On April 29 th , 2019, Dr. Jalal Idiadi, representing World Cultural Heritage Voice (WCHV), met with UNESCO in Paris after requesting meetings with the organization. Dr. Ajadi talked with UNESCO officials about the current threats endangering the structure of Taq Kasra. While presenting the WCHV’s letter regarding Taq Kasra to Ms. Audrey Azoulay, the Director General of UNESCO, Dr. Ajadi also r

equested the urgent investigation into the deterioration of the monument. Dr. Ajadi discussed that neither the Iraqi government, as the state/country where this archeological site is located, nor the Iranian government as the responsible state for preservation of the Iranian archeological sites are fulfilling their duties. WCHV has requested urgent and immediate attention from UNESCO into the dire condition and preservation of this important cultural heritage site.

During the same visit to UNESCO, Dr. Ajadi also had discussions with Iraqi cultural heritage s that have threatened the Sassanid era heritage sites, and has
expressed concerns, therefore extending request for their attention as well as taking the necessary steps for preservation of Taq Kasra and other sites located in Iraq.
WCHV will continue communication with UNESCO officials and has requested to be informed of any actions taken for preservation of Taq Kasra and other heritage sites.

Recording Cairo AFP In a major archaeological discovery, Egypt on Saturday unveiled the tomb of a Fifth Dynasty official adorned with colorful reliefs and well-preserved inscriptions.

The tomb, near Saqqara, a vast necropolis south of Cairo, belongs to a senior official named Khuwy who is believed to have been a nobleman during the Fifth Dynasty, which ruled over Egypt about 4,300 years ago.

“The L-shaped Khuwy tomb starts with a small corridor heading downwards into an antechamber and from there a larger chamber with painted reliefs depicting the tomb owner seated at an offerings table,” said Mohamed Megahed, the excavation team’s head, in an antiquities ministry statement.

Flanked by dozens of ambassadors, Antiquities Minister Khaled al-Enani said the tomb was discovered last month. It is mostly made of white limestone bricks.

Journalists film inside the newly-discovered tomb of the ancient Egyptian nobleman “Khuwy” dating back to the 5th dynasty (2494–2345 BC). (AFP)

Ornate paintings boast a special green resin throughout and oils used in the burial process, the ministry said. The tomb’s north wall indicates that its design was inspired by the architectural blueprint of the dynasty’s royal pyramids, the statement added. The excavation team has unearthed several tombs related to the Fifth Dynasty.

Archaeologists recently found an inscription on a granite column dedicated to Queen Setibhor, who is believed to have been the wife of King Djedkare Isesis, the eighth and penultimate king of the dynasty.

Egypt has in recent years sought to promote archaeological discoveries across the country in a bid to revive tourism that took a hit from the turmoil that followed its 2011 uprising.

A team laying pipes at a chalk stream in Oxfordshire, England, uncovered an ancient settlement with 26 skeletons, some of which may have been part of “human sacrifice,” archaeologists said. (Photo: Thames Water)
More than two dozen ancient skeletons were unearthed during a recent dig as part of a water project in the United Kingdom, and some are believed to be the victims of “human sacrifice,” archaeologists say.
Dating almost 3,000 years to the Iron Age and Roman periods, 26 human skeletons, some that may have been part of ritual burials, were discovered in an ancient settlement as workers dug in the Letcombe Brook in Oxfordshire, England, Thames Water said in a statement Monday.
Archaeologists have removed the skeletons and other items found at the site, including evidence of dwellings, animals and household items, Thames Water said.
Mysterious sarcophagus: Archaeologists opened a mysterious Egyptian sarcophagus. Here’s what they found
The chief executive of Cotswold Archaeology, Neil Holbrook, said the site “was particularly fascinating as it provided a glimpse into the beliefs and superstitions of people living in Oxfordshire before the Roman conquest.
“Evidence elsewhere suggests that burials in pits might have involved human sacrifice,” he added in a statement.
Thames Water, which serves Greater London and surrounding areas, was planning to lay pipes in an effort to preserve the chalk stream. The project will continue now that the artifacts have been removed, the company said.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2019/04/15/skeletons-may-human-sacrifice-victims-unearthed-oxfordshire-england-thames-water/3473974002/

Contributed to WCHV.org by manuvera

The article below originally appeared in the Jewish Encyclopedia in 1906 and is available (unedited and full text) on-line. Despite the article’s age, it remains a valuable resource for scholars and laypersons interested in the legacy of Caucasian Jews, many of whom continue to speak Persian and other Iranian dialects.

Kindly note that excepting the two tables displayed in the original Jewish Encyclopedia article, the pictures and captions below do not appear in the original Jewish Encyclopedia article (in-print and on-line versions).

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A division of Russia, bounded on the north by European Russia; on the east by the Caspian sea; on the south by Persia and Asiatic Turkey; and on the west by the Black sea. It consists of six governments, four provinces, and two districts. The Jewish inhabitants, according to the census of 1897, numbered 58,471, or 6.3 per cent of the total population (“Voskhod,” 1902, No. 3). These figures are probably too low.

Undated photo (late 19th or early 20th century?) Mountain Jews of the Caucasus conversing and resting (Source: Public Domain). The “Mountain Jews” above are actually the descendants of the Jews of Iran whose origins in that land go back to the pre-Islamic era. Their language is Juhuri which is a Persian-based dialect mixed with Hebrew. Note that these Jews are distinct from the mainly Georgian Jews of the Caucasus being discussed in this article. The Juhuri-speaking Jews are mainly located in the modern-day Republic of Azerbaijan (known as Arran and the Khanates until May 1918) as well as Daghestan. 

The exact number of the Caucasian Jews is not easy to determine. Some of them (in the southern provinces) have adopted the Mohammedan religion; while others (in Georgia) have embraced Christianity. They are also often confounded with Jewish immigrants from European Russia. Von der Hoven estimates the number of the native Jews of the Caucasus to be about 100,000 (“Budushchnost,” 1900, No. 52).

Video posted by the Endangered Language Alliance [ELA] of Juhuri instructor Simon Mardkhayev. Speaking in Juhuri (A Persian-based dialect mixed with Hebrew), Mardkhayev is telling a story of hope from his childhood, in the Juhuri language spoken by the Jews of the Republic of Azerbaijan (known as Arran and the Khanates until May 1918) and Daghestan. Recorded at ELA on January 12, 2016.

The following table illustrates the distribution of the Jews of the Caucasus among the various governments, provinces, and districts according to the censuses of 1886 and 1891-92:

Table showing Distribution of Jews in the Caucasus (Source: Jewish Encyclopedia, 1906).

Supposed Descent from Lost Ten Tribes

Some of the Caucasian Jews claim to be descendants of the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel, which were taken captive by Nebuchadnezzar; while others (particularly the Georgians) are equally certain of their descent from the Israelites who were taken from Palestine by Shalmaneser. It is hard to determine whether this belief is based upon valid tradition or whether it is of later origin, and an attempt, by means of bad philology, to connect the “Habor,” near which river the exiles were settled, with “Iberia,” the name by which the Caucasus is known to classical writers. In the Georgian language the Jews are called “Huria,” a term which is related to “Iberia” (Koch, “Reise Durch Russland,” Preface, p. ix.).

Jewish Type Among Caucasian Peoples

The Russian archeologist and linguist Vsevolod Miller believes that a large Jewish population formerly existed in that part of Media which was later called “Atturpatakan,” and which is at present known under the name of “Azerbeijan,” and that this country was probably the cradle of the Caucasian Jews. He thinks that they have preserved the old Semitic type to a more marked degree than the European Jews. The presence of a distinctive Jewish type among many of the Caucasian peoples has long been noticed by travelers and ethnographers. It is especially interesting, as some of these people, the Armenians, Georgians, and Ossetes, for instance, are not of one and the same race. Baron Peter Uslar suggests that during the past two thousand years Jewish tribes often emigrated to the Caucasus (“Russische Revue,” xx. 42, xxi. 300). Miller is of the opinion that in very remote times they emigrated thither from Media. All the Armenian and Georgian historians speak of the existence of a large Jewish population in Transcaucasia until the beginning of the present era.

When St. Nina came to the city of Urbnis in Georgia from Jerusalem in 314, she is said to have spoken to the Jews in the Hebrew language (“Histoire de la Georgie,” translated by Brosset, I. i. 31, 37, 54, 64, 93, 100, 104-120). When the Persians took possession of Transcaucasia in 366, the Jews adopted the old Persian language, which they called “Parsee” or “Tat,” from which they formed a jargon with an admixture of words taken from the Bible and from languages of local tribes. They write this jargon in Hebrew square characters.

A Daghestani Jewish woman of the Northern Caucasus enjoys Chai (Persian-Turkish for “tea”) outside a local Synagogue (Photo Source: The JC). Daghestani Jews speak a Persian dialect that is often intelligible to the Persian speakers of Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikestan.

From the Arabic writers Mas’udi, Ibn Ḥauḳal, and from the “Derbend Nameh” (a Persian history of Derbend) it is evident that the Arabs, when they conquered Daghestan in the eighth century, found a large number of Jews there. According to Pantyukhov (probably following Quatrefages, “Observations Anthropologiques au Caucase,” Tiflis, 1893, cited in “Archiv für Anthropologie,” xxvii. 448,) the Caucasian Jews may be considered descendants of the Chaldeans (early Babylonians), who originally dwelt on the upper Euphrates and in the vicinity of Lake Van, but who in later, though even still remote, times intermixed with the native Caucasians. In the course of time many of these Jews renounced Judaism and embraced. Mohammedanism. It is probable that the Khevsurs and a portion of the Swanetes and of the Lesghians are of Jewish descent. In the fifth century the rulers of Georgia claimed that their ancestors came from Jerusalem. The Chaldean has little in common with the Arabo-Semitic type. Erekert, as the result of a comparison of the head measurements of the Caucasian Jews with those of the other inhabitants of the districts in which they dwell, gives the following data:

Table showing physical anthropological characteristics of various Caucasian peoples (Source: Jewish Encyclopedia, 1906).

If the shape of the head be taken as a standard of a fine type, the mountain Jew may be considered to rank first among the Caucasian races, which are classified by Erckert in the following order: mountain Jews, Armenians, Kumyks, Georgians, Azerbeijan Tatars, Ossetes, Circassians, Tshechentzy, Lesghians, Nogaians, Kalmucks (“Der Kaukasus und Seine Völker,” pp. 370-377).

The stature of the Jews in the district of Kuba (government of Baku) is 1,618-1,621 mm.; that of the Jews in the government of Kutais, 1,630; of those of Daghestan, 1,644. These three groups exhibit slightly varying types; they have completely adopted the language of the people among whom they live (Pantyukhov, l.c.).

Mountain Jews (“Bergjuden”) are those of the Caucasian Jews who live in villages (“auls”) and some towns of the provinces of Daghestan, Tersk, Kuban, and in the governments of Baku and Yelisavetpol, and who speak an Iranian language, a dialect of the Tat. The Tats themselves are of Iranian origin, but have intermarried with Jews. They speak the same dialect (Tat mingled with Hebrew) as the mountain Jews. They probably arrived in the Caucasus with the Jews in the times of the Achæaemenidæ, having been sent to guard the northern boundary of Persia on the Caspian sea. According to Anisimov, the Tats of today were Jews when they arrived in the Caucasus, and they embraced Mohammedanism only when the Arabs conquered the country. They themselves cherish this belief, and carefully preserve their Hebrew books (Hahn, “Aus dem Kaukasus,” p. 181).

A painting of Iranian speaking Jews of the Eastern and Northern Caucasus, also known as “Mountain Jews” (Photo Source: The Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Center).

Ḥasdai ben Isaac, in his letters to the king of the Chazars (about 960), says that, according to a tradition, the Chazars formerly lived in the mountains of Seir (Serir in the eastern Caucasus). Miller is of the opinion that the Jews of the Caucasus introduced Judaism into the kingdom of the Chazars, and that the Jews of Daghestan originated in Azerbeijan. He refers to Esther iii. 8 and to II Kings xvii. 6. He thinks that old Jewish colonies in the Caucasus existed in Tabasseran and in Kaitak, in which region there is a place still called “Shuit-Katta” (Jewish pass). About three hundred years ago many Jews emigrated thence to Majlis, the capital of the Tatars, and a little later to Jangi-kent (= “New Settlement”).

Large Jewish communities existed in the ninth century in Tiflis, Bardaa, Derbend, and other places in the Caucasus. According to Benjamin of Tudela (1160-73), the power of the exilarch extended over all the communities of Armenia, Kota, and Georgia. Guillaume de Rubruquis in 1254 found a large Jewish population in the eastern Caucasus.

Jewish girls from the Caucasus in 1913 (Photo Source: Public Domain).

The traveler Judah Chorny also concludes that the Jews arrived in the Caucasus before the destruction of the First Temple, and that up to the fourth century of the common era they lived under Persian protection. At the end of the Sassanian dynasty, when Tatar hordes overran Persia, and the CaucasianJews were driven from their homes, the latter came in contact with their coreligionists in Babylonia, and adopted the rabbinical teachings as religious law. Soon they began to study the Talmud, of which they had an intimate knowledge when Eldad ha-Dani (ninth century) visited them. This is also corroborated by Benjamin of Tudela and Pethahiah of Regensburg. In the centuries when the great Talmudic schools flourished in Babylon, many eminent Talmudists lived in Derbent and the ancient Shemacha, in the government of Baku. In many regions in the government of Baku, where at present there are no mountain Jews, ruins of their auls and graves, and traces of irrigation trenches, etc., are to be found. The local Mohammedans still call these ruins by their old Jewish names; e.g., “Chifut Tebe” (Jewish Hill), “Chifut Ḳabur” (Jewish Grave), etc. In some parts of Daghestan the Mohammedan religion has supplanted Judaism; but in many Mohammedan families are to be found Jewish books inherited from Jewish ancestors.

Superstitious Beliefs

The Caucasian Jews can not be classed among the Karaites, as they still adhere closely to the Talmud. There is no question, however, that at the present time their Talmudic knowledge is not extensive and that they have added demonology to Judaism. Owing to this comparative ignorance they are nicknamed by the European Russian Jews “Byky” (oxen). The Jews of Daghestan and Baku believe in good and in evil spirits; e.g., Seer-Ovy (the spirit of the water), Ider, Hudur-bai, Kes-sen-bai, and others. The most venerated is the mighty Num-Negyr (the spirit of travelers and of the family), which name signifies “unutterable” (literally, “do not take a name”). A belief in perpetual warfare between the good and the evil spirits is deep-rooted among the Jews as well as among the Mohammedans of the Caucasus. According to Erckert, the Caucasian Jews in the times of the Seleucids were in communication with Palestine. They helped to spread Christianity in Armenia, Georgia, and the highlands of Albania. The mountain Jews are probably later emigrants, who in the eighth century and at the beginning of the ninth settled in the region north of Derbent. It was not until the end of the sixteenth century that they removed to the neighboring Majlis. Another stream of emigrants may have followed about 1180 from Jerusalem and Bagdad via Persia. Erckert and many others are of the opinion that the Caucasian Jews amalgamated at an early date with the native tribes. It is certain that among the peoples of the Caucasus the Jewish type is everywhere represented, and that even among Christian and Mohammedan tribes many Jewish customs and habits have been preserved to the present day. Among the Ossetes the old Mosaic law of levirate marriage still exists, which, according to Chorny, the mountain Jews also strictly observe. Even the outward appearance and the manner of speech of the Ossetes resemble those of the Jews. Many of their villages bear Hebrew names, and the marriage and funeral ceremonies correspond in many respects with those of the ancient Hebrews. The same may be said about the Tshechentzy.

A 1920s photo of a Jewish school in Quba in modern-day Republic of Azerbaijan (known as Arran and the Khanates until 1918) (Photo Source: Public Domain). Quba continues to feature a large Jewish population and is considered ot be among the largest Jewish communities of the former Soviet Union.

The Caucasian Jews differ greatly from the European Jews. Their language, dress, education, employments, and their whole character render them almost a separate people; and they even differ greatly among themselves.

Manners and Customs

The Georgian, Lezghian, and Ossete Jews differ as much from one another as do the countries in which they live. The Jews of Daghestan have nothing in common with the foregoing, either in language, dress, mode of life, or moral views. They differ little from the other warlike mountain tribes among whom they dwell. They only differ from their Mohammedan and Christian neighbors in their adoption of the Tat language. They all dress in the Circassian style, and go about armed with daggers, pistols, and swords; even being armed when they go to bed or when praying in the synagogue. They are skilled horse-men. Their occupations are mostly dyeing, cattle-breeding, gardening, and viticulture. They own small farms, and rent land from their Mohammedan neighbors, by whom they are much oppressed. They raise tobacco, and manufacture excellent weapons. Even their ḥakams know how to handle the spade, the hoe, and the hammer.

Image of a Bukhara Jew in Central Asia at the turn of the 19th century. The Jews of Bukhara are located in not just in the city of Bukhara but also in other cities of Uzbekistan in Central Asia. Bukhara Jews speak a Jewish vernacular of the Samarkand-Bukhara dialect of the Perso-Tajik language (Photo Source: The Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Center).

Owing to their persecutions under Mohammedan rule, the mountain Jews in the Russo-Caucasian wars always sided with the Russians; and the Russian government, after the conquest of the Caucasus, in acknowledgment of their valuable services, granted them equal rights with the other Caucasian tribes. Lately, however, these rights have been curtailed.

Mountain and Georgian Jews

In contradistinction to the mountain Jews, the Georgian Jews have always exhibited great patriotism, and have fought against the Russians. Their love for the fatherland is as proverbial as their bravery in war. Notwithstanding his war-like character, however, the Georgian Jew becomes penitent and humble in the synagogue. Here he may be seen to weep for the unfortunate destiny of his coreligionists scattered over the world. Georgian Jews are found in Tiflis, Kutais, Suran, Karasubazar, and the surrounding villages. Besides the Georgian and mountain Jews, mention should here be made of the Caucasian Subbotniki (Sabbatarians), who are probably descendants of the Chazars. Their type is more Slavonic than Semitic, but their mode of life is Jewish: they not only keep the Sabbath strictly, but also observe all the Mosaic laws and many rabbinical precepts. In Tiflis in 1894 their community numbered thirty families, besides many who lived outside the village and occupied themselves with cattle-breeding, agriculture, and the cultivation of the vine. They have the same prayers as the Russian Jews, but use the Russian language instead of the Hebrew. Some of them send their sons to Wilna for a higher rabbinical education. They consider it a great honor to intermarry with rabbinical Jews; but such marriages are rare. The Georgian and especially the mountain Jews deem it beneath their dignity to intermarry with the Subbotniki.

Late 19th century photo of a Jewish man from the Southern Georgian Akhaltsikhe region (Photo Source: Poemas del Rio Wang).

In recent years, with the improvements in communication,outside interest in the Caucasian Jews has become more extensive. Their coreligionists have endeavored to spread culture among them, while the Zionist organizations have established some schools for the rational study of Hebrew. For further details reference may be made to the articles on the respective cities, provinces, and peoples.

Bibliography

Gärber, Izvyestie o Nakhodyashchikhsya s Zapadnoi Storony Kaspiskavo Morya Narodakh. . . . 1760, pp. 305-307;

Radde, Vier Vorträge über den Kaukasus, in Ergänzungsheft zu Petermann’s Geographische Mittheilungen, No. xxxvi., p. 63, Gotha, 1874;

Erckert, Der Kaukasus und Seine Völker, p. 302, Leipsic, 1887;

idem, Die Sprachen, des Kaukasischen Stammes, Vienna, 1895;

Witsen, Noord en Oost Tartaryen, ii. 692, 808, Amsterdam;

Miller, Materialy dlya Izucheniya Yevreisko-Tatskavo Yazyka, St. Petersburg, 1892;

Merzbacher, Aus den Hochregionen des Kaukasus, Leipsic, 1901;

Anisimov, Kavkazskie Yevrei, Moscow, 1888;

Chorny, Sefer ha-Massa’ot, St. Petersburg, 1884;

Vakhouchte Tzarévitsch, Description Géographique de la Georgie, translated from the Georgian by Brosset, St. Petersburg, 1842;

Veidenbaum, Putevoditel po Kavkazu, Tiflis, 1888;

Russische Revue, xx. 42, xxi. 300;

Sbornik Materialov dlya Opisaniya Myestnostei i Plemion Kavkaza;

Van der Hoven, in Budushchnost, 1900, No. 52;

Harkavy, Ha-Yehudim u-Sefat ha-Slavim, pp. 105-109, and his reply to Steinschneider, Hebr. Bibl. ix. 15, 52, in Roman ob Alexandrye, 1892, p. 32, note;

idem, Soobshcheniya o Chazarakh, in Yevreiskaya Biblioteka, vii. 143-153;

idem, in Zapiski Vostochnavo Otdyeleniya Imperatorskavo Russkavo Archeologicheskavo Obshchestva, viii. 247;

idem, in Voskhod, 1896, ii. 35, 36;

Khronika Voskhoda, 1884, No. 44; 1886, No. 48; 1887, No. 20; 1895, No. 33;

Ha-Meliẓ, 1870, Nos. 4, 28-30, and 1895 passim;

Ha-Ẓefirah, 1880, x. 33-54; 1894, No. 94;

R. Andree, Zur Volkskunde der Juden, 1881;

Langlois Collection des Histoires Arméniennes: Faustus de Byzance, i. 274-275;

Hahn, Aus dem Kaukasus, Leipsic, 1891;

Uslar, Drevnyeishiya Izvyestiya o Kavkazye, Tiflis, 1881,

Yevreiskoe Obozryenie, 1884, v. 157;

D’Ohsson, Des Peuples du Caucase, . . . ou Voyage d’Abou-El-Cassim, Paris, 1828.

Related posts:

1. Photographs from Ancient Kahib, Daghestan in the Caucasus

2. Dmitri Ermakov: Chronicler of the Caucasus

3. A Survey and History of the Persian Population of the Caucasus

4. Flags of Nader Shah’s Army Discovered in the Caucasus

5. Dr. Oric Basirov: Origin of Pre-Imperial Iranian Peoples

6. A Glance at the Ancient Lezgians of the Caucasus

7. Article on Persian Heritage journal publishes article on links between Germania and ancient Iranian Peoples

8. Nowruz Celebrations in the Caucasus

9. A Tribute to WAALM’s Jewish Winners of the Persian Lioness Award

10. Farrokh Lecture on Iran-Caucasus Links at University of Southern California

https://kavehfarrokh.com/iran-and-caucasia/iranian-speaking-jewish-peoples-of-the-caucasus/

Recording CNA Paris as emergency crews pick through the charred remains of Notre Dame cathedral’s ancient wooden beams, which turned the world-famous site into an inferno on Monday night, focus has turned to the investigation into how the blaze started.

Thirty employees working at the Paris landmark before the fire broke out were interviewed by Paris prosecutors on Tuesday, the Paris prosecutor’s office said. They included construction workers and Notre Dame security staff.

Interviews will resume on Wednesday, the prosecutor’s office said, adding: “Investigations continue to search for the truth and identify the origins and causes of the fire.”

On Tuesday, prosecutor Remy Heitz told CNN the cause of the fire was “likely accidental,” and that “nothing shows that it’s an intentional act.”

The University of Notre Dame in Indiana is donating $100,000 toward the renovation of the landmark Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, according to a statement post on the school’s website today. 

“At the direction of Father Jenkins, the University will donate $100,000 toward the renovation of the cathedral. In addition, the bells of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart on the Notre Dame campus will toll 50 times — representing the 50 Hail Marys of Our Lady’s rosary — at 6 p.m. Tuesday, April 16, to mark the start of the rebuilding process for the cathedral,” the statement reads.

There is no direct connection between the cathedral and the university.

Notre-Dame lies at the eastern end of the Île de la Cité and was built on the ruins of two earlier churches, which were themselves predated by a Gallo-Roman temple dedicated to Jupiter. The cathedral was initiated by Maurice de Sully, bishop of Paris, who about 1160 conceived the idea of converting into a single building, on a larger scale, the ruins of the two earlier basilicas. The foundation stone was laid by Pope Alexander III in 1163, and the high altar was consecrated in 1189. The choir, the western facade, and the nave were completed by 1250, and porches, chapels, and other embellishments were added over the next 100 years.

Notre-Dame Cathedral consists of a choir and apse, a short transept, and a nave flanked by double aisles and square chapels. Its central spire was added during restoration in the 19th century, replacing the original, which had been completely removed in the 18th century because of instability. The interior of the cathedral is 427 by 157 feet (130 by 48 metres) in plan, and the roof is 115 feet (35 metres) high. Two massive early Gothic towers (1210–50) crown the western facade, which is divided into three stories and has its doors adorned with fine early Gothic carvings and surmounted by a row of figures of Old Testament kings. The two towers are 223 feet (68 metres) high; the spires with which they were to be crowned were never added. At the cathedral’s east end, the apse has large clerestory windows (added 1235–70) and is supported by single-arch flying buttresses of the more daring Rayonnant Gothic style, especially notable for their boldness and grace. The cathedral’s three great rose windows alone retain their 13th-century glass.

Notre-Dame de Paris, France.© Corbis

Notre-Dame Cathedral suffered damage and deterioration through the centuries. After the French Revolution it was rescued from possible destruction by Napoleon, who crowned himself emperor of the French in the cathedral in 1804. Notre-Dame underwent major restorations by the French architect Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc in the mid-19th century. The popularity of Victor Hugo’s historical novel Notre-Dame de Paris (1831), wherein the cathedral is the setting, was said to have inspired the renovations. During a restoration campaign in 2019, a fire broke out in the cathedral’s attic, and the massive blaze destroyed most of the roof, Viollet-le-Duc’s 19th-century spire, and some of the rib vaulting.

Gargoyles on the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris, added by restoration architect E.-E. Viollet-le-Duc, 1845–64.© Michalakis Ppalis/Dreamstime.com

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica This article was most recently revised and updated by Alicja Zelazko, Assistant Editor.

Open letter to:

Her Excellency, Ms. Audrey Azoulay

Director-General
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)Paris, France

According to the reports, a representative of the Iraqi National Assembly recently released a video showing the fall of a part of cracked roof of Taq Kasra, urging for quick action in order to save this ancient site. According to this official a section of the roof, larger than a meter across has fallen from the roof of this majestic archeological site endangering the integrity of the whole building and structure. However, as far as we know no response and assistance has been provided to this call to this date by any of the Iraqi authorities.

Taq Kasra, also known as the Arch of Ctesiphon, is the world’s largest brick vault and the symbol of the Persian Empire from the Sasanian era (224-651 AD). The monument is located about 35 km south of Baghdad, in modern-day Iraq, which was, at the time, part of Persian Empire. Taq Kasra is also considered one of the most beautiful and unique architectures in the world. Since many of the historical monuments in Iraq are part of the historical identity of Iranians, we believe that the preservation of these sites are greatly important not just to the Iraqis but also to Iranians.

Unfortunately, since the Iranian government has continuously behaved in a negligent manner towards preservation of pre-Islamic sites even in Iran. We, as the first non-governmental organization (NGO) in the United States of America working on preservation of Iran’ s cultural heritage and countries that are suffering from poverty, war and neglected governments, urge your attention to the dire condition of Taq Kasra immediately. While we understand that Taq Kasra has not yet been listed on the UNESCO World Heritage List due to lack of interest and consideration of the two governments of Iraq and Iran, UNESCO is still obliged to pay attention to damage and destruction of a major archeological site which could be considered a part of the
collection of the cultural heritage of humanity.

With Regards,
Shokooh Mirzadegi
Executive Director of World Cultural Heritage Voices
www.wchv.org

On the evening of Friday, March 29, a massive collage was installed around the glass pyramid in the Napoleon Court of the Musée du Louvre. It was a tribute recognizing the 30th anniversary of the museum’s formerly disdained (but now beloved) I.M. Pei-designed structure, the museum’s third-most popular work after the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo.
By Saturday morning, the homage was destroyed. Some visitors trampled over it; the paper became unstuck and disintegrated. Other Instagram-minded shutterbugs tore pieces off and took them home for souvenirs.
For “The Secret of the Great Pyramid,” famed French street artist JR used 2,000 pieces of paper to create an optical illusion of the Louvre’s steel-and-glass pyramid emerging from the abyss of a rock quarry.
It took 400 volunteers four days to assemble the piece, which spanned the 18,000-square-foot plaza. It was JR’s largest work to date.
On Saturday, the artist tweeted a photo of what the work looked like before it was opened to the public. From the perspective of a storeroom on the third floor of the museum, the pyramid seemingly doubles in height.
He wrote: “The images, like life, are ephemeral. Once pasted, the art piece lives on its own. The sun dries the light glue and with every step, people tear pieces of the fragile paper. The process is all about participation of volunteers, visitors, and souvenir catchers.”
Talking to the Huffington Post, a spokesperson for the Louvre reiterated JR’s sentiments: “It is to be expected that it would be damaged, but we did not know how quickly it would happen.” They added that it was scheduled to be taken down on Monday, April 1, anyway. This isn’t the first time JR has utilized Pei’s pyramid in his work: In 2016, he covered up the entire landmark with a photo, utilizing the distortion of perspective known as anamorphosis to creating the optical illusion that it had disappeared. This weekend’s short-lived project was dedicated to Agnès Varda, the late influential filmmaker who died last week.
https://nypost.com/2019/04/02/tourists-destroy-massive-louvre-installation-within-hours/