L'activité de restauration de Piero Sanpaolesi au Moyen-Orient, quelques exemples pour mieux comprendre et protéger l'architecture méditerranéenne

Restoring, consolidating, preserving, and enhancing the architecture of the urban areas in the internal areas or urban districts, can activate cultural tourism and reduce the phenomenon of depopulation. Good practices are reached through the careful study and good preparation of operators and making known what has been done in the past is certainly useful for this purpose. In this short paper we wish to illustrate the restoration works conducted in the Middle East by Piero Sanpaolesi, in Iran particularly, where he both used to give lectures on the restoration of monuments at the University of Tehran and work as a restorer on imported monuments in the country from 1965 onwards. We will focus on the works carried forward on the Mausoleum of Oljeitu, built during the Mongol domination in the center of the small village of Soltanieh, the Friday Mosque in Qazvin, a monumental complex located in the lower part of the city, and finally on the Friday Mosque in Saveh. The Persian and Mediterranean architectures are intricately linked, as a cultural exchange due to the commercial relationships and contact with the Byzantine culture. Therefore, investigating the architecture of the Near East can help us put in place appropriate conservation strategies, which from buildings can be extended to urban centers or part of them.