Milan, 29 August 2023
It rained the day we visited Petra. Not a huge amount, just a sprinkle. But it was enough to keep the skies covered and the temperatures moderate. This was the one time in my life that I’ve been pleased to have rain when I visited somewhere. It was the last days of May, and my wife and I had been worried that we would be visiting the site under a burning sun.
We entered the site through the Siq, that long, long gash in the mountains.
We followed its meanderings, hopping out of the way of the electric vehicles ferrying tourists back and forth, all the while craning our necks backwards to look at the walls of rock soaring above us.
And so we came to the end of the Siq and found ourselves in front of the Khazneh, the Treasury, the building that “is” Petra. It was a gradual unfolding, as we exited from the narrowness of the Siq.
It wasn’t actually a treasury. That’s what the local Bedouins believed. They thought there was treasure hidden in that urn on the very top of the rotunda, as witnessed by the pockmarks on it caused by Bedouins firing at it to try to break it open – a waste of time and bullets since the urn is solid sandstone. In reality, it was a mausoleum for the Nabatean king Aretas IV Philopatris (“friend of his people”, which probably means he wasn’t their friend at all). We have – possibly – a likeness of this friend of the people on one of his coins.
Anyone with a passing knowledge of the New Testament will be interested to know that Aretas’s daughter married Herod Antipas, and it was the latter’s decision to divorce her and marry his stepbrother’s wife Herodias that eventually led to the beheading of John the Baptist. Here’s Caravaggio’s take on this execution.
I actually first came across the Treasury in the Tintin album “Coke en Stock”. For reasons which are too convoluted to explain, Tintin, with Captain Haddock in tow, is crossing the fictional Middle Eastern country of Khemed on horseback to get to the Red Sea. On the way, they pass through a narrow gorge. The relevant page from the album recounts the rest of the incident.
As I say, the story is highly convoluted, and I invite curious readers to go back to the original album to understand who is who and what is going on. Let’s just focus on the Treasury (although I have to say, I’ve always asked myself what that lady was saying to Captain Haddock).
When I read the album, I had no idea that this was the Treasury in Petra. Neither it nor Petra itself is mentioned by name. Captain Haddock says it is a Roman temple, and that is all we are told. It was only years later, when I happened to see a guidebook on Petra, that I realised where Hergé had got his inspiration. Here is one of the many, many guidebooks on Petra with the Treasury on its cover.
The official photos of the plaza in front of the Treasury normally have few if any people. But as my wife’s photo above shows, when we there it was like a souk, although a very modern one. Large crowds of tourists were milling around, taking photos, taking selfies, reading guide books, listening to guides they had rented, or chattering among themselves, before they moved on to the next ruin. In the middle of all this, and rather getting in the way, camels and donkeys waited patiently, with the local Bedouins hawking a ride on them down to the rest of the ruins. Other Bedouins called out from the cliffs above, inviting tourists to climb up and have a drink. Others still manned the stalls lining the side of the canyon which brought us all to the rest of Petra, selling tourist tat.
I noticed that getting one’s eyes lined with kohl was a popular offering when we were there, with all the Bedouins – men and women – heavily eyelined in kohl to advertise the service.
We ignored the tourist tat and the calls to climb onto a camel, or donkey, or horse, and walked down the Street of Facades, the canyon leading away from the Treasury with buildings cut into the canyon walls.
The facades had once been very ornate, but water and wind have taken their toll.
At some point, we climbed up the wall of the canyon to admire the royal tombs cut into the rock farther up on one side
and the theatre cut into the rock on the other side.
We climbed back down and walked along what had once been Petra’s main drag, the Colonnaded Street.
At some point, we passed through the remains of the Temenos Gate.
It was “guarded” by two Bedouins dressed up as Nabatean soldiers.
No doubt they were offering a photo opportunity for a donation, like all those Roman legionnaires haunting the Colosseum, saying “Ave” to each other.
But we declined the offer and moved on.
We finally made it to the path leading to the Monastery and then slowly made our way up the long, long – 850-steps-long – climb, part of a steady stream of tourists struggling upwards in panting silence (thank God for the cloud cover!).
As we climbed we had to squeeze our way through yet more tourist stalls jammed onto the narrow path, with their Bedouin owners loudly advertising their wares.
We finally emerged onto the plaza abutting the Monastery.
It was of course never a monastery, although quite what it was is not clear. Experts’ best guess is that it was dedicated to the cult of the deified King Obodas I. Once again, we can possibly get an idea of what he looked like through his coinage.
Obodas’s people deified him because he was a Mighty Kicker of Ass. He gave the Hasmonean king Alexander Jannaeus, who ruled over Judea, a severe drubbing near the Sea of Galilee, from which Alexander barely managed to escape alive (I’ve mentioned Alexander before; he was the High Priest who was pelted by the faithful with citrons). Then a few years later, after the Seleucid king, Antiochus XII Dionysus, had invaded the Nabatean kingdom, Obodas attacked his army. Antiochus was killed and the remains of his army perished miserably in the desert.
After a well-deserved rest and drink, we joined the stream of tourists going back down, now skipping along and chattering as they went. Once back down to the Colonnaded Street, we headed up onto the hillside to the north, to have a view down on the site.
Looking at all these dusty ruins, it’s difficult to understand what Petra looked like when it was a living, thriving city, so I have resorted to showing a reconstruction.
At the very top of the photo, in the middle, one can just make out the Treasury. Coming down the canyon from the Treasury, we have the royal tombs to the right and the theatre to the left. We are looking down at the red roofs of the Colonnaded Street, with the colonnades finishing at the Temenos Gate. The path to the Monastery, which is not visible here, is off at the bottom right of the photo.
The water in the stream running along the Colonnaded Street is ridiculously blue, like a swimming pool. I wonder how much water there even was in that stream bed. Water was a precious resource in Petra, and its citizens had created a complex network of dams, reservoirs, cisterns, and basins, the whole connected by some 200 km of channels and pipes, to collect, store, and distribute the little amount of rain which fell in the environs.
It’s all gone now, victim of time and neglect (and of a powerful earthquake in 363 CE), but you can still see remains of the network here and there.
In its heyday, this network was able to support a population of some 20-30,000 people, about the same size as the small town of Wadi Musa situated on the edge of Petra, where we stayed the night. Not large by today’s standards, but populations were much, much smaller back then.
There was also an important transient population – of both man and beast – to supply water to, for Petra’s importance – and wealth – came from it being at the crossroads of important trade routes.
From Yemen in the south came frankincense and myrrh, those precious incenses so desired for religious ceremonies throughout the Middle East and beyond. It’s no coincidence that in his Gospel, Matthew has the Three Wise Men bringing frankincense and myrrh, along with gold, as presents fit for Christ the King.
From the south too came ivory and other goods which had originated in Africa.
From the Persian Gulf to the east came pepper and other fabled spices transported there from India and beyond.
From Damascus to the north came its famous damask textile, but also silk which had been brought from China along the Silk Road.
From various places to the east and north came bitumen, used as a glue, a binder, a water repellent, and – in Egypt – in embalming.
Gold, silver, and precious stones also came to Petra from all points of the compass.
The goods moved west to Gaza, or north to Damascus and then west to the coast of what is now Lebanon, from whence they were shipped across the Mediterranean. The Nabateans welcomed all these traders who crossed their kingdom and offered them protection, shelter, and water – for a price. And that price paid for all the buildings and infrastructure in Petra.
Nearly all gone now. The earthquake of 363 CE did massive damage, changes in trade routes did the rest. Once sailors understood how to sail the monsoons in the Arabian Sea, ships from India could sail up the Red Sea and transit through Alexandria, cutting out the Nabateans, while Palmyra to the north drew away much of the rest of the east-west trade. By the time of the Muslim conquest of the Levant in 634 CE, Petra had been forgotten. Sic transit gloria mundi.
We slowly made our way back to the Siq and left the site. Tomorrow, we were on our way to Amman, where I was going to give a training course on green industry policies.
the heart thrills 
