The Ahwar of Southern Iraq: Refuge of Biodiversity and the Relict Landscape of the Mesopotamian Cities

The Ahwar of Southern Iraq joins seven components into one extraordinary property: the Sumerian cities of Uruk and Ur with Tell Eridu, born in the marshlands of the combined Tigris-Euphrates delta in the 4th and 3rd millennia BCE, and four wetland marsh areas that rank among the largest inland delta systems on the planet — all in a fiercely hot, arid land. Cradle of cities and refuge of biodiversity at once, the Mixed site was inscribed by UNESCO in 2016.