ISIS Isn't Saving Anything in Mosul

 Ruins of the shrine of Nebi Yunus (“the prophet Jonah”) in Mosul, January 2017 (VOA)

                                                                                                 

Over the past few months, Iraqi army forces have retaken much of the city of Mosul in Iraqi Kurdistan from ISIS (the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria). With the capture of much of the city– where stories of liberation and horror compete for our attention – these forces have also captured the mounds of Kuyunjik and Tell Nebi Yunus. These two artificial hills (or “tells”) and their surroundings form the site of the famous ancient city of Nineveh, now in eastern Mosul. From the end of February, news outlets started reporting the discovery of an ancient Assyrian palace at Tell Nebi Yunus, in tunnels that ISIS had dug into the mound. News reports about the discovery have varied immensely in quality, and it is often difficult to sort through the many discrepancies. We have also had our share of sensational-sounding headlines: “Previously Untouched 600BC Palace Discovered under Shrine Demolished by Isil in Mosul” (the Telegraph); “Jihadist tunnels save Assyrian winged bulls of Mosul” (Agence Presse-France); “Iraqi troops find Assyrian treasures in network of Isis tunnels” (the Guardian). Fox News unsurprisingly emphasized the biblical connection of the palace. But what do we really know here? Let’s take a step back and sum up the situation to date:

Map showing the location of the shrine of Jonah within the ruins of ancient Nineveh, in eastern Mosul

On July 24, 2014, ISIS detonated the shrine of Nebi Yunus (“the prophet Jonah” in Arabic), standing on the top of Tell Nebi Yunus. The shrine is one traditional site of the tomb of Jonah, revered by local Muslims and Christians alike. After Iraqi forces retook this mound in the middle of January, archaeologists surveying damage to the site discovered that ISIS had dug a series of tunnels through the mound. These tunnels were apparently designed to loot artifacts for sale in order to fund their activities. The effort was successful: while the tunnels were mostly empty, a handful of important stone relief sculptures and an inscribed slab were found in them by the archaeologists – presumably because they were too heavy for ISIS to remove them easily through the tunnels. It is thought that many smaller artifacts of lesser value were removed from the site: a cache of more than 100 artifacts discovered in an ISIS commander’s house in eastern Mosul back in January might have come from these tunnels. Archaeologists now warn that there “cave-ins in the tunnels every day,” with danger of collapse of the entire tunnel system.

 Tell Nebi Yunus (with the shrine of Jonah on top) in 1932 
(Matson Photograph Collection, via Library of Congress)
 

 Shrine of Jonah in 1999 (by Roland Unger via Wikimedia Commons)

Now to the sensationalist headlines: First, despite the claims of several media outlets, ISIS did not “save” anything. ISIS looting does seem to have uncovered artifacts from a palace or other royal building – but, if they hadn’t been uncovered, they would still lie perfectly intact beneath the soil of the tell. Instead, ISIS has looted a number of artifacts from the site, with the exact number unknown. Many of these may be lost, many may be illegally removed from the country. In addition, looting operations are massively – let me repeat, massively – destructive. Any artifacts not deemed of sufficient value on the market (and most artifacts found at sites generally fall into this category) are discarded or destroyed. On top of this, we lose not only the objects themselves, but also their archaeological contexts. Artifacts found in contexts can tell us how they were used by people, the functions of buildings, and all sorts of details of everyday life at a settlement. All of this information is now gone from these tunnels.

Second, it is unclear if ISIS discovered a previously unknown building. As British Institute for the Study of Iraq (BISI) chair Paul Collins told Fox News, previous excavations on the mound of Nebi Yunus have uncovered remains of Assyrian royal buildings. Are the new discoveries related to one of these buildings? Note also the discrepancy between the claim that this is a newly discovered palace and the detailed history given of this palace (which kings founded and renovated it) in several reports. Such a history would be difficult or impossible to reconstruct if without scientific excavation. How do we resolve these discrepancies? The history given in the news accounts actually seems to describe what we know of an Assyrian royal building partially excavated at the site in the past, a “review palace” or royal arsenal. The new discoveries could be part of this building, but we cannot be certain without more information.

Third, are the reliefs left in the tunnels in danger from collapse? This concern appears to be exaggerated in news accounts. It is unclear if the handful of large stone slabs would be seriously damaged by collapses of dirt above, especially since the condition of the tunnels is little understood outside of Mosul. In AFP’s story on the palace, Iraqi archaeologist Layla Salih is cited as follows:

“‘We fear it could all collapse at any time,’ entombing the treasures, said Layla Salih.”

The word “entombing” is not a direct quote from the archaeologist; it is the journalist’s paraphrase or interpretation. Is this in fact what Salih is worried about? After all, “entombing” is not a danger to the artifacts themselves; once again, buried artifacts are relatively safe. They can be dug out again eventually. (Contrast the National [UAE] version of the AFP story, which is simply wrong in stating that “[t]he tunnels could collapse at any time, meaning the treasures would be entombed forever.”

The greater danger from the instability of the tunnel system is the collapse of a significant portion of the mound itself. Paul Collins has made a similar observation, emphasizing that the threat is even greater since the hill was already damaged by the demolition of the shrine of Jonah. Archaeologically, there would be significant loss of information from the dirt above the tunnels. This material is stratified – that is, it records the history of how buildings and dirt layers were deposited at the site, with artifacts in the contexts where they were abandoned or discarded in ancient times. When stratified material is excavated properly, the amount we can learn, about individual artifacts, groups of objects, buildings, and the entire history of occupation of the settlement for hundreds and hundreds of years, is nearly limitless. As was already the case with the looting from the tunnels themselves, all of this information would be lost in case of collapse.

Beyond this, Tell Nebi Yunus is still an important part of the living city of Mosul today. The shrine of Jonah is still a holy place even in its ruined state. A collapse of a significant portion of the tell would be a major loss, and a setback to any attempt to restore the shrine.

There are other problems with the news reports: The British tabloid the Daily Star seems to have invented some details, as we hear not only of stone sculptures but also “coins, jewelry and mosaics found in the palace” (Not only have no such small finds have been reported, but more significantly, coins and mosaics did not exist in Assyria at this time.) Even in Josie Ensor’s generally good report on the discovery in the Telegraph, we read (in connection with the inscribed stone slab) that there are “only a handful of such cuneiforms recovered from the period,” when Neo-Assyrian cuneiform inscriptions are quite common. Several new stories refer to these stone reliefs in the tunnels as “treasures.” This is a poor choice of words, since it presents archaeology less as scientific study of the past than as treasure hunting. The New York Post describes a “race against time to save the archaeological treasures”; compare Maev Kennedy’s “race against time to save artefacts” in the Guardian. Gone are the realities of the war. What we are left with is a romantic image of something exciting and adventurous – like an Indiana Jones film.

Our knowledge of what has actually happened here is partial and provisional. As Iraqi archaeologists continue to study the tell and the artifacts left in the tunnels, as more and better reports are received from Mosul, we can get a much clearer picture of what has actually been found at Tell Nebi Yunus. In the meantime, these stories show that, as usual, we must read news reports on archaeology in wartime with great caution.

Growing up with Chuck Berry

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Chuck Berry was never my favorite musician growing up. As I’ve written before, the first musical artist I really loved was the Beatles. As I’ve also written before, the first musical artist I really loved was actually the Monkees, but I’m a revisionist when it comes to this aspect of my history. But Berry’s music was always around: in my parents' music collection. Or Michael J. Fox’s homage to Berry in Back to the Future. Or listening to oldies stations, back when “oldies” meant late 1950s and 1960s – including generous portions of early rock ‘n’ roll. It is fair to say that I grew up on Chuck Berry.

In reality, only a handful of Berry songs were regularly played on oldies stations (“Rock and Roll Music,” “Maybellene,” “Nadine” and “No Particular Place to Go”, “School Days,” “Sweet Little Sixteen,” and of course “Johnny B. Goode”). Instead, I learned much of his output through the Beatles. The Beatles officially released covers of only two Berry songs during their time together: “Rock and Roll Music and “Roll Over Beethoven.” But they had many other songs of his in their repertoire. They recorded several of these in their many live sessions on the BBC between 1963 and 1965. Judging by these recordings, almost all included in two Live at the BBC releases, their setlists included more songs by Berry than by any other artist. I have fond memories of listening to Beatles’ programs on the weekends in my junior high and high school years, hearing many of these Berry songs for the first time, taping them (with other BBC recordings) long before Live at the BBC was released. In a very real sense, I grew up with Chuck Berry through the Beatles.

The Beatles, too, grew up with Chuck Berry: his songs clearly played an important role in their formative years. Their performances on BBC programs make for an interesting measuring stick against one of their musical idols. I’ve always preferred Beatles’ version of “Rock and Roll Music” to the original. For the simple fact that a song titled “Rock and Roll Music” should, quite simply, rock – unlike the Beatles’ version, Berry’s swings more than rocks (the Beach Boys’ hit cover a decade later, their “comeback” hit, also fails to rock). I also like the Beatles’ version of “Too Much Monkey Business” better – perhaps for the same reason, or perhaps simply because it was the first version I heard.

On the other hand, the Beatles do not do “Johnny B. Goode’s” seminal rock real justice. Then there is “Memphis, Tennessee”: a well-constructed song, and surprisingly tender for Berry and his usual teenage tales of school and jukeboxes and cars. The Beatles’ version fails to capture that tenderness as well as Berry – though not as badly as the recording I was most familiar with growing up, the hit version released a year later by Johnny Rivers, who turns it into a dance number.

Given the importance of Berry to the Beatles’ development – and given that he was still active (and producing hits) during his comeback in 1964 – it is surprising to note that the two apparently never met during the Beatles’ lifetime. John Lennon first met Berry only in February 1972, when Lennon and Yoko Ono co-hosted the Mike Douglas show for a week. It is fascinating to watch the footage of the two performing together, Lennon torn between performing for the camera and watching his musical hero.

The irony is that, at the time of this performance, Lennon was being sued for infringing the copyright of one of Berry’s songs. The tale is really unbelievable: When John Lennon wrote “Come Together” in 1969, he began it with a near-quote from Berry’s “You Can’t Catch Me”: “Here come a flat-top, he was movin’ up with me”. In the early 1970s, Lennon was sued by Morris Levy, the notorious  “Godfather of the music industry”, who owned the publishing rights to “You Can’t Catch Me.” (Berry himself was not involved in the suit.) Levy and Lennon settled out of court in 1973, with Lennon agreeing to record three songs owned by Levy on his next album. Lennon’s oldies album Rock ‘n’ Roll was recorded in part to fulfill the terms of the settlement – until an increasingly unstable Phil Spector, the album’s producer, disappeared with the master tapes. As a result, Lennon’s next release was Walls and Bridges, which violated the terms of the agreement. Lennon explained the situation to an increasingly anxious Levy, and later gave him a rough mixes of the recordings (after resuming in New York without Spector). Levy proceeded to release the mixes as an album on his mail order label. Levy sued Lennon for breach; Lennon countersued for unauthorized use of his material and damaging his reputation. (In 1977, after Levy’s appeal was finally ruled on, Lennon prevailed.)

In an interview in September 1980, Lennon dismissed the importance of Berry’s influence on his song:

“Come Together” is me – writing obscurely around an old Chuck Berry thing. I left the line in “Here comes old flat-top.” It is nothing like the Chuck Berry song, but they took me to court because I admitted the influence once years ago. I could have changed it to “Here comes old iron face,” but the song remains independent of Chuck Berry or anybody else on earth. (interview with David Sheff, September 8, 1980; emphasis in original)

But Lennon appears often to have used others’ composition as a way to start writing songs. His borrowings appear regularly at the beginnings of songs: besides the opening words of “Come Together,” there’s the intro to “Revolution” (from Pee Wee Crayton’s “Do Unto Others”); and the opening lines of “Run for Your Life” (lifted from Elvis’s “Baby Let’s Play House”). As with these other songs, “Come Together” might never have been written (or might have been written quite differently) if not for this inspiration.

This was certainly not the only legal action involving Berry’s songs. Berry’s regular music publisher Arc Music (owned by Philip and Leonard Chess from Berry’s label Chess Records along with Gene and Harry Goodman, younger brothers of Benny) threatened to sue the Beach Boys along with their label Capitol Records in 1963 over their hit “Surfin’ USA.” The song consists of new lyrics to Berry’s “Sweet Little Sixteen,” including a list of beaches where Berry has a list of cities, down to the phrase “all over x” (not to mention that the guitar intro is taken directly from Berry’s “Brown-Eyed Handsome Man”). Here too there was a settlement, though this one wasn’t violated: the song was assigned to Berry’s publishing company, and Berry was eventually given a songwriting credit.

Like the Beatles, the Beach Boys were greatly influenced by Berry. There is the intro to “Fun, Fun, Fun,” based on Berry’s guitar intro to “Johnny B. Goode.” But here the irony is that this, perhaps Berry’s most famous riff, was actually lifted by Berry from Carl Hogan’s intro to Louis Jordan’s “Ain’t That Just Like a Woman.” In interviews Berry made a point of singling out the importance of Hogan and Jordan in influencing his music. “If you can call it my music,” as Berry once said, before continuing, “but then there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Berry had his own influences, which he sometimes lifted. But he stole most often from himself. There was the intro to “Maybellene,” recycled in his very next single, “Thirty Days”; the identical guitar solos in “Too Much Monkey Business” and “Roll Over Beethoven”; the melody and instrumental track of his Christmas song “Run Rudolph Run” reused in “Little Queenie”; the two best-known hits of his 1964 comeback, “No Particular Place to Go” and “Nadine,” reusing the melodies of “School Day” and (a slowed down) “Maybellene.” When listening to Berry’s music it is Berry’s own licks and tunes we hear more than anyone else’s – Berry was really an original after all. Or, to put it another way, everyone grew up on Chuck Berry . . . even Chuck Berry.

Why I Write about Palmyra

  Modern town of Palmyra (Tadmur), Syria, c. 2006

photo by Soman via Wikimedia Commons

About 3 years ago, I started to be very concerned about how we talk about the Syrian war. News consumers, academics, all of us. It seemed that we – and scholars of the ancient world in particular – might care more about ruined buildings than we did about human beings, even as their lives were being snuffed out by the thousands. I was moved to start writing about cultural heritage then, trying to highlight how its importance is completely tied up with its role in people’s lives.

 

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A year ago I returned to this topic. At the time, Palmyra was in the news, and I saw the same pattern repeating itself in how we discussed that city. At the time, I knew next to nothing about Palmyra. I was unaware that its Arabic name was Tadmur; unaware that the site had been constantly inhabited up to the twentieth century; unaware that the modern village was demolished in the early 1930s to allow archaeologists to dig the Temple of Bel; unaware that there was a modern town of tens of thousands there today.

I began to write the archaeology and history of Palmyra. I focused on two topics: the post-classical history of the city; and the history of modern Western exploration of and interaction with it. I felt – and still feel today – that we do not discuss these topics nearly enough. Instead, we are far too concerned with the classical city, because, I suspect, we see it as part of our own heritage in Europe and the United State, unlike the more recent Arab history of the site. In this way our interactions with the site today disturbingly echo the three centuries of modern Western interaction with it, and this is something I desperately want to see changed.

Why don’t I focus on the inhabitants of the modern town and the war itself? These are very worthy topics for discussion, but they are not my areas of expertise. I don’t know Arabic, though I plod through it slowly when necessary for research. My training is in archaeology. Beyond this, I have spent much time over the last few years looking at accounts of European and American travelers to the Middle East, and so Modern European and American accounts of the site were a natural area of focus. When it comes to the present-day people of Tadmur and Syria, I have tried to highlight work by others, especially by Syrians themselves.

In my writing, I try to focus on issues about which we are often uninformed or even misinformed. I hope that in some small way it will affect (for the better) how we think and talk about Palmyra and its inhabitants. But it would be foolish to make changing how we talk about Palmyra and its inhabitants a goal in itself. Talk, after all, is cheap. The real problem for Palmyra and Syria is not the attitudes that we in the U.S. or Europe have, or the attitudes of Bashar al-Assad or ISIS or Al Qaeda or various rebel groups. The real problem is the actions these people and groups are carrying out. In short, the war is the problem. Ignoring the suffering of human beings in Syria (or anywhere in conflict) can make us indifferent to the horrors of war or even help us to rationalize them. Seeing their cultural heritage as actually belonging to us, and seeing that heritage under threat from “barbaric” groups (like ISIS) in the Middle East, can provide a warped justification for those horrors.

I worry that we are often more concerned about symbols and words than we are with actions; I sometimes worry that I am more concerned with them myself. Symbolism is important, but only as much as it leads to action. We must always be aware of this. And so I am ultimately writing to change actions. More precisely, I am writing to change our attitudes towards Syria and Syrians in order to change actions. Our attitudes play an important role in leading towards actions, or (even more) in justifying actions. In justifying death and destruction, theft of resources. In justifying war itself.

To be clear: I am not suggesting my writing will have any significant effect on these problems. My audience is small and my influence on it smaller still. I hold few illusions about my occasional writing on this subject and the impact that it has. But I do hold a few. Illusions can be useful things if they are constructive. Why else would we write, or try to do our own small part to make the world a better place?