Pétra - SpeedyLook encyclopedia

Pétra (of grc πέτρα will petra , “rock” in Greek old; rear RTL البتراء Arab Al-Butrāʾ in ), of its Semitic name Reqem or Raqmu (“the Multi-coloured one”), is an old troglodytic city located in current the Jordan, in the middle of a basin bordered by the mountains which form the Eastern side of the Arabah ( Wadi Araba ), large valley prolonging the great rift towards the north and which extends from the Dead Sea with the Golfe of Aqaba.

It was in the Antiquité a city édom ite then became the capital of the kingdom of the Nabatéens. About the 8th century, the inhabitants leave the city following the fall of the trade and natural disasters. Forgotten at the time modern, the site was revealed with the western world by the Swiss explorer Jean Louis Burckhardt in 1812.

The many buildings, whose monumental frontages are directly cut in the rock, make of it a single cultural monument which, since December 6th, 1985, is registered on the list of the world heritage of UNESCO. The zone around the site is also, since 1993, a archaeological National park.

Geography

See also: Arabah, Jordan, Gulf of Aqaba, Dead Sea

Pétra is located halfway between the Golfe of Aqaba and the Dead Sea at an altitude of 800 at: 1396 meters above the sea level, in a content of valley of the mountainous region of Édom, in the east of the valley of the Arabah.

The site of Pétra is with nearly 200 km in the South of the Jordanian capital Amman, that is to say at approximately 3 hours of road.

The dissimulated situation of Pétra, between rocks with the abrupt walls, as well as a sure supply water made of it a place with the favorable geography, favourable with the prosperous development of a city. The place is accessible only by one narrow mountainous path by the North-West or in the east by a canyon from approximately 1,5 kilometer length and up to 200 meters of depth, the Sîq, the principal access, which, at the narrowest place, measurement only two meters broad.

Water and safety made of Pétra a halt to the crossing of several caravan roads which connected the Egypt to the Syria and the Arabia of the South to the the Mediterranean, charged mainly with luxury items (spices and silk coming from India, ivory coming from Africa, pearls of the Red Sea and precisely of the incense of the south of Arabia). The resin of the “tree with incense” ( Boswellia ) was coveted in the entire ancient world like a particularly invaluable religious offering, but also like drug.

The intermediate trade and of the customs duties produced important profits for Nabatéens. So the city sheltered fifth century BC at the 3rd century a significant market.

Detailed plan of the city

Geology

Pétra being a city “dug” and located in mountainous recesses, the rock and the stone is visible everywhere on the site. This one is composed of sandstone, detrital Roche resulting from aggregation and cementing (or Diagenèse) from grains from Sable. It is thus about a coherent and hard rock. It appears by layers and gives sometimes variations of colors chatoyantes which are reinforced by the intensity of the light, particularly in end of the afternoon.

The Ground water water salted located below Pétra goes up and degrades the monuments at their base.

In the neighborhoods of Pétra, one can find rocks containing of the Silice, that Nabatéens could extract in career S to make impermeable Béton.

This particular geology made it possible to the inhabitants of Pétra to hide and to be protected from the attacks.

The irrigation

The Eau is necessary to the development of the human activities. The sources being not very abundant in this semi-desert area , it is the water of Pluie, approximately 150 mm per annum (today from 50 to 250 mm), which ensured the main part of the needs. The sources alone could provide water only for some families. This weak absorption of water posed nevertheless many problems, like Crue S very powerful and thus destroying. Indeed, before being deviated at the 20th century, the river of Wadi Moussa (“brook of Brace”) which ran since the source of Ain Moussa (“source of Brace”) in the Sîq to the village of Gaia had caused very fatal risings as in 1963.

To the Strabon will say that the inhabitants of Pétra sources in abundance have, whether it is for fine servants or to sprinkle their gardens , the 200 cisterns (of which several on the mount Umm Al-Beira , or Mother of the cisterns ), much of tanks and a nymphaeum , or public fountain.

Water, of an crucial importance, was even used like means of pressure. Thus the Romans cut the aqueduct, at the time of a seat of the city, in order to make yield the inhabitants more quickly.

The result of this control of water was, at the time, the creation of true a artificial Oasis. Only vestiges of these installations are still visible.

Agriculture and the breeding

When the city was in full rise, water was used primarily for consumption of the inhabitants and the cattle, like in the second time with the watering of the gardens.

Cereal S, like barley or Corn, trees Fruit iers and Vigne S were undoubtedly cultivated in Pétra. Pressoir S dug in rocks were found, probably of the period of Roman domination where the Vin was of great importance. The oldest establishment found with Pétra itself dates from the age of iron.

Antiquity

Period édomite

Period nabatéenne

Roman period

See also: Roman Empire, Arabia (Roman province)

A confederation gathering ten City-States named décapole is installation close to Pétra, the capital of the news Roman Province of Arabia ( provencia Arabia ). The emperor Trajan re-elects Bosra (then called Bostra ) in Nea Traiane Bostra , or News Bostra de Trajan , and Pétra receives the honorary title of metropolis ( metropolis ). A little later, in 114.

The opening of the sea routes to the Roman epoch carries a fatal blow in Pétra and to the Nabatéens because trade route does not pass any more by the city. After the Roman occupation some caravans still stop in Pétra, but they become rarer with the wire of time.

At the time of the reorganization of the Empire initiated by the emperor Dioclétien it becomes the capital of the Palaestina taertia or Palaestina salutaris . Athanase of Alexandria mentions a bishop of Pétra named “Asterius”. The Deir will be even used like church during this period, of the crosses painted on its walls, and three other churches will be discovered at the time of research, becomes a kind of Cathédrale in the year 446.

A strong earthquake strikes Pétra on May 19th, 363 1, damaging monuments, of which the theater, and aqueducts. Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, will say that almost half of the city was destroyed when the earthquake struck per third hour, and particularly per ninth hour of the night , describing the earthquake and its powerful counterpart. The city being already weakened by the lack of trade since the beginning of the Roman domination, it cannot be rebuilt and is emptied slowly.

Conquered by the Arab , whose impact on the city is dubious.

Other attempts at explorations were then outlined to explore Pétra, in spite of the mistrust of the autochtones. It is only in May 1818 (either six years after the forwarding of Burckhardt), that ten people coming from Jerusalem, whose William John Bankes, the drogman Giovanni Finati and the naval officers C.L. Irby and J. Mangroves, manage to remain some time on the spot, unfortunately not more than two days, of the competitions between chiefs of tribes obliging them to leave earlier than envisaged.

Starting from 1828 begin the first true archaeological missions. And starting from 1830, the site becomes a place of visit, complement of religious pilgrimages, and source of many profits for the chiefs of the tribes neighborhood.

Structure

General information

At the beginning, Nabatéens being formerly wandering people, their constructions were simple tents in goatskin.

A little later the dwellings cut in the rock were very simple, with smooth frontages decorated with one or two cuttings in the shape of staircase with a door excavated in the lower part. It was an adaptation nabatéenne tombs of Syria; being in constant contact with surrounding civilizations, they took as a starting point the style of several of them, in particular of Alexandria.

With the construction of monumental structures starts: Deir and tombs of the Palate and the Corinthian. During the 2nd century they adopt architectural details hellenistic (plank, Architrave, Pilastre…) and create a new style of capital called still today nabatéen . They use more and more entirely decorative structures, of which some inspired by the indigenous culture: rivet washers, animals of the area or besides (elephant S, Lion S, eagle S…), sculptures inspired of ancient Greece (from which those of Jellyfish, which transformed any being which looked it out of stone), of sphinx, griffon…, the richest families of the city engage architects to create tombs with very decorated frontages. Strabon will say that to Pétra the authorities to a fine those condemn publicly which decrease their richness and confer honors on those which increase them ; the inhabitants make display of their wealths of making build imposing tombs and monuments.

Although the public buildings, the monuments and the tombs show a strong hellenistic influence and other civilizations, with their columns, Péristyle foreign S and other details, private spaces, where Nabatéens sleep, eat and work, are rather of Arab style. Often without windows, they give on small quiet courses interior, as it is still the case in the Middle East. The roofs of the low dwellings (of one or two stages), are punts and without Tuile S and all except the rich person, who preferred the mosaic S, have paved floors. There are often benches hones some where to sit down during the meals, but the remainder of the pieces of furniture seem to have been out of wood because one practically does not find of them traces. The Cuisine S are in a building far away from the principal residence to minimize the risk of Incendie, as it is still the case in much country.

They also build many column S, outside using them and inside their buildings. Outside they are used to separate the courses interior and other structures, and to decorate and separate the various parts inside. At the time of the Roman occupation, the Romans build a rectilinear street, bordered of gantry S with columns, towards the market of the city; previously all the streets followed contours of the valley, the main street according to the course of Sîq.

The majority of the buildings of Pétra are not built on a squaring of ways but on the terraces natural of the walls of the valleys, or dug with same the rock. The districts leave the sources and could begin as simple tribal camps. With ez-Zantur, a district above the Roman way, one finds traces of a stone dwelling of I er; on the same site one finds a villa sumptuous built with.

The architects plan their works by carving plans on the rock with heights going up to 30 meters. They could build a frontage in two manners: from top to bottom with only one team, or two teams working simultaneously, one on the basis of the top and another of bottom. When they built from top to bottom, they in general used a platform cut with very the rock; when a section was finished, they destroyed the lower level to make a lower platform. The workmen used the preexistent cracks in the rock to facilitate the excavation; when it was not possible, one was to dig a hole in the rock and to insert there wood, which, once wet, inflated and exerted an intense pressure on the surrounding rock, breaking it.

At the places considered crowned Nabatéens put raised stones called baétryles , literally house of god . They are used to announce the presence of a god.

The entry of Sîq was surmounted by large a Arche of which there remain only traces today on a side because of the devastations of the erosion, of the earthquakes and of the Crue S. Throughout the walls one finds small niches containing of the sculptures of gods.

A wall, of which it remains only little of traces, protected Pétra and its valley from enemy attacks.

It should be noted that relative the good conservation of the monuments comes owing to the fact that, by tradition, the inhabitants of the close villages “maintained” the city and this to the surroundings the 19th century. It was a mixture of cut rock and Maçonnerie; it had a semicircular Orchestre and steps in three levels superimposed in the increasing moon shape. The church is victim of a Incendie at the end of the 5th century which destroys the marble (scattered in addition to: 4000 fragments found by the archeologists), and damages the most 140 papyri kept in a related room by an easy family.

Archaeological research

Chronology

The antique dealer William John Bankes, who managed to remain a few days on the site and to traverse most of the city, succeeds in making some sketches; the conclusions of its voyage will be made public the same year that the exit of the book of Burckhardt but the sketches will remain new until the end of the 20th century.

Several archaeological missions follow, in particular of the geographers Gotthilf Heinrich von Schubert and Jules de Bertou in 1837, the specialist in the biblical studies Edward Robinson in 1838, the assyriologist Austen Henry Layard in 1840 and the archeologist Honore Théodoric d' Albert de Luynes in 1864. The first studies are based on the tombs more spectacular than the other vestiges. The local populations are hostile with the excavations, not allowing the organization of excavations themselves.

In 1897, the Dominicains of the biblical and archaeological École French of Jerusalem take statements of the inscriptions and monuments.

In 1907, the specialist in Arab world Moravian Alois Musil published in its cartographic work Arabia Petraea the results of one of the first forwardings with scientific vocation having undertaken to inventory all antiquities then visible at the time. In the Années 1920 followed measurements of a highher degree of accuracy of the antique dealers Rudolf Ernst Brünnow and Alfred von Domaszewski allowing the realization of one of the first precise charts of Pétra. It is starting from 1924 that “the true” missions of excavations will start.

Research is not limited to the site. Much further, another nabatéenne city, Hégra is discovered by Charles Montagu Doughty, in 2000 a sumptuous villa nabatéenne out of the Sîq, and in 2003 of the tombs cut in the rock in lower part of Khazneh. Relief of the city being very difficult at certain places, and erosion having made damage, the archeologists asked a mountaineer to climb a wall to reach a tomb, but it found only Os there, fall it having been plundered. On a small plate of the one of cliffs one found a place reserved for the religious ceremonies, where was held probably Sacrifice S of animals whose blood was to run on the wall of cliff. Under the direction of the Jordanian authority of antiquities, American scientists of the Université Brown of Providence revealed the remainders of the principal temple (Qasr Al-Bint) in the downtown area as well as the sector around the door of Temenos. In all, it was excavated, until now, one percent of the surface of the city of Pétra.

In the Years 2000, the National center of the scientific research (CNRS) continued excavations with the Qasr Al-Bint mainly financed by the French Ministry for Foreign Affairs.

The writing

They are research on the inscriptions of Pétra or Hégra which allows the largest projections. There is: 4000 inscriptions engraved on the rocks of Pétra, including 80% of signatures, mainly of pilgrims of the ic religions pre Islam leaving trace of their piety there. Nabatéens having generally written on papyrus and Cuir, which breaks up quickly, it remains to us only the inscriptions on the rock, in Pétra and elsewhere with the the Middle East, where this alphabet was rather current. Writing from right to left, the alphabet was composed of twenty-two consonants; like certain connected languages, from which the Hebrew , the vowels is deduced by the reader.

The numismatists manage to identify the coins emitted during approximately two centuries by Nabatéens, which imitated the Greek currency. Indeed, until after the First World War, the city remained only accessible to the Europeans accompanied by local guides and armed escorts.

In 1868, the “caravan of the French painters”, made up of Gérôme, Bonnat, Paul Lenoir, guide-interprets it Mousali and the Goupil photographer, tries to depict at the time of his voyage in the the Sinai, Fayoum and Pétra, the cultural assets of the city but the result is disappointing because during two days, of the torrential rains do not make it possible to work.

In the Years 1930, Agatha Christie locates the intrigue of sound Detective novel Rendez-vous with death (1937) to Pétra.

Tintin, Belgian hero of Cartoon , Pétra visit in the album Coke in stock .

Hollywood, through films such as Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade , Mortal Kombat, final destruction and the Return of the mummy benefits from the particular decorations of Pétra.

Tourism

General information

The Tourisme in Pétra developed only after the First World War. Front, the city had remained only accessible to the tourists and the researchers when they were accompanied by local guides and armed escorts. The Bedul nomads lived in the ruins of Pétra until the Années 1980; they are today tourist guides or tradesmen established with the surroundings.

Pétra is the site more visited Jordan with: 310271 visitors in 2004 and: 393186 in 2005. However the sector of tourism is depend on the economic conjuncture and of political instabilities of the area, thus in 2003, at the time of the Guerre in Iraq, there was only: 160658 visitors with Pétra and Jordan saw the sacrificed tourist season 2002 and 2003. In comparison, the site of Jerash, second site of the country of many visitors, receives: 214550 visitors in 2006, is about twice less visits.

Before the entry of the Sîq, a tourist pole including luxury hotels in particular was created at the end of the 20th century. The capacity of the offer of the 23 hotels distributed around Pétra is of 589 rooms for: 1290 beds. The site thus represents, with enormously direct and indirect incomes, a true economic lung in Jordan.

This surge of foreign currencies causes migrations of population towards the site of Pétra and the village of Gaia which undergoes a significant demographic development.

A night visit of Pétra, with the gleam of: 1800 candles, is possible to discover the city under another angle. Bedul and others autochtones offer to the tourists walks with back of ass, Cheval or camel.

Since 1993, the site and the zone around are a archaeological National park.

July 7th, 2007, Pétra was indicated like one of the Seven new wonders of the world by a nonofficial organization and related to commercial ( New Open World Corporation ).

Appendices

External bonds

Petra: Lost City off Stone on the site of the American Museum off Natural History
Bulletin off Nabataean Studies
a virtual visit of Pétra
a gallery with more than 100 photographs of Pétra and its surroundings

Random links:

IGM | Ammodytes dubius | Polished Tropheus | Museum of Picardy | Wizard