Syrian Arab News Agency S A N A
Damascus, SANA – Remarkable murals were found in the archeological site of Tal Saka, located in al-Ghuzlaniyeh area, 25 km southeast of Damascus city.
The mural paintings depicted men and women with Amorite features, according to Dr. Mahmoud al-Sayyed of the Directorate of Antiquities and Museums.
The Amorites were an ancient Semitic-speaking people from ancient Syria who also occupied large parts of southern Mesopotamia from the 21st century BC to the end of the 17th century BC.
The paintings in Tal Saka, he told SANA, bear resemblance to those which were discovered in the royal palace of Zimri-Lim, king of Mari (modern Tell Hariri), an ancient kingdom located 11 km north-west of al-Bukamal city on the Euphrates river’s western bank, eastern Syria.
The murals are also similar to others which were discovered in Pharaonic temples and cemeteries as far as composition and style are concerned, al-Sayyed added.
He spoke to SANA of a particular mural painting that features the profile of a person in Pharaonic style. It could be read from the design that the person’s face might be for a king, a god or any of the symbols of the Egyptian Pharaonic civilization.
A crown is shaped on the person’s head with two horns jutting out of it, and in the middle of it a sundisc shape disseminating rays within the crown’s frame appears.
Al-Sayyed suggested that the depiction featured in the painting may stand for Osiris, an Egyptian god, usually identified as the god of the afterlife, the underworld and the dead.
He explained that the mural was painted on an adobe wall covered with a 2-4 cm layer of clay. A white plaster layer was then put, on which the drawings were designed.
The pale blue pale color used in coloring is said to have been used a lot in ancient Egyptian mural paintings.
The mural, as al-Sayyed noted, is thought to date back to the period between 15-18 centuries BC.
Manar al-Frieh/Haifa Said
