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Petra (from "petra", rock in Greek; Arabic: Al-Butra) is an archaeological site in Jordan, lying in a basin among the mountains which form the eastern flank of Wadi Araba, the great valley running from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Aqaba. It is famous for having many stone structures carved into the rock. The long-hidden site was revealed to the Western world by the Swiss explorer Johann Ludwig Burckhardt in 1812. Its famous description "a rose-red city half as old as time" is the final line of a sonnet by the minor Victorian poet John William Burgon, which won the Newdigate Prize for poetry, given at Oxford, 1845. Burgon had not actually visited Petra, which remained inaccessible to all but the most intrepid Europeans, accompanied by local guides with armed escorts, until after World War I.
Rekem is an ancient name for Petra and appears in dead sea scrolls (4Q462 for example) associated with mount Seir. Additionally, Eusebius and Jerome (Onom. sacr. 286, 71. 145, 9; 228, 55. 287, 94) assert that Rekem was the native name of Petra, apparently on the authority of Josephus (Antiquities iv. 7, 1~ 4, 7).
The descriptions of Strabo, Pliny the Elder, and other writers identify Petra as the capital of the Nabataeans, Aramaic-speaking Semites, and the centre of their caravan trade. Walled in by towering rocks and watered by a perennial stream, Petra not only possessed the advantages of a fortress but controlled the main commercial routes which passed through it to Gaza in the west, to Bosra and Damascus in the north, to Aqaba and Leuce Come on the Red Sea, and across the desert to the Persian Gulf.
Recent excavations have demonstrated that it was the ability of the Nabateans to control the water supply that led to the rise of the desert city, in effect creating an artificial oasis. The area is visited by flash floods and archaeological evidence demonstrates the Nabateans controlled these floods by the use of dams, cisterns and water conduits. Thus, stored water could be employed even during prolonged periods of drought, and the city prospered from its sale.
The Nabataeans worshipped the Arab gods and goddesses of the pre-Islamic times as well as few of their deified kings. The most famous of these was Obodas I, who was deified after his death. Du Sharrah was the main male God accompanied by his feminine trinity; Al Uzza, Al Latt and Mena. Many statues carved in the rock depict these gods & goddesses. The Monastery, Petra's largest monument, dates from the first century BC. It was dedicated to Obodas I and is believed to be the symposium of Obodas the god. This information is inscibed on the ruins of the Monastery (the name is the translation of the Arabic "Ad-Deir").
Christianity found its way into Petra in the 4th century AD, nearly 500 years after the establishment of Petra as a trade center. Athanasius mentions a bishop of Petra (Anhioch. 10) named Asterius. At least one of the tombs (the "tomb with the urn"?) was used as a church; an inscription in red paint records its consecration "in the time of the most holy bishop Jason" (447). The Christianity of Petra, as of north Arabia, was swept away by the Islamic conquest of 629 - 632. During the First Crusade Petra was occupied by Baldwin I of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and formed the second fief of the barony of Kerak (in the Lordship of Oultrejordain) with the title Ch?teau de la Val?e de Moyse or Sela. It remained in the hands of the Franks until 1189. According to Arab tradition, Petra is the spot where Moses struck a rock with his staff, and water came forth, and where Moses' sister, Miriam, is buried.
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