BASRAH
MUSEUM
![](Basrah_Museum_in_Iraq.jpg)
Basrah
Museum
Former
name : Palace
of Saddam Hussein
Established : September 2016
Location : Basra, Iraq
Coordinates : 30.4974146° N 47.8611017° E
Type : Museum
Director : Qahtan Alabeed
The
Basrah Museum is a museum in the Iraqi city of Basra, housed in
a former palace of Saddam Hussein. Its collection is related to
Mesopotamian, Babylonian, Persian civilisations, as well as the
history of the city itself. Basrah Museum opened its doors to
the public in March 2019. The Director of the Basrah Antiquities
& Heritage is Qahtan Al Abeed, who has managed the project
from the start with the cooperation of the State Board of Antiquities
& Heritage and the Ministry of Culture and with support from
the UK Friends of Basrah Museum.
History
:
The museum was closed in 1991, when it was among nine museums
looted by mobs opposed to Saddam Hussein at the close of the first
Gulf War.
The
Basrah Museum opened its first Gallery of the Museum in September
2016. The Friends of Basrah Museum is the organisation that raised
the funds for the first gallery's installation through generous
corporate and individual donations. FOBM received a UK Cultural
Protection Fund [CPF] Grant award in December 2016, managed by
the British Council in partnership with the Department of Digital,
Culture, Media and Sport to support the completion of the new
Basrah Museum. The London-based British Museum was also one of
the Western organisations which supported the Basrah Museum at
the start of the project in 2010.
The
museum officially opened its doors to the public in March 2019
with three new galleries: Babylon, Sumer and Assyrian. With the
assistance of the Iraq Museum and the Basrah Museum thousands
of artefacts dating back as far as BCE 6,000 are back on display
in the southern province. These include artefacts from the original
museum looted in 1991 that are now on display in the Basrah Gallery.
The museum now has labels in English and Arabic throughout all
four galleries, worked on by Qahtan Alabeed and others with assistance
from the Friends of Basrah Museum and The British Institute for
the Study of Iraq for the English language labels.
Source
:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basrah_Museum