Signing Ceremony Speech
 

(To be read by Dr. Randall Younker on behalf of Oystein S. LaBianca)

 As excavators of Tall Hisban, we are truly delighted to be among the applicants selected for funding under the Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Preservation. We are also very pleased to have the honor of hosting this signing ceremony by means of which we, as awardees, signify our intent to do our utmost to fulfill the terms of this partnership. We take very seriously the mandate bestowed upon us by the U.S. Department of State under this program. We understand this mandate to be to assist the Ambassador and the Embassy, in partnership with the government and people of Jordan, in the important work of  helping to preserve the cultural heritage and historic sites of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.
 Tall Hisban is, in our view, an especially auspicious site in this regard. This is because, to an extent rarely equaled by other sites in Jordan, its archaeological record offers a unique window on the progress of civilization in the Middle East from the days of the ancient Egyptians and Mesopotamians down to today. Thanks to more than a dozen field seasons led by Andrews University archaeologists—the first in 1968 and the most recent in 2004—the site has helped illuminate the great traditions and imperial projects of ruling elites from such distant capitals as Thebes, Jerusalem, Nineveh, Babylon, Persepolis, Athens, Alexandria, Rome, Mecca, Damascus, Baghdad, Cairo, Constantinople and Istanbul. By studying, preserving and restoring the finds from Tall Hisban, therefore, this project will make possible deeper understanding of the progress of civilization in both the Islamic and Western world. The project also promises to help disseminate this story to their citizenry today and in the future.
 Also important are the insights which anthropological research among the Ajarmeh villagers of Hisban is contributing to our understanding of the little traditions—the survival strategies--by means of which local inhabitants of this region have survived and adapted to centuries and millennia of inter-civilizational encounters and clashes. This is a story of a hardy people—of men and women who have learned to survive through relying on kindred and family; sharing and exchange; cultivating and herding; rainwater harvesting and terracing; stationary life in villages and nomadic wandering. Their story, too, is part of the story which this project hopes to preserve and disseminate.
 As senior director of this project, I want to acknowledge my indebtedness to past and present colleagues: To begin with, Dr. Siegfried S. Horn, Dr. Lawrence T. Geraty and Dr. Roger S. Boraas, leaders of this project during the late sixties and seventies. Thanks also to my co-directors Dr. Bethany Walker and Dr. Keith Mattingly. Colleagues at the Department of Antiquities, without whose support this work would be impossible, include Dr. Fawwaz al Kreishah, Director-General; Mr. Adeib Abu Smeis, Amman District Supervisor and Mr. Ali, Madaba District Supervisor. And for their able leadership of the present project I am especially grateful to Ms. Maria Elena Ronza and Ms Sabah Abu Hudeib. Their work has been outstanding. I want to thank the Mayor of Hesban, Mr. Khalil Dabbas, and Ms. Mediha Barrari, his assistant, for their many kindnesses in helping to facilitate this work, including helping us to locate and hire a terrific team of workmen from Hesban. Finally, I am deeply grateful to President Niels Erik Andreasen of Andrews University for his unstinting commitment to our projects in Jordan.

 

 

Edited 1/30/06 tlc