Dead Cities and Death Threats

At Damascus we had met an American named Kito and we (almost literally) ran into him again on our first day in Hama along with a Scottish-born New Zealander called Rob he had met on the bus coming up from Damascus. Hama is famous for it’s creaking norias (water-wheels). Apparently experienced engineers can tell the health of the wheels by listening to the distinctive creak each one makes. Even the most experienced engineers would have had trouble determining the health of each of Hama’s noria’s due to the fact the water seems to have long ago stagnated and now forms a pretty solid sludge that smells like the toilets at a League of Ireland stadium.  They look undeniably pretty and make a nice change, but when you see pictures of them, try to remember they were probably taken as fast as possible as we fled the vacinity.

We intended to use Hama as a base to explore the region further and this was helped immensely by the fact that Rob, married to a Syrian and living on and off in the region over the past number of years, spoke Arabic. We were thus able to see parts of the country that would otherwise have been too difficult to organise- getting off between stops, negotiating taxi fares and the like.

The first place we visited was Ma’aret an Nu’aman, where we could get a bus to see a couple of the Dead Cities- ancient settlements that had been abandoned some 15 centuries previously. There’s hundreds such sites around the region so we elected for two of the most evocative, Serjilla and Al-Bara.

Ma’aret an Nu’aman itself has some of the mosaics recovered from these settlements but the town is more (in)famous for an event that happened during the First Crusade where the Crusaders, having breached the towns walls and massacred some 20, 000 of it’s people, then resorted to cannibalism, so hungry were they. One witness wrote: “In Ma’arra our troops boiled pagan adults in cooking-pots; they impaled children on spits and devoured them grilled.” Another noted: “I shudder to tell that many of our people, harassed by the madness of excessive hunger, cut pieces from the buttocks of the Saracens already dead there, which they cooked, but when it was not yet roasted enough by the fire, they devoured it with savage mouth.”

Unfortunately there were no mosaics of this.

The Dead Cities were amazing to walk around, hidden deep in the hills. Half ruined baths, and taverns, houses and cisterns lay weathered but still standing defiantly in the sun. It was just possible to imagine what the town must have been like at its peak; the experience both beautiful and eerie.   

With so many buildings, many private, still standing, the effect was somewhat like a Byzantine era ‘Through the Keyhole’ - sneaking through people’s homes searching for evidence of the owner.

The fourth place we went to was Ebla was a Bronze Age settlement, at one time the largest in the world. It’s situated three kilometres from the main road- the ‘Bronzers’ as they’re (probably) known, having hadmore important things to worry about than tourists and their attendent infrastructural needs. Like war, conquest, famine and death. We were however, spared the walk by an obliging lorry driver who allowed the four of us to squeeze into his cabin.

Rob had previously told us that he had so far managed to resist the Middle Eastern custom whereby men often hold one another’s hand, hug, sit on one another’s knees, and generally radiate gentle affection for one another. Sitting on Kito’s knee in a cramped lorry cabin it was reckoned he had probably finally gone native.*

The site itself is impressive and fairly extensive, surrounded on all sides by massive slopes built to repel potential invaders. Although the size of these slops has diminished over the years it still offered the, one would think, once in a lifetime opportunity to storm a Bronze Age settlement. Sadly my repeated shouts of ‘Go away!’ were, despite my lofty position, not enough to deter Kito who charged the bank and gained the top. This advance would most likely have been more laudable had not the determined invader collapsed breathless at the top. We were beginning to see who the site had remained unconquered for so long- any prospective invading army would have had to stop for a tea break halfway to the top, and again at the top.

We were about the only tourists there, Ebla falling well off the main trail, but the site itself remains a cenre of activity in some respects. Bedoin tribes camped and farmed nearby as shepherds tended to flocks of sheep where temples and libraries had once loomed, adm0nishing ancient settlers. Goats strolled across hills that at one time offered protection to a beleaguered townspeople. With this in mind it was extraordinary to be walking the ramparts as the sun went down, although it’s difficult to say of this magical effect was heightened or diminished by the band of assorted Bedoin children who followed us around the latter stages, clutching terrified lambs and kids (as in, baby goats) in their arms and asked to have their photo taken. It’s odd how often the only English these children know are is ‘Hello’ and ‘money.’

There are many ‘don’t do’s’ in the associated with travel in the Middle East and scampering across a motorway at night is probably among them. Getting stuck in the countryside at night is probably another though, so with that in mind we attempted to hitch home. After several long minutes huddled together by the side of the road someone had the (quite literally) bright idea of waving a torch and Kito, ever prepared, was able to produce one. Careful not to point it directly into a hapless driver’s eyes and have him careen into us (another ‘don’t do’), he elected instead to illuminate his own face which had the happy effect of drawing a speeding bus to a halt some yards down the road from us.

The evening itself was enlivened further by a rather over-’friendly’ waiter at the cafe we were at. Upon learning of Kito’s nationality he proceeded to make ever more threatening ‘banter’ with him regarding it- the folly in coming to Syria uppermost in this one-sided verbal jousting. This was fine and rather fun at ‘You’re very brave to come here,’ but rather more worrisome around the point where he came back brandishing a butter knife and warning, ‘Stay here, I call police on you.’ Still, it’s heartening to know a Basil Fawlty/Professor Snape hybrid is hanging around serving tea in centra Hama, isn’t it?

*On one of his first visits to the Middle East, Rob had asked for directions in Arabic, only for one of the (very) willing Syrians to grab his hand and drag him along the street, leaving Rob wondering what on earth he had asked of the man. I couldn’t help but be reminded of the Monty Python sketch with the Hungarian Phrasebook.