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B for Babylon
Director(s): Bernard George
Scientific advisor(s): Béatrice André-Salvini et Sébastien Allard
Genre
Documentary
Copyright
2008
Length
53 minutes
Producer(s)
Alexandre Cornu, Les Films du Tambour de Soie ; Catherine Derosier-Pouchous, Musée du Louvre
Co-producer(s)
Arte
DVD edition
Musée du Louvre
The legendary city of Babylon was born in Mesopotamia almost 5,000 years ago. After its disappearance some 2,000 years later, it was finally rediscovered at the turn of the 20th century. A number of poignant traces have come down to us of this society that heralded the birth of our civilizations: the famous Ishtar Gate, unearthed in 1898 then transported stone by stone to be rebuilt at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin; the Code of Hammurabi, precursor of modern law codes, now in the Louvre; and the famous clay tablets covered in cuneiform script that testify to the remarkable development of writing. The story of Babylon through the centuries reflects a constant swing between destruction and reconstruction. Despite its rebuilding by Saddam Hussein, and its use as a US military base during the Iraq War; the legend of Babylon has survived to this day and is illustrated by many imaginative representations: the Tower of Babel, Nebuchadnezzar, Degas's painting of Semiramis, the hanging gardens, the accounts of Herodotus, Italian epic films…
"B for Babylon" sets out on the trail of this civilization through encounters with people who have explored this now inaccessible site, such as Béatrice André-Salvini from the Musée du Louvre—one of the few people in the world who can read Babylonian—and Joachim Marzahn in Berlin. Salam Jawad, a young Iraqi iconographer compiling a collection of Babylonian objects for an on-line Encyclopedia, leads us on a fascinating scientific, cultural, and human adventure.
Available for sale on the co-publisher's website.