Palmyra 1885: The Wolfe Expedition and the Photographs of John Henry Haynes

Fortunately I managed to visit and photograph this amazing archeological site before unforgiveable barbarians destroyed the ruins and savagely murdered the outstanding man who tried to protect them. I was curious to see how they were over 150 years previously.

This book is full of beautiful black and white, I suppose almost sepia pictures of Palmyra in Syria as it was one hundred years ago, longer in fact. It is heartbreaking the destruction that occurred there recently so this is a nice reminder of how it used to be. Don McCullen photographed it in recent years but his book is I suppose out of print and now quite expensive.

Very interesting photographs showing the site long before it became famous. All photographs in sepia barring two small photographs in colourThis is an interesting book that helps support memories of a visit several years ago Before the sites destruction

Palmyra, a UNESCO World Heritage site in Syria and one of the world’s best preserved Roman cities, appeared in the headlines during the Syrian Civil War in May 2015 after the ancient city's capture by the so-called Islamic State, who demolished the Temples of Bel and Baalshamin in the months thereafter. Ousterhout and Anderson’s book does a great service by reproducing very important, unpublished, and remarkably artful photographs taken of these monuments at Palmyra in 1885 by John Henry Haynes, the father of American archaeological photography. These photographs -- gathered from the archives of Cornell, Harvard, and the University of Pennsylvania -- are lavishly reproduced here, many for the first time, on large-scale 22 x 25cm and 22 x 50cm layouts. With newly-written introductions to the site and the photographer, and identifications of monuments captured by each photo, this book belongs on the shelf of anyone with interests in the Syrian Civil War, cultural heritage and history in the Middle East, the history of archaeology, or Roman architecture.