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Saudi Heritage Commission Approves 500 Sites in Urban Heritage Register

Saudi Heritage Commission Approves 500 Sites in Urban Heritage Register
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Saudi Heritage Commission Approves 500 Sites in Urban Heritage Register

Saudi Heritage Commission Approves 500 Sites in Urban Heritage Register

The Saudi Heritage Commission announced on Sunday the approval of the registration and classification of 500 new sites in the urban heritage register, bringing the total to 4,540, reflecting the deep history of the Kingdom, which has witnessed successive civilizations for thousands of years.

The new sites were registered in various regions of the Kingdom, including Riyadh with 413 sites, 39 in Makkah, 25 in Al-Baha, six in Hail, five in Jazan, four in Aseer, and two sites in each of the Eastern, Najran, and Al-Jouf regions. Tabuk and Qassim regions also registered one site each.

The Heritage Commission reiterated its commitment to the preservation of the Kingdom's historical and cultural heritage by continuing to register and document archaeological and heritage sites throughout the year.

The commission is actively engaged in the exploration and registration of new sites that reflect the richness and diversity of the Kingdom's cultural heritage.

It is also keen on developing management, conservation, and protection plans for these sites to ensure their survival within a comprehensive strategy to elevate the Kingdom's status as a global destination for heritage and culture.

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Thousands Greet the Winter Solstice at the Ancient Stonehenge Monument

A person holds up a smart phone as they wait for sunrise during the winter Solstice celebrations at Stonehenge, England, Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Anthony Upton)
A person holds up a smart phone as they wait for sunrise during the winter Solstice celebrations at Stonehenge, England, Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Anthony Upton)
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Thousands Greet the Winter Solstice at the Ancient Stonehenge Monument

A person holds up a smart phone as they wait for sunrise during the winter Solstice celebrations at Stonehenge, England, Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Anthony Upton)
A person holds up a smart phone as they wait for sunrise during the winter Solstice celebrations at Stonehenge, England, Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Anthony Upton)

Thousands of tourists, pagans, druids and people simply yearning for the promise of spring marked the dawn of the shortest day of the year at the ancient Stonehenge monument on Saturday.

Revelers cheered and beat drums as the sun rose at 8:09 a.m. (0809 GMT) over the giant standing stones on the winter solstice — the shortest day and the longest night in the Northern Hemisphere. No one could see the sun through the low winter cloud, but that did not deter a flurry of drumming, chanting and singing as dawn broke.

There will be less than eight hours of daylight in England on Saturday — but after that, the days get longer until the summer solstice in June.

The solstices are the only occasions when visitors can go right up to the stones at Stonehenge, and thousands are willing to rise before dawn to soak up the atmosphere.

The stone circle, whose giant pillars each took 1,000 people to move, was erected starting about 5,000 years ago by a sun-worshiping Neolithic culture, according to The AP. Its full purpose is still debated: Was it a temple, a solar calculator, a cemetery, or some combination of all three?

In a paper published in the journal Archaeology International, researchers from University College London and Aberystwyth University said the site on Salisbury Plain, about 128 kilometers (80 miles) southwest of London, may have had political as well as spiritual significance.

That follows from the recent discovery that one of Stonehenge’s stones — the unique stone lying flat at the center of the monument, dubbed the “altar stone” — originated in Scotland, hundreds of miles north of the site. Some of the other stones were brought from the Preseli Hills in southwest Wales, nearly 240 kilometers (150 miles) to the west,

Lead author Mike Parker Pearson from UCL’s Institute of Archaeology said the geographical diversity suggests Stonehenge may have served as a “monument of unification for the peoples of Britain, celebrating their eternal links with their ancestors and the cosmos.”