The Iraqi desert has just revealed one of its most beautiful secrets. As Popular Mechanics magazine reports, archaeologists have finally got their hands on the remains of Charax Spasinou, an ancient metropolis that was believed to have been erased forever by the weight of time, the elements and history. This “Alexandria of Iraq”, the ultimate testimony to the excessive ambition of the Macedonian conqueror, is no longer a simple name in ancient texts.
Established in 324 BC. BC, just one year before the death of Alexander the Great in Babylon, the city was initially intended to accommodate colonists and disabled veterans of his immense army. But the destiny of the city was as tumultuous as the Tigris, the river which bordered it.
The Roman author Pliny the Elder reports in his work Naturalis History: “The original city was founded by Alexander the Great with settlers brought from the royal city of Durine, which was later destroyed, and with the disabled soldiers of his army who were left there. He had given the order that it be called Alexandria.»
After devastating floods, it was the Arab king Spaosines who brought it back to life, erecting massive ramparts and raising the ground over an area almost 10,000 meters in circumference. It is from this period that the city takes its name, the one that has remained in history: Charax Spasinou.
The crucial role of technology
However, for decades, the location of this place was pure speculation. Although Royal Air Force aerial photos could show buried structures as early as the 1960s, the geopolitical instability of the region prohibited any excavation for half a century.
It was only from 2014 that researchers were finally able to invest an area of more than 500 square kilometers to carry out surface surveys. The result of this campaign, based on cutting-edge technologies, exceeds all expectations.
The use of drones to construct a detailed terrain model, combined with the use of magnetometers, has allowed geophysicists to “see” buried structures through the ground. They discovered thousands of pottery fragments, industrial debris and bricks littering the site.
The magnetic map reveals an urban city at the height of logistics of the time: wide streets, dense housing blocks, temple complexes and artisan districts with brick kilns. The city was not just a simple border garrison, it constituted a real economic hub, ideally placed between the Tigris and the Eulaeus to control the trade routes of Mesopotamia. The surveys even identified port basins and canals, evidence of remarkable hydraulic engineering.
Researchers now hope that the political stabilization of the region will allow real excavations to begin in order to discover all the treasures of this 1,200-year-old city. A colossal project which promises to rewrite entire sections of Hellenistic history and do justice to one of the last works of Alexander the Great.
