Roaming and Reading: Baghdad

For this week's Roaming and Reading, Justin Marozzi takes us to the streets of Baghdad. Marozzi's richly researched new book "Baghdad: City of Peace, City of Blood," delves into thirteen centuries of the region's history. When U.S. troops entered the city in 2003, it was only the latest chapter in a city that has seen alternating ages of war and peace.

From a review of Marozzi's book in The Spectator:

The history of Baghdad more than any other city mirrors the ebb and flow that has marked Islamic history and civilisation. The rise and fall of empires and dynasties, the splendours of Islam's high culture and its decline, the periodic tensions and ease that affected relations between nations and peoples, sects and faiths have all been played out in the teeming neighbourhoods, palace precincts, market areas, great mosques, educational centres and military compounds of this remarkable city.

On The Daily Circuit: Exploring the history of Baghdad

Justin Marozzi joined The Daily Circuit on Jan. 28 to discuss the epic past and troubled present of the city of Baghdad.

On the rich history of Baghdad's early days

"From 762 to 1258, it was a very cosmopolitan place where you have Jews, Christians and Muslims all together in the same city, in this great melting pot. Although violence was a constant in the history of Baghdad, it seems to me it was a much more tolerant place in its earliest incarnation where different faiths rubbed up against each other, more or less peacefully. Different opinions were tolerated, there were vigorous philosophical and religious debates."

Can you find corners of the city where you can look back into its deep history? Places that haven't been touched by the city's strife?

"It's getting harder and harder to do that, and the main reason for that is the destruction of some of the greatest monuments in the city. Even a century ago, when you read early 20th century travel accounts, people arrived hungry for a city of minarets and palaces and domes and people tended to be quite disappointed because almost all of them have ceased to exist.

Many of the buildings were built from mud-baked or kiln-fired brick. With the regular flooding of the river Tigris, they've just been swept away in these huge floods. Unlike Damascus, which has many of its finest buildings made of stone, very little remains in Baghdad. Having said that, you can find tremendous sections of architecture and monuments like at the Al-Mustansiriya University, which claims to be the oldest in the world. It was started in the mid-13th century and it has been heavily restored. Although it feels quite modern as you wander through this magnificent environment, it goes quite a long way to show you how splendid and awe-inspiring some of that original architecture was."

Were there places in Baghdad that you hesitated to go while researching?

"A lot of the city I was hesitant to visit. I was lucky to have a number of Iraqi friends who bravely put their lives on the line to help me get out and about. I'm incredibly indebted to those men and women. A lot of times, it was simply impossible. [...] A simple trip to the market could mean chancing death. I had to be quite careful about when and where to make visits across the city. I had the advantage of working for a security company at the time, so I did have an armored taxi service at my beck and call."

On the current situation in Baghdad

"This has to be one of the low points in the city's history, but if you go back across the centuries, you read the descriptions of what conquerors like Hulagu, who is Genghis Khan's grandson, did to the city in 1258. He razed it the ground. Only 150 years later, when the city was just slowly recovering from this apocalypse, along came Tamerlane, the Turkish warlord, who sacked the city again and cut off 90,000 heads of the city's inhabitants. He built the heads into 120 towers around the city and set them alight as a warning to the people of the Middle East: don't even think about resisting me because this is what will happen to you. That puts things like al-Qaeda and corrupt governments in Iraq in perspective, but it's a pretty bleak comparison to make. Many Iraqis today are despairing about what has happened to their great capital."

Looking toward Baghdad's future

"This is an exceptionally difficult time for the city, but one thing we should acknowledge, one of the great things this city and its people have demonstrated over the ages is resilience, endurance and stamina. The city hasn't been swept aside and it hasn't disappeared into the sand. It's still there, it's still proud and the people are still tough; they have to be because of the circumstances that regularly face them."