Archaeologists and historians the world over have expressed outrage over the levelling by Islamic State (IS) of the ancient city of Nimrud near Mosul, captured by the cult last June. On Thursday, militants arrived at Nimrud after noon mosque prayers and began demolishing the remains of the 13th century BC capital of the mighty Assyrian empire.
IS "assaulted the historic city of Nimrud and bulldozed it with heavy vehicles", Iraq's tourism and antiquities museum announced, calling the assault "cultural barbarism" and demanding a meeting of the UN Security Council to discuss how to protect Iraq's cultural heritage, which is also the cultural heritage of the world.
Idol worship
Fundamentalists claim ancient shrines and statues encourage idol worship prohibited in Islam while archaeologists argue that artefacts and monuments have survived in Muslim countries for 1,400 years.
Iraqi archaeologist Lamia al-Gailani said the 360-hectare site contained "much, much more than [the collection] in the British Museum" compiled by the 19th century archaeologist Austen Henry Layard. She mentioned the work done in the 1950s by Max Mallowan, the husband of British crime writer Agatha Christie, and successors. "There was still a great deal to discover," she said.
Dr Gailani, who visited Nimrud last year, says there were “at least five winged bulls” as well as magnificent carved stone reliefs in the remains of the palace of the 9th century BC ruler King Ashurnasirpal II: “It was the royal palace of the king who ruled the known world.” Built by thousands of slaves, Nimrud had a population of 100,000 and contained botanic gardens and a zoo.
She said the magnificent gold jewellery displayed in the Iraq Museum in Baghdad came from Nimrud. An associate fellow at the London-based Institute of Archaeology, Dr Gailani was dispatched to Baghdad by the British Museum to assess the damage to the Iraq Museum's collection, looted after the US occupation.
She condemned the destruction by IS militants, wielding sledgehammers and drills, of treasures in the Mosul museum, notably 9th century BC Assyrian winged bulls from Nimrud and statues from the northern 2nd or 3rd century BC Iraqi-Hellenistic-Parthian city of Hatra.
IS “also erased Islamic sites”, including the 14th century mosques of the prophets Seth and Jonah in Mosul as well as the 7th century Assyrian Christian Green Church and the Forty Shrine mosque, the oldest shrine in Iraq housing the remains of Companions of the Prophet Muhammad in Tikrit.
“All we can do is what Shias do [in mourning]: beat our chests,” said Dr Gailani. The rise of IS in Mosul “goes back to [George W] Bush . . . all the mistakes . . . the US did nothing to prevent the establishment of [ultraorthodox] Salafis in Mosul in neighbourhoods called ‘Kandahar’, for Afghanistan.
Sympathy for IS
“Mosul has always been a conservative city but it changed once the university opened [in 1967], women took up studies and students came from all over Iraq.” She admits there could be some “sympathy” for IS among conservatives in Mosul. The university was closed by IS last year.
IS counts on the shock value of erasing the history of Mesopotamia and the Islamic empires to promote its cause of recreating the utopian Islamic society of the 7th century just as the cult relies on the shock value of cutting off human heads to promote its image as a “terrorist” and “terrorising” cult that tolerates no opposition.
