In 1995, I visited Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan as a backpacker, and I spent a couple of days in the ancient city of Palmyra. Later that automn, I wrote this article about the unique Unesco-listed city. It has never been published. This week, the world learned that the terrorists of ISIS have taken Palmyra. I cannot imagine what has happened to this breathtaking city in the middle of the desert. I therefore decided to publish this article in the memory of what has been. Reading through it again, my heart bled as I read the following lines: "there is no danger connected with visiting
either Syria or any other of the Middle Eastern countries in this corner of the
Mediterranean. On the contrary, people are very friendly (...)". That was 1995. This is now
Christine
***
Palmyra
sunrise
Perhaps nothing can be said to be beautiful at
five o’clock in the morning. But sunrise over the oasis of Palmyra definitely
comes pretty close,
We crawled
out of bed at the deafening shrill of the alarm clock: 04.45 a.m. A quick
glance out the window confirmed what we had been dreading: even late September,
Syria’s autumn, the sun rises early over the desert. It was dawn, the light
announcing that the sun would soon start its climb up the horizon.
This
glimpse of grey light outside a hotel window was the beginning of a race
against the sun. We jumped into our ragged backpacker’s clothes, grabbed the
camera equipment and woke the hotel receptionist on our way out the hotel door.
Then we ran, flew like djinns through
the narrow, dirty streets of Palmyra, at daytime dominated by donkeys,
carriages, and small mopeds, the main means of transport in the area. At this
time, though, the only sign of life we saw was an old truck sliding along the
desert highway, which passes through the small town of Palmyra.
RELIGION
We made it!
We got out of town, into the desert and to its stunning ruins before Helios
started manoeuvring his wild horses high up above the oasis. Or was it really
Helios? In Palmyra you never know: the religious influences have been numerous
and different. At fist, one worshipped Baal, then came the Romans and imposed
upon the citizens of Palmyra the Hellenic culture. Later, as Christianity
became the main religion of the Roman Empire, the temples were turned into
churches. But, of course, this period did not last long before the whole of the
Middle Eastern region converted to Islam – the main religion today as it was
more than one thousand years ago.
THE OASIS
So, when we
take our seats on downfallen columns, shivering from the desert’s cold dawn
air, nothing could be more appropriate than listening to the distant sound of
the Imam singing his prayers as day breaks. Against the purple, pink, and red
horizon rests the black silhouettes of the oasis, the palms swaying softly in
the breeze.
The oasis
is the secret and the treasure of Palmyra. The water emerging from the ground
gives life to palm trees (the only ones growing naturally in Syria),
pomegranate trees, and olive trees, thus giving the citizens of Palmyra the
possibility to survive in the arid desert. Outside the green oasis lies the
town, apparently not much more than a dust-grey colony of houses. It is quite
new, living its own life outside both the oasis and the overwhelming ruins that
cover a considerable area.
THE DATE CITY
Even in
ancient times, Palmyra was a thriving city, situated on a central point of the
trade route between the Far East and the Mediterranean region. Through Palmyra
passed silk and spices, and merchants always played an important role in the
city’s daily life. But if the merchants were important, there would never be a
city without local city dwellers. They lived off the crops provided by the
fertile oasis, as well as off their flocks of goats which they herded in the
burning desert.
Today the
merchants of ancient times have been replaced by other foreigners, only now
with cameras tied to their waist instead of heavily decorated daggers. But time
has not changed much of the way the locals live. Even though small pick-ups
roam the streets of Palmyra, the importance of camels and donkeys
cannot be neglected. In late September, the citizens spend their days in the
oasis, where they climb the palms and harvest the dates. These sweet fruits are
the main products of Palmyra, or Tadmor,
as it is known in the Arab world. Tadmor means, not surprisingly, the Date
City. Outside the green world of the oasis, among the impressive monuments, the
black goats still wander about. Squeezed in between the colonnades and the
remains of the Roman city wall is a colony of black tents – Bedouins.
– When I
was a kid, we used to live in the ruins, explains one of the locals, a white
clad charming old man, who served under General de Gaulle in WWII.
– Now,
we’ve got houses in town, and only a few “Bedous” still have their tents among
the columns. But me, I am no more a Bedouin.
So time
doesn’t stand entirely still in the desert. The climbing sun is a good reminder
of that. The sky turns transparent as the sun peeks over the palms and sends
its first beams to paint the clouds above in a golden colour. The silhouette of
a vaulted colonnade gives a dramatic effect to the event. Behind us the ruins:
columns, temples, and streets are glowing in the warm light. High above in the
background the Crusaders’ castle overlooks the spectacle.
EMPRESS ZENOBIA
Down the
hill next to the Crusaders’ castle lie sinister looking tombs and what is left
of the Roman city wall. This leads the visitor to the palace of Zenobia, the
romanticised empress of Palmyra, the hard headed ruler who made Palmyra the
capital of an important, and to the Romans threatening, empire. In the name of
her son Wahvallath she conquered Egypt and most of the central Middle Eastern
region. But such a venture couldn’t be successful for long; Palmyra was far too
important to the Romans. So the emperor Aurelian sent his troops to the desert
and forced the Palmyrians into submission. Zenobia was taken prisoner and ended
her days in Tivoli, a village outside Rome. This fact could never dismantle her
reputation, however, and in the consciousness of the Arabs, Zenobia remains a
heroine. Although less known than Cleopatra, she was surely as big a headache
for the Roman rules as her Egyptian sister of spirit. A clever femme fatale almost two millenniums
before feminism and equal rights.
THE TEMPLE OF BAAL
From
Zenobia’s palace there is a column lined street which leads to and through the
small temple of Baal, four amazingly well preserved columns, each consisting of
four columns grouped together under the same stone roof. Then the street
continues, bypassing the agora (the
city square) and the theatre, before crossing the highway, which links modern
Palmyra to the rest of the world and ends up at the doorsteps of the grand
temple of Baal. In the Middle East, Baal was to the Arabs what Zeus was to the Greek
and Jupiter to the Romans: the mighty god of the gods, the omnipotent.
The temple
of Baal is indeed impressive: huge walls, magnificent carvings and great
columns, which were rolled across the desert from the nearest quarry, miles
away. A downfallen block of stone shows veiled women – 600 years before Islam.
– This
proves that the veil is a part of the cultural heritage from ancient time,
claims our guide, an anti-Westerner with a degree in English literature.
– Which
justifies our women wearing the veil even though it is not mentioned in the
holy Qu’ran.
The temple
of Baal was later converted into a church, of which some fine frescos are still
visible. Then came the Muslims, then the crusaders, and finally Saladdin, the
Arab medieval hero, who wrested the Middle East out of the grip of the
Westerners. Brave man Saladdin closed the main entrance to the temple but left
most of Palmyra unchanged, as had all the conquerors before him. Today, a deep
ditch tells its silent story about important sacrifices made to the gods, when
the blood was gathered in the stone channel and led around the temple to the
gods’ pleasure.
SWEET TEA
Today no
blood is shed in Palmyra. Well may the locals do their best to twist some
pounds out of the many visitors, but there is no danger connected with visiting
either Syria or any other of the Middle Eastern countries in this corner of the
Mediterranean. On the contrary, people are very friendly, and chances are that
at the end of a visit, you’ll be quite tired of sweet tea, offered to you by
most merchants and any other Syrian you might run into.
This
morning, though, no tea is offered us, as we are quite alone in the desert
ruins. That is, of course, with the exception of the Bedouins, who go on with
their daily tasks in their camp some hundred feet away. Smoke from the open
fire confirms that they have already had their morning tea: the new day has
begun for man and beast. They have let out the black goats, which move slowly
around columns, leaving behind their black pea-shaped visitors’ cards.
SUNRISE
Over
Bedouins, goats, columns, temples – and the oasis – the sun rises steadily,
first purple, then pink, finally turning orange, before it hangs high above us,
yellow-white, burning. The air, which made us shiver from cold, heats up,
forcing us to tear off sweaters and jackets, leaving us in our t-shirts. The sunbeams
sting our arms and faces, and not much is left of the magic we experienced only
minutes earlier. Our shadows, twice our length half an hour ago, now nothing
but small, black dots, follow us as we stroll back to the hotel for a quick
breakfast and a well deserved nap.
Written in September 1995. Never published.
