Jebba on the World Heritage List
Kerkouane archaeological site hosts the official launch of the 34th Heritage Month
Kerkouane archaeological site in Tunisia hosted the official launch of the 34th Heritage Month on April 19, 2025. This year’s theme was “Heritage and art, memory of civilization”.
In the presence of Culture Minister Amina Srarfi, the ceremony highlighted Tunisia’s rich heritage, with the announcement of new UNESCO World Heritage candidacies, including that of the Tunisian jebba.
The opening evening was marked by the immersive show “La Dame de Kerkouane”, combining theater, dance and Punic song, to bring to life the history of the Punic city, listed as a World Heritage Site since 1986.
Kerkouane monuments are known to the public and visitors ،،،، But the Punic cemetery, where the rulers, leaders and inhabitants of this Punic city, which belongs to the archaeological city of Kerkouane, are buried, is not known and there is no identification board to guide the visitor to the location of the cemetery and its importance and value.
The reason is that the road between the ruins and the cemetery is not prepared and not equipped with either public lighting or a respectable road that reaches the rank of the agricultural path that facilitates the task of the visitor so that some tourists who have already seen this important site are surprised that this cemetery is not given the necessary importance.
Noting that this cemetery has graves that have not yet been opened, and there are still many archaeological treasures inside…
The connecting road is one and a half kilometers at most… I appeal to all concerned ministries, the Culture and Tourism Heritage Agency, Nabeul Province, Dar Alloush Municipality, to connect the cemetery to the antiquities, upgrade the road, and valorize our heritage and treasure inside.
Brief overview
The Punic city of Kerkouane, located at the tip of Cap Bon on a cliff overlooking the sea, bears exceptional witness to Phoenician-Punic urban planning. Unlike Carthage, Tyre or Byblos, no Roman settlement was built on top of the Phoenician city, whose port, ramparts, residential quarters, stores, workshops, streets, squares, temples and necropolis are clearly visible in their 3rd century BC state. The site of the Punic city of Kerkouane was discovered in 1952. The National Institute of Archaeology and Art carried out excavations. The earliest evidence found on the site dates back to the 6th century BC, while the remains currently visible on the site date back to the end of the 4th, the first half of the 3rd century BC, and attest to sophisticated urban planning.
The Arg El Ghazouani necropolis, located on a rocky hill less than a kilometer from the town, is also a priceless testimony to the Punic funerary architecture of the period; it is the best-preserved sector of the great Kerkouane necropolis, whose tombs are scattered all along the coastal hills at the tip of Cap Bon.
The Punic city of Kerkouane, which has never been reoccupied since it was abandoned in the middle of the 3rd century BC, bears exceptional testimony to Phoenician-Punic urban planning. It is the only Punic city currently recognized in the Mediterranean and contains a wealth of information on urban planning (the layout of the site follows a pre-established general plan: wide, relatively straight streets form a checkerboard pattern whose squares are filled by insulae) and architecture (defensive, domestic, religious, craft structures, construction techniques and materials). Based on the data uncovered, the archaeologist is able to trace the profile of a Punic city as it was between the 6th and mid-3rd centuries BC. The Kerkouane discovery represents a major contribution to our knowledge of Phoenician-Punic sites in the Mediterranean.
TunisianMonitorOnline (NejiMed)
