Basrah Museum
The Basrah Museum is a museum in the Iraqi city of Basra, It is located on the banks of the Shatt al-Arab some 3 km south‐east of Basra’s historic city centre. 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.After the 2003 allied invasion of Iraq, the palace grounds were occupied by the British Army. In 2008, the Iraqi Army and National Police, along the United States Army took over the area and used it as a base of operations. During 2008, Iraqi and U.S. forces executed numerous combat operations from this base to defeat the Mahdi Army.
The Basrah Museum opened its first Gallery of the Museum in September 2016. The FOBM 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 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 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.
Building
The 2,500 square meter wide museum building is designed as Ottoman architecture featuring Basrian shanasheels. A domed foyer opens into four halls on the ground floor accommodating the museum galleries and an upper floor with further four smaller halls.Collections
The museum houses over 2500 artefacts spread across four galleries.- In the Assyrian Gallery, most objects date to the Neo-Assyrian Empire.
- The Babylon Gallery features items from the entire Babylon period with a focus on the Kassites.
- The Sumer Gallery displays material from the Halaf culture to the Third Dynasty of Ur.
- The items in the Basrah Gallery stem mainly from the Islamic period, consisting mainly of pottery, glass vessels, terracotta figurines and a large numismatic collection including Hellenistic coins.