Dead Cities
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How it came to be
In the limestone uplands between Aleppo and Idlib in north-western Syria stand villages built from the 1st to the 7th century. Some 40 of them, grouped in eight archaeological parks, keep houses, pagan temples, churches, cisterns and bathhouses, and show the passage from the pagan Roman world to Byzantine Christianity.
About 30 km north-west of Aleppo is the church built around the pillar of Saint Simeon, a monk who lived on top of a column and died in 459. Four basilicas extend in a cross from a central octagon, and the church was completed in 490. Pilgrims chipped away the column as relics until only a block about 2 metres high was left.
Most of the villages were abandoned between the 8th and 10th centuries. They were inscribed in 2011 as the Ancient Villages of Northern Syria and, because of the armed conflict that began that March, have been on the List of World Heritage in Danger since 2013.
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