Sanctuaries, taxation and caravans: Wadi Sabra, a satellite hamlet of Petra (original) (raw)
Several questions have remained unanswered in scholarship about the interpretation of Wadi Sabra, a satellite hamlet situated 6.5 km south of Petra’s city centre, not least because of the lack of substantial fieldwork undertaken there. In 2014, the Belgian and French archaeological missions to Petra together made the first general map of the site at a scale of 1:50, which subsequently allowed a new understanding and interpretation of its various archaeological features. A second temple, associated with the precinct that was partially studied by J.P. Zeitler in 1992, was discovered and surveyed, together with its temenos, a bath complex and crypto-porticoes. Dwellings developed on a hill to the west of this precinct from the Nabataean to Late Roman periods, and an enigmatic isolated building has been tentatively identified as a caravanserai. The site, which is accessed from the Wadi Arabah via Wadi Sabra and lies besides springs at the bottom of Ras Sabra, was an obligatory transshipment stop for the caravans. It is therefore proposed that there is a correlation between the storage facilities of the sanctuary and the likely existence of a royal or municipal taxation of the caravans destined for Petra, as explained by Pliny the Elder for Southern Arabia. This interpretation, which could also be applied to at least another major peripheral temple in the greater Petra area, can contribute to our understanding of the presence of a major rock-cut theatre at Sabra. This theatre has remained largely unexplained and can be consequently justified by the organization of religious and commercial feasts. This paper will present and discuss these new findings and hypotheses, subsequently shedding light on Petra’s hinterland and the organization of Nabataean trade.
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in Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 46 (2016): 277-303. This paper aims to provide the first reassessment of the available documentation concerning the Nabataean-Roman site of Sabrah, situated 6.5 km south of Petra. A major sanctuary developped at the latest between the first and early fourth century AD, together with major adjacent structures such as a bath-house and a theatre, in a small oasis situated on a track joining Humayma and Wadi Araba to the Nabataean capital, and supplied by spring and rainfall water. For the first time since 1828, a 1:50 top plan of its visible remains has been drawn. Along with a general description and surface ceramic material, it gives a first general image of the site and serves as the basis for renewed analysis.
Prehistoric Petra A Synthesis.pdf
Decades in Desert, 2019
It might be argued that the city of Petra is the most investigated archaeological site in the Ancient Near East. Several archaeological expedition from all continents researched either the site or the inhabitants of it. However, since its rediscovery by Johann Ludwig Burckhardt in 1812 the site was revisited and explored by several travelers and explorers (Lindner 1974: 9-12) but no fieldwork has been undertaken at the site till 1929 as the first scientific excavations were financed by Lord Melchett. Moreover, this excavation was followed during the period from 1932 to 1936 by archaeological systematic excavations directed by G. and A. Horsfield, W. F. Albright, M.-R. Savignac, J. H. Iliff, and N. Glueck. These scholars belonged to several archaeological schools such as the Cambridge University Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, the British Museum, the State Museums in Berlin and the British and the American Schools in Athen (Hadidi 1986: 11). This expedition and from that time on open doors for hundreds of teams belonging to several national and international institutions to come and excavate in Petra. Since the back-bone of this presentation is the prehistoric period, thus we will shed light only on the archaeological activities undertaken at sites belonging to the Paleolithic, Epi-Palaeolithic, Neolithic and Chalcolithic reported inside the city Petra or even in its surroundings.
The Petra Area and Wadi Silaysil Survey (or PAWS) undertook its initial season of fieldwork in the summer of 2010 as a major component of the Brown University Petra Archaeological Project (BUPAP). The PAWS research area is located some three to ten kilometers north of the Petra city-center, between the modern village communities of Umm Sayhun and Bayda, within which three zones were intensively surveyed: Areas a, b, and c (Fig. 1). Given its close proximity to Petra, it is no surprise that previous travelers, explorers, and archaeologists have investigated this region, with the earliest accounts going back to the 19th century (Robinson and Smith 1841). However, the diachronic, systematic, and intensive design of the PAWS survey represents a novel approach to the documentation of this landscape that has yielded substantial and provocative results after only a single season of fieldwork. In approximately a month long period between 28 June and 31 July 2010, the PAWS team systematically surveyed 133 hectares, in which material culture from all periods (from Paleolithic to the present) was counted and collected for some 334 Survey Units, and over 240 features, ranging from tombs to water management structures to agricultural installations, were recorded. The intention of this article is briefly to review previous research concerning the survey area, to discuss our methodological and theoretical concerns, and to summarize the preliminary results of the 2010 season.
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American Journal of Archaeology, 2017