Unesco has added 26 sites, more than three quarters of them cultural, to its World Heritage list. The new additions to the list—which offers legal protection for sites deemed to be of “outstanding universal value”—are in countries including China, Romania, Russia, Iran, Ethiopia and South Africa. The newly inscribed properties bring the total number of global Unesco World Heritage Sites to 1,223.
The World Heritage committee, which is made up of representatives from 21 member states, is meeting in New Delhi, India, for its 46th session. Of the 26 new designations, 20 are cultural world heritage sites while five are natural world heritage sites. Another site—Te Henua Enata, The Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia—is a mixed property, encompassing natural and cultural elements.
The ancient Monastery of Saint Hilarion (Tell Umm Amer) in Gaza has been urgently added to Unesco’s List of World Heritage in Danger, due to threats from the ongoing war, making it the most politicised site on the list. The decision underscores the critical situation facing the historic site.
A view of the crypt chapel at The Saint Hilarion Monastery, one of the earliest monastic sites in the Middle East
© Elter 2022
Meanwhile a series of outdoor sculptures (1937-38) by the Romanian artist Constantin Brâncuși, located in the south-western Romanian town of Targu Jiu, also made the list. The five installations, a tribute to soldiers who died in World War One, are on a 1.5-km-long axis along Targu Jiu’s central Avenue of Heroes.
“The remarkable fusion of abstract sculpture, landscape architecture, engineering, and urban planning conceived by Constantin Brâncuși goes far beyond the local wartime episode to offer an original vision of the human condition,” says a Unesco statement.
Italy gets its 60th entry on the Unesco list after the Appian Way—an ancient highway which connected Rome to the southern city of Capua near Naples, extending later to Brindisi—was added. “More than 800 kilometres long, the Via Appia is the oldest and most important of the great roads built by the Ancient Romans. Constructed and developed from 312 BCE to the fourth century CE, it was originally conceived as a strategic road for military conquest, advancing towards the East and Asia Minor,” Unesco says.
Three cultural sites in Africa are among the 24 entries, including the abandoned city of Gedi in Kenya—one of the most important Swahili cities on the east African coast from the tenth to 17th centuries—and the Melka Kunture and Balchit archaeological and palaeontological sites in the highland area of Ethiopia. “Footprints that testify to the area’s occupation by the hominin groups from two million years ago,” were found in these areas, Unesco says.
The pre-Islamic walled city of Qaryat al-Faw located around 700 kilometres southwest of Riyadh was included, giving Saudi Arabia its seventh World Heritage designation, a move which will boost the country’s cultural credentials. The ancient metropolis of Hegmataneh in Iran, which provides important and rare evidence of the Medes civilisation in the seventh and sixth centuries BC was also included, becoming the 28th Unesco site in the Middle Eastern country.
Hegmataneh hill in northwest Iran, which was continuously inhabited for nearly three millennia
© HHCH Base Archive
Representatives also voted to “add significant modifications” to a Moravian Church Settlement (Denmark), already inscribed on the World Heritage List. “The extension includes three municipalities founded in the 18th century: Herrnhut (Germany), Bethlehem (United States), and Gracehill (United Kingdom)”, says Unesco. Gracehill becomes Northern Ireland’s second Unesco World Heritage Site, the first being Giant’s Causeway which was listed in 1986.
Chris Bryant, UK government minister for creative industries, arts, and tourism, says in a statement: “Gracehill has been rightly cherished by the local community since its foundation in 1759 as a town built around the central values of equality and tolerance and I am glad to see it gain the recognition that it deserves.”
UPDATE (1 August): Unesco says in a statement: "The committee inscribed 26 new properties, including making two major extensions to properties which are considered as new inscriptions. The other inscriptions include 20 cultural properties, five natural properties and one mixed site."