Before we lose Amrit…. the
city of the Purple and alphabet
History is the memory of the nation and the heritage
of its culture and civilization. Some people try to
invent some culture and make roots to give them
places in the depth of history.

They fake the truth some times, and steal the
heritage of those who left their impact on the land
of humanity, in the end they try to erase the memory
of peoples and attack it by all kinds of silly
exciting things, to make homelands as bodies
grooving and mean less connections, and an endless
series the west inventions, which cares about our
development and democracy.
(Save Amrit) a scream that shouldn't be in an empty
valley, and in order to let this scream has an echo
,the branch of Adytat society of Tartous and Homs
held a seminar in the society of the university
graduates in Homs, in which many speakers
participated.
In a good
enlightment about the Amrit archeological site
Amrit
Volunteers team presented an explanation about
the history of Amrit, with very accurate and
beautiful pictures and showed all the places of the
sleeping city since many centuries which are
discovered now.
I think that the most important thing about this
seminar in addition to the quantity of knowledge
that was presented, was the group of young
volunteers to launch this initiation in order to
attract sight to Amrit which was wrote down in the
list of
100 most endangered sites in the world.
The well-known historical researcher Mr.Malatus
Jaghnoon talked about Amrit according to the old and
new historical documents, and these are some parts
of his speech:
“The historian Philip Hatti in his book (Lebanon in
history) says that Amrit name was mentioned in the
ancient Egyptian texts amongst other 14 Phoenician
cities. The German archeologist Burkhart mentions in
his book (The ancient inscriptive Canaanite
epigraphy in Egypt) that the name (Qart Amret) is an
ancient eastern Semitic name that means the city of
palms.”|
William Word says : the researchers can see a
meaningful similarity between the words (Amret ,
Amrit and Amuro) and particularly that this area was
known as the land of Amuro during the rule of the
second dynasty of kings of Egypt ( 1991-1786 B.C) .
Mr.Malatus Jaghnoon thinks that the name is western
Aramaic particularly that we know that the Aramean
settlement here in this area is something proved
historically, and the name (Omerto) in Aramaic that
means the inhabited place.
About its flourishing of Amrit and currency making
inside it, Ernest Babylon mentions in one of his
books (The making of the bronze currency in Amrit
proves the flourishing of the city in the third and
second centuries B.C.
About its destruction of the city the historian
Theodore of Sicily, who lived in the first century
B.C (The Arwadians destroyed the city of Amrit
during the rule of the king Alexander Palas) about
150 or 148 B.C.
About its
identity and the impress of its sites (the temple
and the stadium), Mr.Jaghnoon sees that Amrit
maintained its first Phoenician impress, because the
French researcher Ernest Rennin during his diggings
noticed that there are no Greek or Roman scripts in
the city.
Today there is nothing left from the inhabited
places in Amrit, and in today’s Amrit we can only
see what’s left from the temple, the stadium, and
the cemeteries and graveyards which were excavated
by (Morris Dono), (Naseeb Saleebi), and (Kerishian),
these excavations proved that the city was inhabited
by Phoenicians since the third millennia B.C at
least.
Then Mr.Jaghnoon finishes saying:
“ the most
important that we know about Amrit today is the
temple, the stadium, the port or at least what
refers to its existence and the cemeteries (Azar and
others). What we don’t know about Amrit is under the
soil, and what we don’t know is much much more than
what we know about it, so we have a long road to
discover more and we hope that the young Syrian
excavators from volunteers and employed ones will
discover the truth about the city.”
The volunteers had a big role in putting the soil
aside from the history of Amrit, starting from its
importance because they care about the culture of
the country, they started with the important places
which were robbed and neglected and these are Azar
cemeteries that are located about 2 KM from Amrit
site, and till now excavations are taking place by a
national mission in cooperation with the volunteers
which are there based on their love to the country
.These works are happening in the same time , in
which the ministry of tourism has plans to put it in
touristic investments.
The volunteers ask, that the site should be invested
in a cultural touristic way, by preparing the site
to be a real touristic attraction.
The volunteers during the seminar criticized the
negative actions that were taken by the general
sector institutions like:
Establishing the high way of Tartous-Tripoli through
the site of Amrit and Azar, and throwing rubble in
the site by Reema Company, also throwing the garbage
of the city in the cemeteries of Azar by the city
council.
In addition to the pillars that Tartous electricity
company did inside it….and other actions done by
other institutions.
The
volunteers consider that putting the name of Amrit
for investments market is the worst offense that
happened to Amrit recently, and they wonder
isn’t the name of Amrit enough to put aside all the
projects that need substructures and services??!
After all the offenses we mentioned and the absence
of consciousness, the only thing that the
responsible people in the Archeological sector had
to do is to write it down in the list of
100 most endangered sites to get enough
financial support to support its budget-as the
volunteers said-.
These are parts of the UNESCO report about Amrit:
The towers in Amrit were exposed to high humidity,
the thing that effected on their stones a dangerous
degree, in addition to some plants, which started to
strangle the site. Writing down Amrit in the (mwf)
list of the year 2004 amongst the
100 most endangered sites, helped in increasing
its importance to the national authorities
especially to the Directorate General of Antiquities
and museums, but since writing it down not too much
to save it took place, or even to stop building near
the archeological ruins. Amrit is in an extreme need
to be protected from destruction, and needs to be
documented, the ones working in its case need to be
trained and money should be collected to do all the
things mentioned above.
Amrit
volunteers finished saying:
that the
culture appeared amongst people and people have to
guard it, the participation of people is the base of
the process of saving eternal ruins and antiquities
and maintain them.
Syria the beautiful land, about which the director
of Louver museum André Paru once said:
(Each man has two homelands : his own where he
lives, and Syria)
Syria needs all the efforts to save its heritage
that we can’t do with it, what we want except if it
was in order to save it and make the future
generations inherit it, this heritage is a lighting
torch needs to be carried, and these young people
carried the flag to save Amrit, so (Save Amrit) ,
and save every forgotten beautiful site in the
beautiful Syria.
Suzan Ibraheem
For more information Read:Adyat
Society in Homs holds “ save Amrit” Seminar
Translated by:
Anas Abbas
|