The Hevsel Gardens: archives of human activities and of the past and present evolution of the River Tigris at Diyarbakır

Abstract

Environment and environmental systems have memories which become heritages common to several civilizations. The river and valley systems at Diyarbakır are such a heritage, whose future depends first today on our decisions and deeds, but also on the history of the system dynamics. This history is recorded in the terraces stretching along the river flood plain, and in the relationships between the river and the substratum that it incises. In 2014, we investigated the Hevsel gardens, which correspond to river terraces stepping at the foot of the city walls (right bank), but also at the foot of the plateau over which the University is built (left bank). The results presented here fix the general context of our further studies (2015): 1) a topographic profile of the terraces from the foot of the City walls to today’s active bed; 2) the map of the terraces on the right bank of the river at Diyarbakır (corresponding to Hevsel gardens); 3) a preliminary geological section from the City to the river; 4) the stratigraphy of a sediment core retrieved from an abandoned channel of the river in one of its youngest terraces. Finally we expose our plans for future studies, which will investigate not only (1) deep cores to be set in terraces of different ages at the Diyarbakır location, but also other parts of the watershed such as (2) the remnants of a river network allowing the Tigris to join the Euphrates West of the Karacadağ volcanic massif, and (3) possible sediment archives contained in the collapsed bottom of dolines in the Bismil vicinity.

Pourquoi le jardin d’Éden n’est pas un paradis. Mythe et psychanalyse

“…Le problème est que l'étude pédologique de l'Hevsel n'est pas achevée et que nous ne savons pas exactement pour l'heure quelle était l'emprise de cet Hevsel protohistorique (Kuzucuoğlu et Karadoğan 2015). Or -et je m'en tiens ici à la seule question des sources, j'entends les documents littéraires ou épigraphiques -, la documentation annalistique ne nous permet pas pour l'instant de situer ces jardins dévastés, et donc de documenter de manière positive l'existence de l'Hevsel là où il se trouve aujourd'hui.…”

Using satellite imagery to assess the changes in land use and land cover in Diyarbakır city (SE Turkey)

“…Diyarbakır is one of the biggest cities of Mesopotamia and SE Turkey, show different examples of the LULC. Urbanization was generally taken into consideration, especially in old town section of the city (i.e., Suriçi) (Koç and Aykal, 2018;Sinemillioglu et al, 2010;Kuzucuoğlu and Karadoğan, 2015). Other satellite image analysis-based studies in the study area have concrete objectives and examined at changes through the lens of a single factor.…”