LONDON,
(CAIS - edited by Shapour Suren-Pahlav) -- Once
again the Islamic regime threat of dam construction to
pre-Islamic cultural heritage of Iran has raised its ugly
head to dominate this year’s excavation calendar.
In
terms of scales of construction and related destruction of
Iranian cultural heritage, massive dam programmes by the
Islamic regime is currently tearing up landscapes in Iran.
The country’s 243 dams under construction (or undergoing
feasibility studies) are intended to contain ten billion
cubic metres of river water for irrigating Iran’s arid
fields and generating hydroelectric power, and to
modernise the country following a seven-year drought. At
least 79 dams have reached various stages of completion.
Particularly
problematic are the Salman-e Farsi, Mulla Sadra, and
Marvast dams in Fars Province, southern Iran, where
pre-construction figures estimated that 42 ancient and
historical sites would be submerged (threatened sites
include a great Zoroastrian fire temple in the reservoir
area of Salman-e Farsi).
Iranian
experts confirm that no formal feasibility studies were
conducted before construction of the Sivand Dam in the
Bolaghi Valley of Fars Province was started. Consequently,
the endangered list has now swollen to 174 sites ranging
from the Palaeolithic to Islamic periods according to the
Cultural Heritage News Agency. Mohammad Talebian, director
of the Parse-Pasargadae Project, which is co-ordinating
salvage operations, calls the 129 sites to be lost to the
Sivand Dam alone ‘unquantifiable damage’. The speed
and scale of construction has shocked scientists and the
United Nations.
Scheduled
to become operational in March 2006, current efforts are
concentrated on these priority 130 sites within the
Bolaghi Valley. After archaeology was frozen in Iran
following the Revolution of 1979, the country has
dramatically reopened as an archaeologists’ heaven - but
also a hell. Some 16 foreign teams are currently
conducting fieldwork along the 5.5km-long Valley. Some 77
new sites found in the region include ancient settlements
(seven Sasanian), 12 Palaeolithic caves, ten Achaemenid
mounds, four mines, five cemeteries, three dams, water
mills, castles, mosques, and a commercial wine production
estate of c. 200 CE. None of these sites has ever been
examined scientifically.
The
Sivand Dam lies less than 2km from the UNESCO World
Heritage Site of Pasargadae, the first capital of the
Achaemenid dynasty (550-330 BCE) and residence of Cyrus
the Great. Iranian experts and European archaeologists
alike are highly concerned that alongside the
disappearance of the ‘Royal Road’ inside the Valley -
Iran’s oldest road - the mausoleum of Cyrus the Great
may even be at risk.
Elsewhere,
excavations behind the Ai-Doqmush Dam in the Eastern
Azarbaijan region, encompassing Bronze and Iron Age
remains in the area of Kola, have uncovered a mysterious
two-storey platform dating to c. 3000 BCE. Archaeologists
are currently trying to make sense of unique ‘violet
glazed’ pottery sherds, some incised with geometric
decoration, found at Bronze Age Kale Tepe, but are
literally fighting against the current: Iranian
archaeologists have dismissed the 10 million rials
($12,000) allocated to saving the site as unacceptably
low.
Meanwhile,
salvage work ongoing at the Iron Age cemetery of Lafurak
in Mazandaran Province has also confused scholars by
exposing burials of 800 BC apparently encased in fired
clay, with no grave goods. At least three other
inhumations, one with gold and silver earrings, stand out
from the overall sample because of their dolichocephalic
(elongated) skulls, suggesting the deceased are
non-indigenous. The ancient village and cemetery of
Lafuruk, in addition to 11 other sites nearby, will all be
inundated by the Alborz Dam.
Excavations
directed by Kazerun Azad University and the Cultural
Heritage and Tourism Organisation at Tell-e Bondu in Fars
Province have revealed at least 50 mid-Elamite (1500-1100
BCE) clay seals stamped with merchants’ marks listing
produce quantities and quality. Extensive pottery
workshops also cover the site, where vessels were
manufactured for export. In combination, the evidence for
substantial organised inter-regional trade (including the
discovery of what the Iranians are referring to as a
‘pen’) has impressed local scholars.
Junko
Taniguchi, a UNESCO officer in Tehran, has confirmed that
the current international rescue missions ‘will only be
able to do initial research. It is unfortunate but the
work is very urgent’. Despite the absence of formal
pre-disturbance assessments, Iranian archaeologists have
managed to win some major concessions from the developers,
not least pushing the opening of the Sivand Dam back one
year from March 2005, to maximise the rescue efforts.
How
on earth, in such a sophisticated world, can such major
cultural heritage as in Iran be so blatantly sacrificed?
Every country naturally has to balance cultural resource
management with everyday economic reality that will
benefit the well-being of its people. No nation can live
in a protected Disneyland heritage centre, but the
equilibrium remains alarmingly stacked against the past.
On
a planet subjected to so many extreme pressures - bloating
demography, globalisation, industrial expansion - there is
little scope for unproductive ‘tree hugging’ amongst
the dense forest of cultural heritage management. Yet
there is every reason to expect pre-conceived programmes
to successfully sample appropriate key endangered sites
well in advance of destruction or to explain why such
measures have been sacrificed for a greater good. Such
systems work very successfully in the United Kingdom and
America to strike a realistic balance.
So
why, with the high-profile experience of Pre-Islamic Iran,
has Iran failed to implement appropriate measures to
record or at least to allocate appropriate funds from
developers?
Even
though archaeologists have had a longer run up to events
in Iran, the scale of destruction will be a disaster.
Although an accurate picture based on facts and figures is
extremely hard to assemble, the language of various
documents makes it obvious that local teams are uncovering
completely new sets of material culture and data on a
daily basis. The Cultural Heritage News Agency has
confirmed that $300,000 has been allocated to fieldwork in
the Bolaghi Valley. This sum must cover research into 130
sites and is ‘meant to be spent on excavation, repair
works, and also the establishment of a museum in which the
objects found in this ancient site will be exhibited. In
addition, since most of the foreign universities and
institutions who are currently working on this project in
Iran have not undertaken their own expenses, part of the
above mentioned budget will be allotted to funding their
archaeologists’.
For
Iran, surely it would not be too much to expect at the
very least a project overview to be published on the
websites of UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre or ICOMOS?
What is the purpose of either organisation if it is not to
exert high-level pressure on Islamic regime and to
kick-start funding initiatives? Accountability and
transparency are keys to safeguarding the past; neither is
evident amidst the ruins of this ‘dammed’ nation.
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