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Abbasi J, Samanian K. (2025). Community-Oriented Conservation and Restoration (Case Study of Negel Qurans). Athar. 46(108), 149-170. doi:10.22034/Athar.1628
URL: http://athar.richt.ir/article-2-1628-en.html

Abstract
The review of international conservation and restoration documents shows a gradual change in conservation and restoration approaches. Until now, there have been different approaches in the conservation and restoration of cultural heritage and these approaches have influenced the methods and sciences used in conservation and restoration. The top-down approach prevailed before the Burra charter and many restorations have been based on this approach. In this approach, positivist methods are dominant, which emphasize the body and matter that make up the cultural historical object. The result of a positivist system will miss many of the rich meanings associated with heritage, including people’s feelings and emotional attachments associated with the work. After the Burra Charter, with the spread of cultural relativism, the approach has changed and the bottom-up approach, i.e. the active participation of the people in conservation, restoration, and “community-oriented” conservation, has become the rule. The important point is that in practice, these cases have been addressed less. Many factors are involved in the conservation and restoration process, and the community where the work is located is an important factor in the conservation and restoration process. People, as an important part of the stakeholders related to historical cultural monuments, should be considered in the process of conservation and restoration. The purpose of this research is to deal with the conservation and restoration process and the effects of social factors involved in it. One of these cases is the conservation and restoration of the Negel Quran in Sanandaj city. The type of writing and the thickness of its paper have led people to believe that it is one of the early versions of the Qur’an. In this research, the process of conservation and restoration of Negel Quran was investigated and analyzed with a qualitative method (case study). The results show that the process of conservation and restoration of the Negel Quran, since it is a “community-oriented” conservation based on soft and hard sciences and with a bottom-up approach; a conservation and restoration has been completely different and special and is important in all these aspects.
Keywords: Negel Qurans - People’s Participation in Conservation & Restoration- the Approach of International Documents.

Introduction
In the past few decades, there has been a growing call to change the ontological perspective of heritage conservation so that it can accommodate a wider range of socio-cultural and experiential values (Wells, 2015). Utilizing the participation of community members in advancing affairs and solving community problems is one of the concepts whose importance has become more and more clear in the contemporary era. Community-centered conservation is a concept that is fully applicable in urban landscape restoration and fabric restoration. However, in the process of preserving and restoring historical and cultural objects, the role of society as the beneficiaries of preservation and restoration has received less attention.
In fact, public participation in conservation and restoration is a highly debatable issue, and people should be considered as the main stakeholders in the conservation and restoration process.
The restoration of the Negel Quran, which was completed in December 2017 (B. Shokri, personal interview, November 29, 1403; A. Karimi, personal interview, November 7, 1403; H. Malekian, personal interview, March 10, 1401), is one of the restorations that should not be ignored in the area of public participation and intervention in conservation and restoration. The Negel Quran is one of the important manuscript Qurans written in Iranian Kufic script. The type of script and the thickness of its paper have led people to believe that it is one of the earliest copies of the Quran (Zarei, 2014).
But what is important from the authors’ point of view is the approach and process of conservation and restoration of the Negel Quran. An interesting incident in the conservation and restoration of this exquisite work was that the people of Negel village prevented the Quran from being transported to Tehran for necessary conservation and analysis, until finally the conservation team from Tehran left for Negel village and this valuable work was restored in the village and under the care of the people (B. Shokri, personal interview, November 29, 1403; H. Malekian, personal interview, March 10, 1401). An approach that has been widely discussed in international conservation and restoration documents and conservation and restoration approaches in the contemporary era (Vinas, 2012), but is rarely seen in practice (real examples of conservation and restoration).
This article attempts to analyze and examine the process of preserving and restoring the Negl Quran, and also to address the importance and position of the role of people in preserving and restoring historical and cultural objects. For this purpose, the important issue of involving people in preserving and restoring and the importance of local communities and people’s participation in preserving and restoring will be analyzed and evaluated from the perspective of international documents and approaches to preserving and restoring.

Discussion 
In fact, addressing the process of conservation and restoration the Negel Quran carries many implications; including the issue of using hard and soft sciences in conservation and restoration and the difference they make in the conservation and restoration process, or paying attention to the dominant approaches in different time periods conservation and restoration. 
The dominant approach in the conservation and restoration of the Negel Quran has been a “bottom-up” approach. This is a theme emphasized in paragraph 4 of the Florence Declaration. One of the most important new concepts in this document is “community-based conservation” and the devolution of power to local residents. The document believes in a bottom-up approach to the effective conservation and management of heritage; that is, starting with the people, and proposes a practical and transparent approach to designing the right relationship between conservators and communities; that is, recognizing an active role for communities in formal management planning structures by giving them a voice and input in conservation decision-making processes. The role of heritage experts as those who provide technical advice and when the presence and role of the community in dealing with fragmented heritage should be recognized as a facilitator (Florence Declaration, 2014). An issue that is clearly seen in the conservation and restoration of the Negel Quran. The people of the region and the village believed that the Quran should not be moved from the village mosque and transferred to another location (Zarei, 2014). This issue had made the conservation and restoration of this work difficult for the authorities and the government.
The important point in the restoration of this work is that it is one of the few historical and cultural objects that people have direct intervention in its conservation and restoration. So, the participation of the people is an active participation and the conservation/restoration of this work is considered a community-based conservation/restoration. The requirement of this type of approach and type of conservation and restoration is that the scope of the sciences used in this conservation and restoration also expands and goes beyond the focus on hard sciences and includes soft sciences.

Conclusion 
Public participation in conservation and restoration is a colorful perspective in international documents. The results of this research show that people and their role in conservation and restoration have been considered since the earliest charters, but their approaches have been different, and concepts such as public access, awareness and education of the public about the importance of protecting cultural heritage, encouraging the protection of historical monuments, and the participation of indigenous people in conservation have been considered in most international documents, and the common theme of most of these documents is that they have all been examples of a top-down approach to conservation and restoration. Also, with the passage of time, new approaches have been introduced in this field. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, new approaches can be seen in the field of public and community participation in the protection of cultural heritage. The most important dominant approach in this period is to pay attention to conservation and sustainable development through public participation in the conservation process. In general, the dominant approach in international documents is participatory approaches that, along with the spread of cultural relativism - which began with the Bura Charter - are based on a bottom-up approach to conservation and restoration. Recently, there has been a lot of emphasis on “community-based conservation” and “intercultural dialogue.” It is important to note that although public participation in conservation and restoration has been emphasized and there are even examples of it, this participation and intervention has not been in the field of restoration of historical and cultural objects. For this reason, the restoration of the Negel Quran is a completely special and unique issue. Since people have had direct and indirect intervention in the conservation and restoration process of this work, it shows the trustworthiness of the work in society, which in itself will be a reason for the permanent conservation of the work in society. Since the conservation and restoration process of the Negel Quran was a “community-based” conservation and restoration based on soft and hard sciences and carried out with a bottom-up approach, it has been a completely different and special conservation and restoration, and it is important in all these respects.