The 28th annual session of the World Heritage Committee of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre has just concluded. During the session, the committee’s members revised the World Heritage List, bringing to 788 the number of properties identified world-wide as natural or cultural heritage treasures. The annotated on-line list is searchable by name, country, region, category and date of addition to the list. There is also a dynamic map that can be used to browse its contents. In the following subsections, I have excerpted those ancient sites that have been added to the list this year, or that have been placed on the World Heritage in Danger List.
All quotations in this article are from the UNESCO World Heritage Centre website.
Ancient Sites Added to the WHL in 2004
Note: You can consult the entire list of 200 additions to the World Heritage List.
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The Madriu-Perafita-Claror Valley in
Andorra
[This valley] offers a microcosmic perspective of the way people have harvested the resources of the high Pyrenees over millennia. [ read more ]
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Capital Cities and Tombs of the Ancient Koguryo
Kingdom in China
The site includes archaeological remains of three cities and 40 tombs ... of the Koguryo culture, named after the dynasty that ruled over parts of northern China and the northern half of the Korean Peninsula from 277 BC to 668 AD. [ read more ]
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Complex of Koguryo Tombs in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
The site includes several groups and individual tombs — totalling about 63 individual graves — from the later period of the Koguryo Kingdom. [ read more ]
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Champaner-Pavagadh
Archaeological Park in India
A concentration of largely unexcavated archaeological, historic and living cultural heritage properties cradled in an impressive landscape which includes prehistoric (chalcolithic) sites, a hill fortress of an early Hindu capital, and remains of the 16th century capital of the state of Gujarat. [ read more ]
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Pasargadae in the Islamic Republic of Iran
The first dynastic capital of the Achaemenid Empire, founded by Cyrus II, the Great, in Pars, homeland of the Persians, in the 6th century BC. [ read more ]
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Bam and its Cultural Landscape in the Islamic Republic of Iran
This site has also been placed on the World Heritage in Danger List.
Bam is situated in a desert environment on the southern edge of the Iranian high plateau. The origins of Bam can be detected to the Achaemenid period (6th to 4th cent. BC). [ read more ]
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The Etruscan Necropoleis of Cerveteri and Tarquinia in Italy
[These] two large Etruscan cemeteries ... reflect different types of burial practices from the 9th to the 1st century BC, and bear witness to the achievements of Etruscan culture. [ read more ]
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Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range in Japan
Set in the dense forests of the Kii Mountains overlooking the Pacific Ocean, three sacred sites — Yoshino and Omine, Kumano Sanzan, and Koyasan — linked by pilgrimage routes to the ancient capital cities of Nara and Kyoto, reflect the fusion of Shinto, rooted in the ancient tradition of nature worship in Japan, and Buddhism, which was introduced to Japan from China and the Korean peninsula. [ read more ]
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Um er-Rasas (Kastron Mefa’a) in Jordan
Most of this archaeological site, which started as a Roman military camp and grew to become a town as of the 5th century, has not been excavated. It contains remains from the Roman, Byzantine and Early Moslem periods (end of 3rd to 9th century AD) and a fortified Roman military camp, ca. 150m by 150m, [as well as] 16 churches, some with well-preserved mosaic floors. [ read more ]
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Petroglyphs within the Archaeological Landscape of Tamgaly in Kazakhstan
Set around the lush Tamgaly Gorge, amidst the vast, arid Chu-Ili Mountains, is a remarkable concentration of some 5,000 petroglyphs dating from the second half of the second millennium BC to the beginning of the 20th century. Distributed among 48 complexes with associated settlements and burial grounds, they are testimonies to the husbandry, social organization and rituals of pastoral peoples. [ read more ]
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Orkhon Valley Cultural Landscape in Mongolia
The 121,967-ha Orkhon Valley Cultural Landscape encompasses an extensive area of pastureland on both banks of the Orkhon River and includes numerous archaeological remains dating back to the 6th century. The site also includes Kharkhorum, the 13th and 14th century capital of Chinggis (Genghis) Khan’s vast empire. [ read more ]
Ancient Sites on the World Heritage in Danger List
Note: you can view the entire list of 35 properties on the World Heritage in Danger List
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Cultural landscape and archaeological remains of the Bamiyan Valley in Afghanistan
The cultural landscape and archaeological remains of the Bamiyan Valley represent the artistic and religious developments which from the 1st to the 13th centuries characterized ancient Bakhtria, integrating various cultural influences into the Gandhara school of Buddhist art. The area contains numerous Buddhist monastic ensembles and sanctuaries, as well as fortified edifices from the Islamic period. The site is also testimony to the tragic destruction by the Taliban of the two standing Buddha statues, which shook the world in March 2001. [ read more ]
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Butrint in Albania
Inhabited since prehistoric times, Butrint has been the site of a Greek colony, a Roman city and a bishopric. Following a period of prosperity under Byzantine administration, then a brief occupation by the Venetians, the city was abandoned in the late Middle Ages after marshes formed in the area. [ read more ]
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Tipasa in Algeria
On the shores of the Mediterranean, Tipasa was an ancient Punic trading-post conquered by Rome and turned into a strategic base for the conquest of the kingdoms of Mauritania. It comprises a unique group of Phoenician, Roman, palaeochristian and Byzantine ruins alongside indigenous monuments such as the Kbor er Roumia, the great royal mausoleum of Mauritania. [ read more ]
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Abu Mena in Egypt
The church, baptistry, basilicas, public buildings, streets, monasteries, houses and workshops in this early Christian holy city were built over the tomb of the martyr Menas of Alexandria, who died in AD 296. [ read more ]
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Bam Cultural Landscape in Iran
See entry above -
Ashur (Qal'at Sherqat) in Iraq
The ancient city of Ashur is located on the Tigris River in northern Mesopotamia in a specific geo-ecological zone, at the borderline between rain-fed and irrigation agriculture. The city dates back to the 3rd millennium BC. [ read more ]
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Old City of Jerusalem and its Walls
As a holy city for Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Jerusalem has always been of great symbolic importance. Among its 220 historic monuments, the Dome of the Rock stands out: built in the 7th century, it is decorated with beautiful geometric and floral motifs. It is recognized by all three religions as the site of Abraham’s sacrifice. The Wailing Wall delimits the quarters of the different religious communities, while the Resurrection rotunda in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre houses Christ’s tomb. [ read more ]
