Gaza’s endangered heritage: 5,000 years of history at risk amid conflict

AMMAN — The international community does not know how long will last the most recent of Zionist's offensives on Gaza, nor it can predict how much damage will be inflicted on the Arab and non-Jewish cultural heritage in the Gaza Strip. 

Because of that, relevant institutions, both local and international, should keep the record on artefacts, historical sites and cultural heritage that is under the constant threat.

In the early 12th century BC, groups probably originating in the Aegean established trading posts on the coastal plaine. They were known in historiography as "Sea people" and information on their ethnic origin varies. 

Sea people seem to be heterogeneous conglomeration of different ethnic groups from the Asia Minor, Greece and northern Mediterranen. However, our focus this time won't be on them.

"Conquered by the Assyrians in 734 BC, Gaza pledged allegiance to Nineveh. Under Nebuchadnezzar II, Gaza became a Babylonian outpost on the empire's Western frontier. In 539 BC, the Persian Cyrus seized Babylon and founded the Achaemenid Empire. During the Persian period, Gaza was the pearl of the Mediteranean," said British-affiliated archaeologist Claudine Dauphin. 

The archaeologist noted that all these historical periods have left their mark on an exceptional discovery in 1995: The ancient port and city of Anthedon at Tel Blakhiyyah, next to Shatteh refugee camp. 

Founded in the early 8th century BC as one of the Neo-Assyrian citadels of the buffer zone against Egypt, it was founded anew by Greek immigrants, probably from Anthedon in Beotia who took advantage of the 6th century BC boom in seaborn trade and established the new trading port of Anthedon of Palestine around 520 BC, Dauphin continued.

She added that it was active until the 12th century AD. The defensive site has been silted in, but parts of the city wall are still standing.  

The port structures used for fishing and shipbuilding and an aristocratic quarter with walls painted in Pompeii style (200 BC) were excavated by Franco-Palestinian expedition directed by Fr J.-B. Humbert, OP of EBAF, between 1995 and 2005, Dauphin underlined, adding that a Hellenistic city, Anthedon had an agora and temples. 

It was governed by a council (boule) of 500 members and had its own army commanded by a strategos, according to the Jewish Roman historian, Flavius Josephus.

In the course of his conquest of Syria, Alexander the great besieged Gaza in 332 BC, perpetrating massacres, looting and destruction. Rebuilt, Gaza regained its importance under his successors, the Ptolemaic Lagids in Egypt (323-30 BC) and the Seleucids (323-64 BC) ruling from Anatolia to the Indus.  

"In 97 BC, Gaza and Anthedon were conquered and devastated by the Jewish Hasmonean ruler, Alexander Janneus, and left deserted - a taste of what was intended but not fully achieved some 2000 years later, giving us as 21st century archaeologist hope for the renaissance of Gaza, since Anthedon was again important enough in the Byzantine province of Palaestina Prima (395–636) to become a suffragan bishopric of the metropolitan archbishopric of Caesarea Palaestinae," Dauphin underlined.

In the 4th century AD, the city became an episcopal see, though the worship of Venus and Astarte survived there until the 5th century according to Sozomenon. The first known bishop of Anthedon was Paul, who took part in the Councils of Ephesus (431) and Chalcedon (451). 

Bishop Eustathius took part in the Council of Jerusalem (518), and Bishop Dorotheus in the Council of Jerusalem (536). 

Roman and Byzantine Gaza

In 61 BC, the great stateman and general of the Late Roman Republic, Gnaius Pompeius Magnus (106-48 BC) consolidated Rome's hold over its eastern provinces, annexing Syria and reducing Judaea to a dependent, diminished Temple state, Dauphin said.

The aracheologist noted that seizing Gaza reinstated Greek Laws and gave the impulse for the rebuilding, implemented by his successor Aulus Gabinius (101-48/47 BC) of a theatre, hippodrome, gymnasium and stadium. 

In the 4th century, Christian sailors from Egypt settled in Maiuma, the second port of Gaza, at the end of the Nabatean spice and incense trade route. 

Goods from Southern Arabia were brought to Maiuma on the backs of camels which had trudged through Petra and the 'Araba Valley and had crossed the Naqab Desert via Eboda. 

Gaza was one of main ports and hubs of that trade and from Maiuma, these goods, as well as the produce from the agricultural land surrounding Gaza, in particular its wine in "Gaza ware" pithoi, was exported to Mediterranean markets. 

Maiuma harboured a small Jewish community, whose presence is attested by the early 6th century "inhabited scrolls" mosaic pavement of a synagogue discovered in 1965.

"The city of Gaza and its Romanised aristocracy remained pagans beyond Emperor Constantine's proclamation of the Edict of Milan [313 AD] which declared tolerance for Christianity in the Roman Empire, and his convening of the First Council of Nicaea in 325 AD which proclaimed the Nicene Creed establishing a common creed for all Christians,” the archaelogist said. 

“The main god worshipped in Gaza was the oracular Zeus Marnas, who brought rain to the parched, desert hinterland of Gaza," Dauphin highlighted.

His concentric, domed temple was destroyed in 402 AD under the instigation and in the presence of Porphyrius, bishop of Gaza from 395 AD to 402 AD, whose tomb (425 AD) is enclosed in the Church of St Porphyrius in Gaza. 

"While Byzantine Gaza was famous for its School of rhetoric and sophistry, headed by Procopius, and subsequently by his disciple, Choricius, and which competed with its Alexandrian counterpart, it was also the cradle of Monasticism in Byzantine Palaestina.”

“According to his hagiographic Life written in Latin by Jerome of Stridon in 389-392 AD, Hilarion was born in 291-292 AD in Thautha in the region of Gaza," Dauphin elaborated. 

He converted to Christianity in Alexandria where his wealthy family had sent him to study. At the age of 15, he joined St Anthony in the desert, but did not choose the monastic life until he had returned to Gaza in 306 AD. 

Upon hearing of the death of his parents, he disposed of his inheritance and became a hermit in the desert hinterland of Maiouma. During 22 years he led an ascetic life on the Antonine model, eating only lentils and figs at dusk, and overcoming many temptations. 

His austerity and reputation as a healer attracted monks and laymen. In 340 AD he founded a laura at Tel Umm 'Amr, near Dair Al Balah, which combined a hermit's isolated life in a cell (anachoresis), with Sunday gathering to attend church (coenobitism). 

Muslim and Crusader Gaza

In 637 CE the Muslim Arabss took Gaza. The orientation towards Christian Jerusalem of the road network of Byzantine Palestine was superseded by a Mecca-Gaza axis on which travelled the merchants of Mecca and Medina, notably Hashim Ibn 'Abd Manaf (464-497 AD), the paternal great-grandfather of Prophet Mohamed and progenitor of the ruling Banu Hashem clan of the Quraysh tribe in Mecca. 

"He died in Gaza and was buried in the Great Omary Mosque, the core of which was a large Romanesque church erected by the Crusaders during their brief occupation [1149-1187]," the scholar said, adding that the Mamluks (1260-1277) left their mark strongly by building mosques, khans and great houses (dar). 

Despite the diversion of international traffic due to new maritime trade routes, the Ottomans, who took over Gaza in 1516, pursued also a building policy expressed by mosques, Coranic Schools (madrasa), public Baths (hammam), covered markets (suq), and public fountains (sabil). 

The collection of artefacts displayed in Paris at the exhibition titled “Rescued Treasures of Gaza: 5,000 Years of History" may speak on behalf of Gazans who die on a daily basis from IDF's bombardment. The rich cultural heritage exhibited in Paris, may influence the Western public opinion to prevent the ongoing carnage in Gaza and the West Bank.