Cyrene spreads across the Libyan coast where Greek colonists from Thera settled in 631 BC. For over 1,200 years, this intellectual centre produced scholars who shaped the Mediterranean world:

📐 Eratosthenes calculated Earth's circumference using only mathematics written on paper and the angles of shadows

🏛️ Aristippus founded his school of philosophy within the city's walls

📜 Callimachus wrote 800 works that influenced Roman literature

🌿 The city exported silphium, a medicinal miracle plant worth its weight in silver

This prosperity left behind one of the most spectacular archaeological sites in North Africa.

But it won't be there for much longer.

This incredible city needs immediate help from threats on multiple fronts:

🌊 Storm Daniel dumped a metre of rain in September 2023, flooding structures and weakening foundations

⚠️ UNESCO added the site to its World Heritage in Danger list in 2016

🚜 Bulldozers destroyed 2 kilometres of necropolis in August 2013, demolishing 1,200 burial vaults

🛡️ Political instability since 2011 left the site vulnerable to systematic looting

The Cyrene Conservation Initiative addresses emergency stabilisation, foundation shoring, drainage repairs, and site security through practical conservation work.

But they can't do it alone.