Italian company reproduces Palmyra Arch in Trafalgar Square

(AGI) London, April 19 - Palmyra's Arch of Triumph, which was destroyed by ISIS, has risen again in London's Trafalgar Square thanks to the Tuscan company Tor Art, utilising the Italian 3D printer D-Shape to reproduce the arch from the Temple of Bel, which was erected under Roman Emperor Septimius Severus. The arch will remain on display for three days in front of the National Gallery before being exhibited in New York, Dubai, and various European cities. Reconstructed with Egyptian marble based on a project by Oxford's Institute of Digital Archaeology (IDA), the replica arch is two-thirds the size of the original destroyed by the Islamist extremists last year. The archaeologists aim to transfer the replica to Palmyra as soon as Syria returns to normality and place it next to the ruins of the original. The project also involved Dubai's Museum of the Future, the government of the United Arab Emirates, and UNESCO. The Italian protagonists in the reproduction are "D-Shape", a specialised 3D printing brand headed by Enrico Dini that uses sand from the Dolomites, and the Tuscan robotics compay Tor Art. Speaking to the BBC, Syria's director of antiquities Maamoun Abdulkarim stated: "It is a message to raise awareness in the world. We have common heritage. Our heritage is universal - it is not just for Syrian people." Palmyra was retaken in late March this year after being held by ISIS for over ten months. The replica cost over 100,000 pounds to produce - around 130,000 euros at the current exchange rate. The arch of Bel was added to a special initiative in The Millon Image Database program, a photographic documentation project launched by the Institute for Digital Archaeology, with UNESCO's patronage, which aims to produce million of images of endangered sites throughout the Middle East and North Africa. (AGI). .