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UNESCO in action: culture
Iran: Glimmers of hope in Bam
In the wake of the destruction, despair and nearly 30,000 deaths caused by the recent earthquake, the ancient Iranian city of Bam is starting to look forward to a possible reconstruction
At five in the morning on December 26, 2003, the earth shook with tremendous violence for 12 seconds in south-eastern Iran, some 1,200 kilometres from Tehran. The earthquake, which registered 6.3 on the Richter scale, claimed the lives of over 40,000 people and left a further 75,000 homeless; the citadel of Bam (Arg-e-Bam), the largest adobe fortress in the world and the quake’s epicentre, is now little more than dust and debris.
Those who were in Bam in the days following the catastrophe speak of “destruction on a scale that is hard to describe,” of a city that “looked like Ground Zero.” Yet even as the most pressing needs of survivors were being met, the possibility of repairing this jewel of Iran’s heritage began to take shape.
The citadel that used to stand within the Old City of Bam, which adjoins a new city by the same name, is 300 metres long and 200 metres wide. Built almost 2,000 years ago, it is a remarkable example of ancient Iranian urban construction, and along with Persepolis the most precious relic of pre-Islamic Persian architecture.
Most of this magnificent site, which last year alone received 100,000 visitors, was destroyed in a matter of seconds. Alongside the illustrious history of Arg-e-Bam (see inset), a vital source of income for the city’s inhabitants also vanished: until the earthquake, the citadel had been a major tourist magnet, generating considerable revenues for the entire region.
Even so, despair has not overwhelmed the city completely. There are excellent records detailing many features of the citadel. In addition there is ample technical expertise to hand, since Iran has many well-trained professionals – over the past 30 years Iran’s National Council of Monuments carried out restoration work on the citadel which it included on its list of protected historical monuments.
“As always in such cases, caution is the only possible strategy,” says the architect and UNESCO consultant Hubert Guillaud, a specialist in mud and adobe buildings, “but it is still true that we have very precise records covering the 32 years of work that preceded the destruction of the site. Amongst these documents there is a body of very solid, interesting and highly valuable material that could be used for a possible reconstruction.”
Moreover, of the 24 historical monuments that stood outside the citadel of Bam, half can be restored as they have suffered only minor damage.
These factors underpin a restoration plan prepared by UNESCO and the Iranian authorities in the wake of a first expert mission to Bam last February. The first phase will involve reinforcing the structures that are still standing to prevent them from collapsing. Then data will have to be collected and all available information about Arg-e-Bam studied to lay the ground for the reconstruction, which will begin soon after.
The simultaneous inclusion of Bam’s citadel on the World Heritage List and the World Heritage in Danger List – in a process similar to that involving the minaret and archaeological remains of Jam, in Afghanistan, in 2002 – would give a much-needed impetus to these plans. “Given that the Iranian government had intended to propose Bam’s inclusion on the UNESCO World Heritage List, we will help in the preparation of the candidacy, which will be presented before the next meeting of the World Heritage Committee in June,” declared UNESCO’s Director-General, Koïchuro Matsuura.
It is certain that the “restoration of the monuments that suffered the worst devastation will take several years, and will need considerable support and solidarity from the international community,” added Matsuura.
Photo © UNESCO/Alain Brunet: The Bam citadel largest adobe fortress in the world, in 2001.
A stop on the way
Bam also has a long history as a stopover on the fabled Silk Road. The prosperous trading along the Silk Road and Bam’s strategic position close to the Pakistan border made the city extremely rich, as is evident in the opulence of its extraordinary buildings. Most of the Old City , as it stood before the earthquake, dated from the most recent period of reconstruction, carried out by the Safavids between 1502 and 1722. Three protective walls ringed the citadel, which housed mosques, mansions, a bazaar, a caravanserai (merchants’ inn) and a residential neighbourhood where most of the city’s population lived. A garrison was located in the highest parts of the fortification, along with the Four Seasons Palace (Chahar Fasl) and the governor’s residence. The citadel was abandoned by its inhabitants for the first time in 1722 following the Afghan invasion, and again in 1810, when it was sacked by guerrilla forces from Shiraz. |
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Author(s) |
Lucia Iglesias Kuntz
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the new Courier
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