Arg-E Bam

The Arg-E bam (ارگبم in Persan, the " citadel of Bam ") was the largest monument in adobe of the world, located at Bam, a provincial town of Kerman in the south-east of the Iran. It is included in the Liste of the world heritage of UNESCO. This gigantic Citadel, located on famous the Silk route, was built some time before the Ve front century J. - C. and remained in activity until in 1850 a. J. - C. One does not know with certainty the reason of his abandonment.

The building as a whole was a large fortress in which the heart of the citadel itself was located, but because of impressive appearance of the citadel, which constituted the highest point of it, the whole fortress is called Citadelle of Bam .

The December 26th 2003, the Citadel was almost completely destroyed by an earthquake, at the same time as most of the remainder of Bam and its surroundings. A few days after the tremor, the Iranian president Mohammad Khatami announced that the Citadel would be rebuilt.

Dimensions

Broader than its neighbor Arg-E Rayen, the Citadel occupies approximately 180.000 m ² of surface, and 6-7 m is surrounded by gigantic high and long walls of 1815 Mr. It presents two of the turns of guet which make the celebrity of Bam - it to 67 turns of the same kind dispersed there among the old city of Bam.

Structure and design of the Citadel

The design and the architecture of the citadel were ingeniously elaborate starting from various points of view. Thanks to current form of the citadel, one can see that it (them) architect (S) had envisaged the whole final shape of the monument and the city as of the first stages of the design. With each phase of development of the building, the already built part improved the form of the unit, and each new part could be " cousue" with a former section without tear.

The citadel is located in the center of the city-fortress, on the highest point, to benefit from the panorama vast and released for safety reasons. The remarkable impression left by the citadel made that the entirety of the fortress surrounding it was also included in the name " Citadel of Bam".

In the architecture of the Citadel of Bam, one distinguishes two different parts:

the sector of the leaders in the enclosure of the internal wall, including/understanding the citadel, of the barracks, a mill, houses, a well of water (dug in the rocky ground on forty meters of depth)
the sector of surrounding the sector of the leaders, including/understanding the main entrance of the city-fortress and the Bazaar skirting the North-South axis (which connects the main entrance to the citadel), like + 400 houses with the associated public buildings (such as a school and a sports ground).

One can classify the houses in three categories:

smallest with 2-3 parts for the poor families;
largest with 3-4 parts for the average social classes, some have also a veranda;
most luxurious, with more parts directed in directions corresponding to the seasons of the year, and having large a court and a stall for animals in the vicinity. There are few houses of this kind in the fortress.

All the buildings are out of believed clay bricks, for example in adobe. The Citadel of Bam was probably, before the earthquake of 2003, the greatest structure in adobe in the world.

Safety

When the door of the city was closed, no human, nor no animal could enter. The inhabitants could continue to live a long time in insulation, considering which they had a puit, gardens, cattle and other pets inside. When the city-fortress was besieged, the inhabitants remained in the city while the soldiers could defend this one correctly, protected by the very high walls and turns.

Air conditioning

In addition to the turns of guet and tops ornamented of the high walls on the horizon of the fortress, the Badgir S are also remarkable. They are structures special emerging of the various buildings, created to benefit from the winds and to bring them inside the buildings. Sometimes the wind thus captured are brought to pass on the surface of a watery basin to refresh the building, and to remove the dust and the dryness brought by the air of the desert. There are several types of badgirs used for different buildings. For example, there exist badgirs with four directions for the largest buildings and most important, which are able to catch the winds blowing in directions varying according to the hour, the day or the season; and there exist badgirs with a direction for the small buildings.

Tourism

From the middle of XIXe century a. J. - C., the fortress was abandoned for unknown reasons. Before the earthquake of December 26th, 2003, the Citadel was one of principal tourist attractions of the area and was visited by a great number of Iranians like foreigners.

The earthquake in 2003

In 2003, the earthquake of Bam destroyed more than 80% of the Citadel.

Much country cooperates with the reconstruction project of this site pertaining to the inheritance of humanity. Japan, Italy and France are among the countries which began their co-operation with this project from the beginning. Japan granted 1.300.000 US dollars to Iran for the rebuilding of the Citadel of Bam, moreover it supported the Iranian government in this project by sending equipment and by recreating the plan 3D of the Citadel, to improve the precision of the restoration of the citadel. Italy gave 300.000 US dollars in the Project of Rescue of Bam. It also sent a team of experts Italian to restore the principal tower of Bam. France also helped the Iranian government by providing the chart of the citadel. The World Bank also allocated a great amount of money to this project.

References

the original text was a translation of the article " Bam-Citadelo" , writes at the origin in Esperanto by Asad Mahbub, appeared the first time in the Irana Esperantisto n°4, year 2, be 2003,40 p., pp.5-7. The permission to use it in Wikipédia was granted. Its sources were:

Nimrokhi az Arge Bam (the Citadel of Bam in a glance) , by Davood Yousofzadeh, Bam: Mr. Mohammadi-zade, 1998, p160

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