Crossing rivers using animal skins

Alexander aficionados like to believe that crossing rivers using animal skins is something Alexander “invented”. Well, I have to disappoint them, for as it turns out, the practice was already known by the Assyrians, who used this technique as early as the ninth century BC, i.e., at least five hundred years earlier. It is not impossible that the practice is even much older but has not been documented.

[Picture from Nemrud showing Assyrian soldiers using inflatable devices to cross a river from Ancient History]

Cyrus the Great, whom Alexander greatly admired, used inflated or stuffed animal skins to cross a Babylonian river, as mentioned by Xenophon. Another example is Darius I, who used the same technique in 522 BC to cross the Tigris River. Much later, the Romans and the Arabs still resorted to this simple but ingenious solution.

One impressive such depiction comes from the Northwest Palace of Nimrud and shows how King Ashurnasirpal II and his army cross the Euphrates River on their march westwards in order to expand the empire all the way to the Mediterranean. This king immortalized his successes on the walls of his splendid Palace of Nimrud at some time between 865 and  860 BC. A substantial number of these reliefs found their way to museums around the world, including the British Museum in London.

An Alexandria in Kurdistan - Iraq?

Two and a half thousand years after his death, the name of Alexander is still making good PR. As soon as some ruins or artifacts are being found somewhere near the presumed route the conqueror took during his campaign through Asia, there is a rush to connect them to Alexander. Maybe wrongly, maybe rightfully so – time will tell.

The lakeside site was discovered by a team of Iraqi and 

British archaeologists led by experts from the British Museum - From Phys.org.

The spot this time is situated in northern Iraq, actually in the Kurdish region near the city of Qalatga Darband which according to some daring researchers could be a city founded by Alexander the Great in 331 BC. Qalatga Darband is located a good one hundred kilometers east of the battlefield of Gaugamela, meaning that the assumption is not entirely improbable. Other theories link the site to the late Hellenistic era or even to the transition period from Hellenism to Parthian rule. The very name translates into Kurdish as “Castle of the Mountain Pass”, a strategic location where the Little  Zab River cuts through the mountain range to empty eventually into the Tigris River.

Qalatga Darband was discovered in 1973, but excavations in this troubled region started  first by the French in 2013 followed by the British in 2016 who used the terrain to train Iraqi archaeologists. Unfortunately the latest unrest after the Kurdish referendum for independence has forced the last foreign experts to leave.

The once so proud archaeological tradition in Iraq is in a very poor state after the Iran-Iraq war, the Gulf War and more recently the invasion of IS. Many sites have been looted or simply bulldozed, meaning that history has been obliterated altogether. Others remain inaccessible and based on aerial and satellite surveys there are still many more to be explored. But the days of excavations by foreign nations are no longer acceptable and the Iraqis will have to do it themselves – hence the training mission of the British Museum that is set to run until 2020.

In the meantime, the discovery of two statues at Qalatga Darband seem to indicate that the site was once a thriving hub on the route from Greece to Mesopotamia and Persia – possibly linking it to Alexander because one of the unearthed statues could be his portrait (a second statue looks like Aphrodite). Of course, it will take far more research and excavations in order to confirm the link with Alexander as there are many gaps in the facts and figures that came to us.

The grass-grown walls of Qalatga Darband, running down to Lake Dokan. 

The fortifications defended the western border of the young Parthian Empire. In the foreground is one of the square towers under excavation. 

Photograph: Mary Shepperson/by permission of The British Museum - From The Guardian

The Kurdish region seems to be rich in archaeological sites as satellite images have found some 354 sites! One of the images taken near Qalatga Darband  and shared in the article from The Guardian shows an overgrown fortification wall interrupted every twenty meters or so by a square projecting tower – a very tempting project!

In the end, I’m afraid that Qalatga Darband is not high on the list of researchers and archaeologists as bigger names from history will claim priority once the staff is properly trained. After all, Iraq is home to rich historical sites like Nimrud, Ctesiphon, Nineveh, Ur, Uruk, Babylon, Borsippa, Hatra, and Seleucia-on-the-Tigris to name just a handful.

World Heritage Sites in Danger

The war in the Middle East, especially in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, is a terribly destructive one ( see: The War in Syria, what will happen to its heritage?; Loss of our Cultural Heritage in the Middle-Eastern Conflicts). Millions of people have been displaced, and the number of habitations that have been shot down and blown to pieces can no longer be counted. Among the damaged constructions are – inevitably – irreplaceable ancient sites that belong to human heritage. They are pages of our history that are torn and lost forever.

In Syria and Iraq alone, UNESCO lists ten World Heritage Sites, and of those ten, they say, nine are presently in danger. ISIS, although not the only destructive factor, is definitely the main culprit.

The majority of the sites are located in Syria:

The ancient city of Palmyra has been in the news repeatedly (see: The Legacy of Ancient Palmyra; The Temple of Bel at Palmyra – In Memoriam; The glorious days of Palmyra; In honor of Palmyra; Good news from Palmyra?; Open letter from Syrian Archaeologists about Palmyra;  Another Wave of Destruction hitting Palmyra). There is no need to develop the subject any further.

The well-preserved remains of Bosra on Syria’s southern border are less known but contain a great number of ancient buildings. Most famous is probably its Roman theater from the 2^nd century AD, when Bosra was the capital of the Province of Arabia. Yet there also are many testimonies from the days when the city was ruled by the Nabataeans, the Byzantine Empire, and the Umayyads. Bosra, however, was one of the first cities under siege and suffering from repeated shelling and bombing by ISIS (the theater was a choice location for the snipers).

Another sore spot is the ancient city of Aleppo, which, like Palmyra, was situated on antique trading routes (see: Tracking Alexander from Tyre to the Euphrates) and remained a major city in Syria. Since 2012, it has been divided alternately between rebels and government troops. Among the destroyed and damaged buildings is the Mosque of Aleppo and its Minaret from the 11^th century AD (see: Desperation of the Archaeologists).

Lesser known but certainly as important are the so-called Dead Cities with their precious villages and churches that flourished between the 1st and the 7^th centuries, ranging from antiquity to the end of the Byzantine era. Fighters and refugees alike sought shelter among these ruins, trying to accommodate the fragile remains to their needs.

From another time frame are the many Crusader Castles, the most renowned being the Crac-des-Chevaliers. They are unique because of their mixed architecture of European and Eastern influences. Here too, the Syrian army and the rebels occupied the premises in turn without any respect or consideration for the patrimony.

Last but not least, there is the damage done in Damascus, one of the most ancient cities in the world. Damascus was already a problem child because of a population decrease and people moving from older buildings to newer housing facilities. This left big gaps in some of the city’s neighborhoods. The fighting inside the Old City started as early as 2012 and caused more damage. UNESCO has counted as many as 125 protected monuments in Damascus, among which is the famous Umayyad Mosque, one of the largest mosques in the world.

UNESCO also lists a number of precious buildings in Iraq. Unfortunately, these are less known by the general public simply because traveling to Iraq was and is problematic.

The city of Hatra was one of the best surviving examples of a Parthian city founded in the 3^rd or 2^nd century BC. Most of its city walls and towers, as well as the sacred temenos of the Temple of Mrn, were still standing when ISIS arrived. As they did in nearby Nimrud a few days before, they hacked down the magnificent figures that decorated the arches and vaulted passages. The Great Temple was a rare example of combined Greek, Roman, Persian, and Arabian architectural styles.

The Assyrian city of Assur on the western bank of the River Tigris is another precious site, as it was the first capital of the Assyrian Empire. Assur existed for nearly four thousand years and was finally destroyed by the great Tamerlane. However, the stately Parthian Palace and Temple have survived into our 21^st century until they fell under threat of ISIS. The fate of Assur remains uncertain, for if the city is not destroyed by terrorists, it may become a victim of the dam project on the Tigris, which will flood whatever walls that are still standing.

Finally, there is the old Abbasid capital of Samarra, which is the only surviving Islamic capital to show its original layout, architecture, and decorations (including mosaics and carvings). It is home to the Great Shiite Mosque, which was in danger when the city was taken by ISIS and was caught up in the war between Shiites and Sunnites. It seems that the Iraqi government was able to push the invaders back.

Not very uplifting altogether. As to Afghanistan, where the situation is far more complicated, there is the Valley of Bamiyan, where the giant Buddhas were blown up in 2001, and the Minaret of Jam (see: The Minaret of Djam, an Excursion in Afghanistan by Freya Stark). Meanwhile, UNESCO has put the cities of Herat, the city founded by Alexander as Alexandria Ariana, and Balkh, or, as it was called in antiquity Bactra or Zariaspa (see: Alexander’s Prison?) on a tentative list.

[Picture of the Bamyan Valley is from Ancient Origins]

Although this is only a corner of our planet, there is more than enough to worry about!

[Picture of Hatra Temple is from Judith Weingarten. 
Picture of the Holy City of Samarra is from Al-Islam]