UNESCO World Heritage Site list now mostly free of Yemen

[Irbis]

Old City of Sana'a:

The Director General of UNESCO condemns the destruction of historic buildings in the Old City of Sana’a, Yemen

Creative Commons/Richard Messenger - Sana'a (Yemen)

In the early hours of 12 June 2015, the Old City of Sana’a, a UNESCO World Heritage site, was hit by a bombing raid. Several houses and historic buildings were destroyed, causing human casualties. Among the buildings destroyed was the magnificent complex of traditional houses in the Al-Qasimi neighborhood, bordering an urban garden (Miqshama), near the Sailah water channel.

“I am profoundly distressed by the loss of human lives as well as by the damage inflicted on one of the world’s oldest jewels of Islamic urban landscape. I am shocked by the images of these magnificent many-storeyed tower-houses and serene gardens reduced to rubble. This destruction will only exacerbate the humanitarian situation and I reiterate my call to all parties to respect and protect cultural heritage in Yemen. This heritage bears the soul of the Yemeni people, it is a symbol of a millennial history of knowledge and it belongs to all humankind” declared the Director General.

Sana'a, before and after the bombing raid

Sana’a has been inhabited for more than 2,500 years and bears witness to the wealth and beauty of the Islamic civilization. By the first century AD, it emerged as a centre of the inland trade route and its houses and public buildings are an outstanding example of a traditional, Islamic human settlement. Sana’s dense rammed earth and burnt brick towers, strikingly decorated, are famous around the world and are an integral part of Yemen’s identity and pride.

Since the beginning of the conflict in Yemen, several houses within the heritage city of Sana’a have suffered damage and collapses as a consequence of shelling and explosions. On 9 June, the Ottoman era Al-Owrdhi historical compound, located just outside the walls of the Old City, were severely damaged. Historic residential buildings, monuments, museums, archaeological sites and places of worship have not been spared. The historic value and memories enshrined in these sites have been irreparably damaged or destroyed.

Marib Dam, Historic Town of Zabid:

UNESCO Director-General condemns airstrikes on Yemen’s cultural heritage

Marib Dam photos before and after the destruction - © German Archaeological Institute/Burkhard Vogt / © Dhamar GOAM team

The Director-General of UNESCO, Irina Bokova, has condemned the airstrikes on the ancient city of Marib in Yemen and is calling on all parties involved in the conflict to refrain from targeting the country’s unique cultural heritage.

UNESCO has received information on damage caused to the Great Dam of Marib by an airstrike during the night of 31 May. According to reports received, the ancient Sabaean inscriptions on the walls of the dam may also have been affected by the bombing. This came just one week after the National Museum in Dhamar was completely destroyed. The museum contained some 12,500 artefacts bearing witness to the rich cultural heritage of the surrounding region.

“I am deeply concerned by the distressing news from Yemen of further damage and destruction of its unique cultural heritage. The damage inflicted on the great dam of Marib, one of the most important cultural heritage sites in Yemen and in the Arabian Peninsula, and a testimony the history and values shared by humankind”, said Ms Irina Bokova.

She further added “I strongly urge all parties involved to refrain from targeting cultural heritage sites and monuments.

Many other historical sites suffered collateral damage from the armed conflict, including the old cities of Sana’ and Zabid, inscribed on the World Heritage List, as well as the historic centre of Sada’a, Mukalla and Taez.

With an expanse of 98 hectares, the Sabaean capital Marib was the largest ancient city in South Arabia and is considered one of the most significant historic sites on the Arabian Peninsula. Despite climatically unfavourable conditions, at the end of the 2nd millennium B.C., a complex society emerged in Marib, whose economy relied on a highly developed irrigation system. Due to its economic prosperity and geographic location, Marib became the most important trading station along the Incense Route. From the capital Marib, the Sabaeans controlled extensive parts of the country as well as the trade on the incense route as far as the Mediterranean and Mesopotamia.

Today, Marib hosts several important cultural sites such Bar´an Temple, Awam Temple with necropolis, Wadi Ghufaina settlement and al-Mabna dam, Great Dam of Marib, which is considered as a wonder of technical engineering and also appears in a verse of the Qur’an. These major cultural sites are also listed as the Archaeological site of Marib on Yemen’s Tentative List.

And several other less decorated, but still important places. These sites included, between others, 1200+ year old high rise apartment towers, canals, gardens, mosques, and the oldest dam in the world. Who cares, though, it was made by brown, not white people and the religious fanatics destroying it are West best buds, so it's totally okay.

Oh, wait, I forgot, Saudis care - now they wouldn't need to feel inferior to some uppity southerners who dared to build civilization millennium before the though occurred to Saudi goat herders.

[Irbis]

By the way, European Community, long denounced by various right wingers as wasters of money that should be rightly returned to rich, happened to fund DASI (Digital Archive for the Study of pre-Islamic Arabian Inscriptions) as one of its projects. Said DASI is now the only place where Sabaean and early Arabic inscriptions from museum of Dhamar (destroyed by Saudis as in the link above) still survive. It's about as bad as if Palmyra was one of last remaining Roman ruins in the world, and ISIS started continuously shelling it for fun.

Link: http://dasi.humnet.unipi.it/

To quote the leader:

The museum’s inscriptions survive online as the result of a collaboration between the University of Pisa and Yemeni institutions in which more than 700 ancient inscriptions from nine of the country’s museums were inventoried and digitized. Project director Alessandra Avanzini says that the ultimate goal was to save and disseminate ancient South Arabian inscriptions so that researchers could have a better understanding of pre-Islamic history in the region. “Frankly, when we started the project, I did not imagine that ‘to save’ was to be taken literally,” she says.

[Channel72]

Oh, wait, I forgot, Saudis care - now they wouldn't need to feel inferior to some uppity southerners who dared to build civilization millennium before the though occurred to Saudi goat herders.

That's kind of an anachronistic statement - nomadic tribes in the Arabian peninsula were a constant for millenia - Saba'a was one of the civilizations in southern Arabia that popped up around 1200 BCE (contemporary with King Solomon/David) - but there were also civilizations that popped up in the central Arabian penisula, such as Thamud, which appeared around 800 BCE I think - hardly a millennium apart. Regardless, it's a bit anachronistic to separate these various Arabian civilizations as coming from different "peoples" - as if the modern "Saudis" are somehow different from the Yemeni people apart from their modern political boundaries.

[Irbis]

That's kind of an anachronistic statement - nomadic tribes in the Arabian peninsula were a constant for millenia - Saba'a was one of the civilizations in southern Arabia that popped up around 1200 BCE (contemporary with King Solomon/David) - but there were also civilizations that popped up in the central Arabian penisula, such as Thamud, which appeared around 800 BCE I think - hardly a millennium apart. Regardless, it's a bit anachronistic to separate these various Arabian civilizations as coming from different "peoples" - as if the modern "Saudis" are somehow different from the Yemeni people apart from their modern political boundaries.

There were civilizations, yes, but Arabian peninsula spent most of its time under Roman/Persian/Caliphate/Ottoman control. Only south, including Yemen, remained mostly independent through the era and built what you could call domestic states with grand cultural, architectural and religious achievements. Thamud, by the way, originated in the south of the peninsula, too.

As for Sauds themselves, they only started to rise in importance in late XIX century, and as far as I saw, denounce any cultural heritage of regions comprising their kingdom (such as people of Asir or Hejaz) to not give anyone irredentist ideas. That includes demolishing of monuments from earlier cultures, so they can't be even given remote credit for those, IMHO. Even if we stretch and equate Saudi Arabia's history to its core region of Nejd, I don't recall any state even remotely equalling Yemen arising there through history until Sauds, so, yeah.