When I was a child in the late 1960s and early 1970s I lived in Dar es Salaam, Nairobi, and Accra and travelled across Africa, from east to west, marvelling at the range and splendour of the continent’s architecture. It was not the easiest time to experience Africa’s architectural glories. But I was left with an enduring desire to understand the nature of African buildings and their origins and whether they came into being through expedience, their relationship to colonial power, economics, self-belief or self-identity.
　　上世纪60年代末70年代初，当我还是个孩子时，我先后居住在达累斯萨拉姆、内罗毕和阿克拉。从东到西，我的足迹遍及整个非洲大陆，我为非洲建筑的丰富多样和绚丽恢宏所折服。当时并不是易于感受非洲建筑之辉煌的时期，但后来我一直希望了解非洲建筑的本质及其起源，以及在它们的发展形成过程中，方便性、它们与殖民势力的关系、经济学、自信、自我认同等因素是否起到了重要作用。

　　It is a passion that has never left me. In the past decade I have documented the 53 capitals of the continent in a bid to understand how regional geography and tradition transcend state boundaries. In that time I have researched the great pyramids of Giza, the temples of Luxor, Libya’s Roman ruins at Leptis Magna, the stone walls of great Zimbabwe, the Buganda shrine of Uganda, the medieval Islamic architecture of Fes and Marrakech in Morocco, Ethiopia’s churches carved into the rock in Lalibela and much more.
　　这种激情从未离开过我。过去十年间，我记述了非洲大陆53个国家的首都，以图理解区域地理和传统是如何超越国家边界的。在这段时期，我研究了吉萨的大金字塔、卢克索的神庙、利比亚大莱普提斯(leptis magna)的古罗马遗址、大津巴布韦的石墙、乌干达的布干达陵墓、摩洛哥菲斯和马拉喀什的中世纪伊斯兰建筑，埃塞俄比亚的拉利贝拉岩石教堂，等等。

　　Yet of all these places and more, few if any can rival the shrines and mosques of Timbuktu. Among the more famous are the 15th-century Sidi Yahya mosque and the ancient tombs of Sufi saints. Their desecration over the past week by al-Qaeda-linked militants wielding picks, hoes and, of course, guns is much more than an act of vandalism. It is, as the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor says, a war crime.
　　然而，上述所有建筑以及其它建筑，鲜有能与廷巴克图(Timbuktu)的陵墓和清真寺相媲美的。其中比较出名的是15世纪建造的西迪叶海亚(Sidi Yahya)清真寺和苏菲派圣徒陵墓。近期，与"基地"有关联的武装分子用镐头、锄头，当然还有枪支亵渎这些古迹，这绝不仅仅是蓄意毁坏公物行为。正如国际刑事法庭(International Criminal Court)的检察官所言，他们犯下了战争罪。