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Drought reveals Iraqi archaeological treasures

Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on March 21, 2009 at 5:40 am

From NPR’s All Things Considered:

Iraq is suffering one of the worst droughts in decades. While this is bad news for farmers, it is good news for archaeologists in the country. The receding waters of the Euphrates River have revealed ancient archaeological sites, some of which were unknown until now.

For Ratib Ali al-Kubaisi, the director of Anbar province’s Antiquities Department, the drought has opened up a whole new land of opportunity. He explains that civilization began in Anbar, next to the Euphrates River. “Everyone … thought that Anbar was only desert with no historical importance. But we discovered that this area is one of the most important archaeological areas in all of Iraq. This part of Iraq was the first to be settled,” he says.

In the mid-1980s, Saddam Hussein’s government dammed the Euphrates in the area, flooding a 120-mile-long stretch of land near Iraq’s border with Syria. What once was an enormous reservoir that stretched as far as the eye could see has shrunk an astonishing 90 percent since summer, officials say.

And those receding waters have uncovered ruins of civilizations from a plethora of time periods, from 3,000 B.C. to the Sumerian and Roman periods. Read more from NPR by clicking here.

March 21, 2009 · Filed Under International Water Issues

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