BAM, Dec 26: Friday’s devastating earthquake in Iran wiped out one of the most perfectly preserved cities of the ancient world, known as the Emerald of the Desert, featuring a 2,000-year-old citadel that was one of the largest mud-built structures anywhere.

The vast castle, surrounded by a three-kilometre crenellated wall, loomed over a city entirely built of mud bricks, clay, straw and the trunks of palm trees, and sealed off by a defensive perimeter with a single gate.

Not only was the city on the list of World Heritage Sites of the UNESCO, but it also used to be a favoured place for movie-makers seeking an exotic setting.

It provided the backdrop for Valerio Zurlini’s 1976 epic, “The Desert of the Tartars”, which in turn was inspired by a painting of the citadel by Giorgio de Chirico called “The Red Tower”.

The movie touched off a minor tourism boom to Bam, although this trade has suffered recently because of the kidnapping of several tourists by the drug-traffickers plaguing Iran’s borders with Pakistan and Afghanistan. —AFP