Palmyra (Tadmor), once a prosperous trading city in Syria located in an oasis between Damascus and Euphrates, is a world-famous architectural museum complex added to UNESCO’s list of World Heritage Sites.
As well as many other monuments of ancient civilizations, Palmyra won international renown in the 18th century. This is a vivid example of how the interest developed in this city by Europeans - namely by historians and archaeologists - was instrumental in making it the antiquarian object of desire. Regular excavations of Palmyra started in the 1920s. The artefacts found on the territory of the city and its necropolis are not only displayed in the museum of Palmyra, but also included in the museum collections around the world. The State Hermitage has a small collection of Palmyrian antiquities as well.
