East Kurdistan · Rojhelat · Living heritage
Hawraman (Uraman)
Stepped stone villages on steep Zagros slopes, where the roof of one house is the yard of the house above.
UNESCO World Heritage Site
- Period
- A living tradition, thousands of years old
- Place
- Hawraman Takht and the villages of Hawraman
- Region
- East Kurdistan · Rojhelat
- Age
- Living heritage
In Hawraman the mountain decides the plan. Houses of dry-laid stone and timber are built into slopes so steep that each flat roof becomes the courtyard, path and meeting place of the house above. Terraced gardens of walnut, mulberry and pomegranate are watered by channels from the springs.
This is architecture without architects, refined over many generations by people who farmed and herded these valleys and kept their own language and customs. In 2021 UNESCO inscribed the Cultural Landscape of Hawraman as a World Heritage Site — a heritage that is still lived in.
Chosen and introduced by Aram Mizuri, architect in Erbil