!st May 2012: AMMAN, Jordan

It was our last day in Jordan, and in Amman, before we flew home that evening, so we wanted to pack in as much as possible. We'd been out to eat with Marney and Andy on previous evenings but this was to be our only day sight-seeing proper.
Where better to start than the pavement markets in Downtown for a bit of souvenir-shopping? Strolling around, we felt at ease in what seemed in many ways a stereotype of a Middle eastern city: loud traffic and voices, Arabic music blaring from shopfronts, and people selling clothes, coffee, cigarettes and trinkets on the street.
 And then a leisurely lunch in a restaurant overlooking one of Amman's main shopping streets. I know it looks deserted but that's no reflection on the food: we arrived just at the end of lunchtime when everyone was leaving!

The Husseini Mosque:
Like nearly everything else in Amman, this pink-and-white-striped mosque is a relatively recent construction.

There's been a mosque on this site since 640 AD, and before that a Byzantine cathedral, the current building dating from 1932 when Emir Abdullah ordered the site cleared for construction. It is one of the city's most important places of worship and has traditionally also been a focus for political demonstrations, most recently after the Arab Spring.

The Nymphaeum:

Behind the mosque is the site of excavation and restoration work on the Roman Nymphaeum, the public fountain dedicated to water nymphs. Similar fountains were sited near rivers running through major cities, eg Jerash, throughout the Greco-Roman world.

This one was originally two storeys high, and must have dominated the area with its colonnades of Corinthian columns, faced in marble, with statues of gods, emperors or city nobles filling the niches.

The Roman Forum:
An impressively long Corinthian colonnade and some original Roman paving are the only physical remains of the marketplace.

The Roman Theatre:
Cut into a depression in the hillside, the Roman Theatre was built between 169 and 177 AD, during the reign of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, for an audience of almost six thousand.

Above the seating is a small empty shrine with niches. Part of a statue of Athena was discovered here during clearance work.

The design of the theatre is ingenious. Not only are the acoustics remarkable, the south-facing stage is flooded with sun throughout the day while virtually every spectator remains undazzled and in cool shadow.
Vaults beneath the auditorium house two museums of traditional clothing, jewellery and customs.

The Odeon:
This freestanding theatre , seating about five hundred, dates from slightly earlier and was probably the venue for parliamentary-style council meetings or small-scale drama. in antiquity the whole building would probably have been roofed.

28 APRIL: PETRA

It's impossible to see everything in a single day so we headed back the following day. At 55JD for a two-day ticket, it's a real bargain for any tourist. Bearing in mind the low average national wage, we had been surprised at how many Jordanians had been visiting yesterday but there were even more today. The place was teeming! It was only later that Marney explained to us that there was a flat-rate 5JD charge for Jordanian residents, which was waived on Bank Holidays like today.
 The plan was to retrace our steps as far as the Temenos Gate, from where we would veer off to the Royal Tombs. That they are 'tombs' is not in doubt, but 'royal' refers to their grandeur rather than the certainty that they were the resting-places of kings.
  It was to be an easy climb up solid, modern steps.

Tomb of Unayshu: 
We'd seen this one yesterday as we'd walked past but, to be truthful, hadn't really known what it was.

It features a once-porticoed courtyard in the front, with a triclinium to the side.

The Urn Tomb:
Built in 446/7 AD and named after the fairly small and insignificant urn at the top of the pediment, this structure was obviously the tomb of somebody extremely important. Whether or not it was a king, and if so who, is unknown, although Malichus II (d. AD 70) or his predecessor Aretas IV have been suggested.
The tall narrow facade towers above the city , its terrace supported by two rows of vaults which emphasise its height.

Set into the facade high above the forecourt between the engaged columns are spaces for three bodies. The central one, possibly that of the king, is still partially sealed by a stone which formerly depicted the bust of a man wearing a toga.
The door to the main chamber is eroded at the bottom.

Along the side of the front courtyard are a row of columns.

In the mid-fifth century the tomb was converted into a church and the cavernous interior still shows signs of the adjustments that had to be made. Two central recesses of the original four were combined to make a sort of apse, and myriad holes were drilled in the floor to support all the relevant ecclesiastical furniture, eg. chancel screens, a pulpit etc.

The Corinthian Tomb:
This has one of the most sadly-eroded facades in Petra, but its position, on the corner of the cliff and directly in line with the Colonnaded Street, points to the likelihood of its having been the tomb of another Nabatean king.

It was obviously modelled on the style of the Treasury but below the upper level its symmetry is a mess.
Its name comes from Leon de Laborde who, on his visit in 1828, deemed its columns and capitals to be of the Corinthian order.

The Palace Tomb:
Named because of its supposed resemblance to a Roman palace (the Golden Palace of Nero), the design of this tomb was clearly too grandiose to be accommodated by the existing rock face, so part of the upper levels had to be built instead of carved. As much of the superstructure has fallen, it is impossible to know how high it once stood.

Equally unknown is when it was carved, or for whom, but it is believed to have been near the end of the Nabatean period, perhaps in the reign of the last king, Rabbel II (AD 70-106).
In front of the tomb is a large stage and in front of this a large courtyard.

Tomb of Sextius Florentinus:
Sextius Florentinus was a Roman governor of the Province of Arabia who died about 130 AD and chose to be buried in Petra rather than in the provincial capital of Bosra. The Latin inscription above the doorway states that thee monument was built by his son, following the will of his father, thus making it one of the few sights in Petra that can be dated with certainty.

27 APRIL 2012: PETRA

Approach to the city of Petra
Once we were through the entrance gate it was a walk of 3km to the centre of Petra. On the way down the gentle gradient of 5 per cent meant we hardly noticed the drop in altitude (from 1027m to 861m, equivalent to a 45-storey skyscraper) but it was to be a different matter on the way back up hours later!

Echoes of Jerash with locals dressed up.

Bab as-Siq:
The 'Gate of the Siq' is a modern gravel path, one side for horses the other for pedestrians, that leads down from the entrance gate through a lunar landscape of rocky white domes and looming cliffs. The bed of the Wadi Musa curves alongside, carrying water during the winter and early spring.

Bab as-Siq Triclinium:

A few metres on, these major Nabatean monuments, being on an exposed corner, were badly eroded. Four huge obelisks guard the entrance to a cave in the rock. Between the four is an eroded figure in a niche, and the cave behind holds graves.

The Siq:
The Siq gorge is the principal entrance into the city and was formed when tectonic forces split the mountain in two. The waters of the Wadi Musa found their way into the fault, laying a bed of gravel and eroding the sharp corners into smooth curves.

Riding of horses is forbidden in the Siq, but not horse-drawn carriages. Officially only for the elderly and infirm, in practice they can be hired by anyone, and they hurtle past all the way to the Treasury: 

The path twists and turns between high sandstone cliffs, sometimes widening to form broad sunlit open spaces......

....while in other paces the high walls close in to little more than a couple of metres apart.

Dotted along the walls at many places are small votive niches, shrines and carvings:

When we were thinking the gorge couldn't go on any further, suddenly there was a dark, narrow defile framing a strip of beautiful classical architecture:

The Treasury:

Probably built in the first century BC in the reign of King Aretas III, who brought architects to Petra from the centres of Hellenistic culture throughout the Mediterranean, the name 'Treasury' derives from the local name (Treasury of the Pharaoh) for such a seemingly inexplicable construction. Unable to explain why anyone would carve such a structure deep into the rock face, the bedouin believed it to be the work of the pharaoh. According to legend, in pursuit of the Israelites after the Exodus, the pharaoh was slowed down by having to carry all his treasure so he created the Treasury and deposited his riches, out of human reach, in the urn at the very top of the facade. In fact, the function of the Treasury remains unknown,  but the recessed basin on its threshold, with a channel leading outside clearly for washing and ritual libations, suggest it may have been a place of worship such as a tomb-temple. 

Apart from the scale and the sheer beauty of the structure, as if that wasn't enough, you have to get your head round the fact that the huge Nabatean columns in fact support nothing, the entire Treasury 'building' having been sculpted in situ, gouged out of the unshaped rock. 

The Outer Siq:

The path now broadened into the Outer Siq, leading to the city centre.

Tomb of Unayshu

The Tomb of 17 Graves

The Street of Facades: dozens of facades carved side-by-side out of the rock on at least 4 different levels.

Petra colours: the soft sandstone has been eroded for centuries by the wind to reveal an array of colours streaking the rock. 

The Theatre:

Obviously classical in design and inspiration, the Theatre dates from the 1st century AD, i.e. before the Romans annexed Nabatea. As many as 8,500 people could be accommodated, more even than the vast theatre in Amman that we were to see a few days later. Apart from the stage backdrop and the ends of the banks of seating, the entire edifice was carved out of the mountainside!

The path from the Theatre took us to the city centre, focused along the Cardo Maximus (Colonnaded Street).

Although today the overall feel is of rocky desolation, we had to keep remembering that in Petra's prime this landscape would have been covered in buildings of every shape and size, all now lost beneath the rubble.

The Great Temple:

http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Joukowsky_Institute/Petra/temple/temple.html

At 7,000 square metres, this is one of the largest complexes in the city and one of Petra's most important monuments. As yet, though, historians have no idea which deity was worshipped here.  

Worshippers originally climbed a staircase from street level onto a paved sacred precinct. The temple itself stands 25m above street level, fronted by 4 enormous columns which were originally stuccoed in red and white.

The whole building is very complex and somewhat confusing to look around, set on different levels, with internal and external corridors.

At the heart, stands a renovated Nabatean theatre, or Theatron, about 7m in diameter, which would have seated at least 300 people and may have been used as a council chamber.

Temenos Gate:

At the end of the Colonnaded Street, the partially-reconstructed Temenos Gate marks the end of the commercial sector of the city.

Sockets in the threshold show that great doors once closed off all 3 entrances of the gate.

Three domed rooms just inside the gate have been tentatively identified as baths.

The Qasr al-Bint al-Faraoun:

This huge, square Nabatean temple, dating from the late 1st century BC, is the only free-standing monument as-yet uncovered in the whole of Petra. 

Legend has it that this 'Palace of Pharaoh's Daughter' was where the pharaoh, desperate to let nothing slow him down in his pursuit of the Israelites, stashed his daughter.
The huge arch that survives today was probably only a relieving arch for a lower horizontal lintel.

The courtyard in front of the Qasr al-Bint is full of tent cafes, and was the perfect place for us to take a much-needed break from the heat and information -overload before beginning the climb to the Monastery.

The Monastery:

We knew it was going to be a daunting hour's climb from here, 220m above the elevation of the Qasr al-Bint, to reach the Monastery. There are well-trodden Nabatean-carved sandstone steps just about the whole way, as well as plenty of places to stop, so there was no excuse. 

We could, of course, have taken a donkey ride to the summit and back but we never considered it! The thought of it was terrifying enough, and once we saw just how precarious the ride was, and just how petrified many of the riders were, we knew we'd made the right decision.

The Lion Triclinium: Soon we passed a small classical shrine, named for the worn lions that flank its entrance. A small round window above the door and the doorway itself have been eroded together to form a strange keyhole shape.

There are numerous bedouin stalls along the way selling the usual souvenirs and postcards, but they are never insistent or demanding.

The views are amazing and give you a real sense of the vastness of the mountains and valleys all around.

Finally, we emerged onto a wide, flat plateau and the Monastery.

Wow! This is quite some building! We knew it would be there at the end of the climb but when you get there  the facade is so big it looks like an optical illusion, the doorway alone being higher than a house. Of course it was never a monastery but it was certainly a temple, possibly dedicated to the Nabatean king Obidas I who reigned in the first century BC.The flat plaza in front of the monument isn't natural, having probably been deliberately levelled to contain the huge crowds that gathered here for religious ceremonies.
Inside is a single chamber with double staircases leading up to a niche.

Steve couldn't resist having a look inside .......

 .......and getting up and in was easy with the help of a Jordanian guard, BUT getting down again was another, much less elegant, matter!

There are dozens of other monuments and carvings to explore around the Monastery, and everywhere the views are mind-blowing!

The cliffs are punctuated with caves, tombs and cisterns for hundreds of metres.

Mercifully, a very enterprising Jordanian had set up a cafe in the cave opposite the Monastery facade, so we settled down for some much-needed R and R, and glasses of deliciously refreshing green tea.

The only route back to Petra is the way we had come, so ....