The archaeological site of Bura is located in the Tillabéry Region, of the Tera Department, in southwest Niger. The Bura archaeological site has given its name to the area's first-millennium Bura culture.
The Bura site consists of many individual necropoleis with coffins crested by unusually distinctive terra cotta statuettes. The main necropolis itself has a diameter of about one kilometer. Burial mounds, religious altars, and ancient dwellings occur here over a large area. In 1983 a site 25 meters by 20 meters was excavated.
Following the 1975 discovery and 1983 excavation of the Bura archeological site, and after a Bura-Asinda exhibition toured France in the 1990s, the ancient Bura earthenware statuettes became highly valued by collectors.[1]
The clay and stone anthropomorphic heads of the ancient and medieval Bura culture have been sought for their unusual abstraction and simplicity.[2]
Unfortunately, widespread looting and smuggling have followed this commercial demand, and so many of the Bura culture sites have been negatively impacted.[3] Le Monde concludes that "90 percent of Niger's Bura sites have been damaged" by looters and vandals since 1994.[4]
Other Bura artifacts have been large terracotta burial jars (both tubular and ovoid) and varied funerary pottery. Of the 834 Bura-related sites in the Niger River valley, UNESCO reports that the original Bura archeological site has produced the oldest equestrian clay statues.[5]
More recently, many Bura "rat-tail" iron-age spear-points have also entered the Euro-American collectors market.[6]
This site was added to the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List on May 26, 2006 in the Cultural category.[7]