of jungle ruins is most revered for the way giant banyan roots grip the temple walls in a tight embrace. It's an image captured in a million paintings, prints and photographs.
So it came as a surprise when an Indian archaeologist heading a recent mission to Ta Prohm warned that chain saws might be required to "save" the monument. Reactions were instantaneous. "Ta Prohm's poetry and harmony is engraved in the memories of people the world over," said Azedine Beschaouch, Unesco's scientific adviser for Angkor. "How can we destroy those memories?"
"Poetry, what poetry?" shot back Michel Tranet, undersecretary of state at the Ministry of Culture. "We are here for temples, not poetry." In Cambodia, the subject of temple restoration is often contentious, but the case of India is especially sensitive. From 1986 to 1993 an Indian government team drew widespread criticism for damage it inflicted to parts of Angkor Wat: in an attempt to clean the temple of lichen and prevent water erosion, many exquisite details were erased forever. Concrete was used to fill cracks.
Who is making these decisions? The Cambodian body nominally in charge of Angkor's 100-odd monuments is the Apsara Authority, created by Unesco in 1995. But while the Cambodians are the hosts, they are not yet the masters of their legacy: They hold the keys but not the essential resources. Within the tangle of international politics and conflicting philosophies of architectural restoration, Angkor Wat, with its beautiful honeycomb towers is, in reality, a latter-day Tower of Babel.
It wasn't always so. L'Ecole Francaise d'Extreme-Orient, the elite French research institute, enjoyed 100 years of hegemony. It diligently restored some 50 monuments, but had no qualms about plundering artifacts it considered its patrimony for French museums. With the Khmer Rouge advance in the early 1970s, the French retreated, leaving a number of projects unfinished. Under communism in the 1980s, a handful of "friendly" countries were invited onto the site: Poland, Russia and India.
In 1992, Angkor was added to the list of World Heritage sites, bringing it firmly under the control of Unesco. The French returned to reassemble 30,000 stones at the vast Baphuon Temple, while an Indonesian team rebuilt the entrance gates to the Royal Palace. By this time, the World Monuments Fund in New York had already beaten a path to Preah Khan, a partly collapsed 12th-century structure outside the main complex.
But it was the Japanese, Cambodia's most generous donor, who came to dominate the effort through the presence of what now amounts to four restoration teams. Since arriving in Cambodia in 1994, the Japanese government team for safeguarding Angkor, JSA, has already spent $21 million and now oversees the largest concentration of monuments within the walled city of Angkor Thom, less than a half mile from Angkor Wat.
But around a dozen nations have staked claims to other prestigious sites. As the World Monuments Fund toils away on its three temples, a Chinese government team is rebuilding the intimate Chau Sey Tevoda and an Italian team stabilizes the brick towers of the ninth-century Pre Rup. Switzerland has just begun work on the exquisite sandstone Banteay Srei.
The jewel in the crown and the focus of international ambitions remains Suryavarman II's glorious Angkor Wat, which at three-quarters of a square mile is the world's largest ancient temple. While Germany's Cologne University monitors its many apsaras (friezes of celestial dancers) and an Italian team restores a collapsed embankment, Sophia University in Tokyo works on the western causeway, a stone's throw from JSA's reconstruction of the northern library. With major backing from a New York businessman, Peter Stern, the World Monuments Fund is eager to lay its hands on the Churning of the Sea of Milk bas-relief, an Asian equivalent of the Parthenon friezes.
Restoring a Khmer ruin is a bit like attempting a nightmare jigsaw puzzle. Faced with collapsed or collapsing structures, should one rebuild, restore or simply conserve? Whether to fill lacunae with newly quarried or recycled stone, and how much to decorate them, are all crucial questions. Ta Prohm's voracious trees present a further problem: to chop or not to chop?
The fate of each tree will be debated before chain saws arrive. At the heart of all current arguments on restoration is a paradox: the less you notice it, the better the job. Over many years the French used concrete beams to shore up temples in imminent danger of collapse - a sensible and pragmatic approach - but simultaneously rebuilt others, using anastylosis, a controversial process, pioneered by the Dutch at Borobudur in Indonesia, of dismantling and reassembling stones already on site.
This "trial and error" is inherently flawed, according to World Monuments Fund philosophy, but also far too intrusive: Overzealous rebuilding sacrifices a monument's natural history, and its beauty. "We do not think we have the right to reverse the course of history," said the organization's chief architect, John Sanday.
A ruddy-faced Englishman who likes to dress in Indiana Jones attire, Sanday draws a clear distinction between the views of such eminent Victorians as John Ruskin, the British critic who led a generation's passion for classical ruins, and the approach of his French contemporary Viollet-le-Duc, who loved to indulge French taste in reconstructed medievalism even to the point of creating fake features.
One French project that drew widespread criticism, Sanday said, was the rebuilding of Angkor Thom's famous Terrace of Apsaras. When, centuries ago, the first terrace began to crumble, the Khmers simply built another on top, but the French decided to restore both walls, creating a passageway between the two that never existed.
The Japanese take another view: authenticity is in the rebuilding. They don't share the Western insistence, set out in the 1954 Venice Charter on European restoration, on differentiating the old from the new or restored. For the North Library of the Buddhist Bayon Temple, JSA used their considerable resources to research and painstakingly replicate original Khmer techniques. Not only did they apply newly quarried sandstone - anathema to Sanday - but rendered it in such a way that future generations might be hard pressed to distinguish between the old and the new. That's the whole point, said Takeshi Nakagawa, JSA's chief architect. Why should future generations know the difference? Meanwhile, World Monuments marks its recycled stones with a small "wmf" to avoid such confusion.
Finding appropriate methodologies has not been easy. Through the International Coordination Committee, a regulating body of experts co-chaired by France and Japan, Unesco sponsors a biannual forum to air the myriad views. It has created a rich debate, but not always a consensus, as the case of Ta Prohm indicates. Today's vive la difference bonhomie may reflect a less censorious atmosphere than 10 years ago, yet experts still violently disagree and have traditionally guarded their secrets. The top architects of two Japanese teams working on Angkor Wat still scrupulously avoid each other.
But, citing the Swiss example, Tamara Teneishvili, a Unesco program specialist, thinks the committee's approach is working. "In the past, experts didn't share information even when working in the same field," she said. "But now many of them are having to depend on consultation and exchange."