DEIR SUNBOL, Syria (AP)--The ``Dead Cities'' of Syria are coming alive. And archaeologists are aghast.Pushed by a booming population, farmers are moving back into the lonely hills of northern Syria and making homes in villages that had stood deserted for a millennium in nearly pristine condition. In Deir Sunbol, a formerly abandoned town that grew rich from the olive oil trade in the 6th century, farmers are using stones and sometimes even the standing walls of Byzantine houses for their own homes. Crosses carved into stone blocks centuries ago stand next to cheap plastic windows and plywood doors put up by the newcomers.
Sheep and horses shield themselves from the scorching midday sun by huddling beneath the stone arches of largely intact frames of ancient stone houses. One family uses an underground burial chamber to store grain. Many of the families get their water from underground cisterns built in Byzantine times. The trend has scientists fearful the world will lose a trove of Byzantine archaeological treasures.
``If we leave these people to do what they like, in a few years we will have no historical sites at all,'' said Abdu Asfari, director of antiquities in the region. The government is trying to limit the destruction, barring people from moving into hundreds of ancient villages that are still deserted and imposing fines for destroying antiquities. In some cases, officials can raze houses that are too close to ancient buildings. But that has outraged the new villagers, mostly poor Muslim farmers and shepherds who feel little connection to antiquities from Syria's Christian past. ``We may be forced to destroy what we built,'' said Ahmad Satouf el-Barghout, a 75-year old shepherd. He lives a few hundred yards from a five-story pillar that was built for a Byzantine hermit. ``Of course, it would be better'' if the antiquities never existed, he said. ``There is no benefit.''
Antiquities experts also criticize the government effort. They say it is doing too little to save an area that boasts 2,000 ancient churches and is considered one of the best preserved stretches of Byzantine communities. ``It's a beautiful example of life in the villages,'' said Jean-Pierre Sodini, a French archaeologist from the Sorbonne who has been excavating in the area since 1974. ``These villages must be protected.'' Syrian courts, however, are often reluctant to take strong action against impoverished farmers trying to eke out a living in the rocky land where the Dead Cities are located. ``The judge will say, `The living are better than the dead,''' said Abdallah Hadjar of the Archaeological Society of Aleppo. ``The government says they are just illiterate peasants.''
In the 4th to the 6th centuries, Deir Sunbol was part of a 90-mile stretch of mountain villages in the hills near Aleppo. Hundreds of thousands of people are believed to have lived in approximately 800 villages. Many of the villages exported olive oil and wine to Antioch and Apamea, two of the major cities of the Byzantine Empire. The region started to decline as the empire began to lose control of the area in the 7th century to the Persians and later the Arabs. The population plummeted when the turmoil severed lucrative trade ties. By the 10th century, the area was largely abandoned as farmers left the hills for the more fertile plains. The region was mostly deserted until Syria's modern population boom forced people from the plains to move back around the ancient hilltop villages in search of land. Twenty-five years ago, there were only a few dozen homes in Deir Sunbol. Now there are 500, evidence of the growth that is expected to double Syria's population in 20 years.
Archaeologists are urging the government to declare more of the ancient sites as protected areas to save the most cherished villages. Qalaat Semaan, where St. Simeon stayed atop a pillar for some 42 years as a show of faith, already has been declared off limits for development. It is a major site for tourists. Archaeologists admit that most of the eerie stretch of land they dubbed the Dead Cities will no longer remain abandoned. ``We can't stop the demographic changes,'' said Gerard Charpentier, a French architect working at Serjila, a Byzantine town that remains unoccupied. ``You can't preserve the whole area.''
(Source: Waco Tribune-Herald [TX,USA] / By Louis Meixler - Aug 29 1998)