Petra
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The sun is rising over a desert in southwest Jordan, lighting up red sandstone mountains that rise out of the dust. There's little sign of life here. No water, few plants. A snake darts into the shadows when a goat trots past, its hooves kicking up dust. Following the animal are two men with long beards and headscarves. They're tired, thirsty, and caked in the grime of their long journey.

One of the men pauses next to a wide crack in a red sandstone rock face. He calls out in Arabic, signaling for the other traveler to follow him through into a narrow gorge that he calls the Sique. The second man replies in the same language, hoping his accent doesn't fail him. Swiss by birth, Johann Ludwig Buchhardt has been practicing for years, trying to perfect his grammar and pronunciation so his disguise is convincing.

He told the local guide he's an Islamic pilgrim on a search for an ancient tomb, where he intends to sacrifice a goat. He'll do it too, if that's what it takes. But his real reason for coming is very different. Burkhardt has prepared well for the journey. Not just his language skills, but also studying the Quran and Islamic culture. Even growing his beard to blend in. But the dangers are real. Only recently he heard of a German explorer searching for a lost city near here who was murdered before he found it.

Now he's determined to find it for himself. As they walk through the gorge, their voices echo against the towering rock face. And now, heart thundering, Bookheart catches a first glimpse of something incredible at the end of the shady path. As he gets closer to the end of the seek, he can make out columns, archways, windows, all carved directly into the stone. There's only one thing it can be, the lost city of Petra.

Transfixed, he emerges into an incredible place. He blinks in amazement as he walks between exquisite facades cut straight into the tall sandstone cliffs. They're three times as high as Buckingham Palace in London, and even more elaborate. There are columns, doorways, triangular pediments. They remind him of ancient Greece and Rome. One facade looks like a cathedral, others like palaces. Many resemble tombs, and there's so many of them.

He could spend weeks here, taking notes and making sketches. But knowing he has to keep up the pretense, he grabs the goat by the scruff of its neck and keeps on walking. When they reach the tomb of Aron, Bukat reaches into the small bag he's carried with him for months. He pushes aside his most prized possession, a leather-bound notebook in which he's been making extensive notes on his explorations, and brings out the knife laying at the bottom.

He glances at the goat, but hesitates, raising his eyes to the magnificent ruins that lie beyond the doomed animal. His local guide steps forward and speaks gruffly. He's irritated, suspicious maybe. Is this visitor really here to make a sacrifice, or has he been tricked? So Bokat does what must be done. He grits his teeth, and mere moments later, the goat lies still at his feet. One life has been sacrificed, but the prize is beyond value.

For centuries, this city has been lost to outsiders. Few beyond these lands believed it existed, but all that changes now. Wiping the blood from his knife, Burkhardt knows that this will be his greatest achievement. Forever, he will be known as the man who rediscovered Petra. The ancient city of Petra is one of the world's most famous archaeological sites.

Founded over two millennia ago by a formerly nomadic tribe, it flourished thanks to its key location on ancient trade routes linking Arabia, Egypt, and the Mediterranean Sea. As its wealth grew, so did its splendor. But though it was forgotten by most after the 8th century, its rediscovery over a thousand years later by a Swiss explorer saw a surge in interest. Described as "a rose-red city, half as old as time,"

It has fascinated archaeologists, researchers, and tourists from across the globe. In 2022, almost 1 million visitors traveled to this remote site in southwest Jordan to see the elaborate temples, tombs, and theaters cut straight into the towering red sandstone. In 2007, it was voted as one of the new Seven Wonders of the World. But why did a tribe of nomads settle down and create a permanent city in the middle of the desert?

Why did they choose to carve into the rock instead of constructing free-standing buildings? And what lessons can today's modern society learn from an ancient tribe that most Westerners have never heard of? I'm John Hopkins from Noisa. This is a short history of Petra. The story of Petra begins four centuries before the birth of Jesus. In Britain, the Iron Age sees warring Celtic tribes roaming the land.

In Italy, the Gauls sack the city of Rome, defeating the army of the new Roman Republic. And in ancient Greece, Alexander the Great is leading a massive military campaign to extend the boundaries of his empire. To the east, merchants travel along trade routes that link Arabia, Egypt, and the Mediterranean, carrying precious goods such as silk, spices, and textiles.

But the desert can be a dangerous place, so they travel in groups or caravans, often accompanied by camels. As they traverse the land, they need safe places to sleep and to replenish food and water supplies. Luckily for them, many nomadic tribes are happy to help. For centuries, these local people have explored vast areas of the Arabian desert, searching for water and pastures where their animals can feed and rest. They know the landscape better than anyone.

One of these tribes are the Nabataeans, who roam the region of modern-day Jordan. They offer shelter and sustenance to strangers for a price. Some also charge a toll for traders passing through their territory. Traditionally, the Nabataeans have lived in goat-skin tents in the desert, but it's time for a change. Jody Magnus is an archaeologist, author, and distinguished professor at the University of North Carolina.

A past president of the Archaeological Institute of America, she's written several books about the history and archaeology of the Holy Land. I like to say they're one of the most important ancient peoples who most people today have never heard of.

We don't have like a corpus of historical literature or other kinds of literature that they wrote and left for us. It's not just that they were nomads, but they were nomads who at some point develop a very lucrative trade, bringing expensive goods from further east to the Mediterranean coast.

As you have these caravans moving through the desert, you need to have at regular spots or at certain locations places where the animals can get their water and people can rest and, you know, be fed. And so at some point, at least some of these trading posts become permanent settlements. Petra is one of those places. In 312 BC, they established a settlement at the crossroads of two vital trading routes.

Known originally as Edom, meaning red, the area was populated by the Edomite tribe many centuries previously. And though the Nabataeans now call it Rakhmu, meaning "colored stone," history will remember it by the name the Greeks later give it: Petra, meaning "rock." The settlement grows. To its west is Jerusalem and the port of Gaza, gateway to the Mediterranean Sea. To the north is the glittering city of Damascus in Syria.

Further east are Iraq and Saudi Arabia, key points on the ancient Silk Road trade route that connects China with the West. Many other roadways crisscross the arid region, snaking through mountains and desert landscapes. One of these is the Incense Route, connecting Arabia to the Mediterranean. Petra becomes a key part of this flourishing commercial movement, meaning the Nabataeans have center stage. Some Nabataeans abandon their nomadic lifestyle and become traders themselves.

Little by little, the tribe becomes extremely wealthy. And with money comes power. The tribe eventually take political control of the land they've roamed for centuries. Under their first known king, Aretas, they name Petra as the capital.

A lot of times these sorts of things also have to do with the idea of something being sacred. Was there something about the location of Petra, about that site, that had a long history of sacredness in the local tradition? Whatever their spiritual beliefs say about the site, in some way it's an obvious place to build a city. Lying at the end of a gorge in the Negev desert, it's got natural defenses.

A trading post of such importance needs good protection, and that's provided by the landscape itself. But the geography is also part of the challenge. Petra is a place of heat and dust, of sand and dry earth. So how can a city here provide hydration for the thousands of residents and merchants passing through? The Nabataeans have the answer. Eight kilometers from the city, in the Wadi Musa mountains, there is a perennial freshwater spring.

And once the engineers in the city understand how to harness it, there's no stopping them. It's 4 BC, a blisteringly hot day under an endless blue sky. A palace servant is hurrying from the marketplace in Petra with a large basket of fresh fruit. Today, his royal master is having a very special celebration. With the city center behind him, soon he comes to the palace complex.

The guards at the gate uncross their spears to let him through, and he emerges into a courtyard where dozens of attendants are milling around. As he crosses to the buildings beyond, he has to dodge a whole team of gardeners who are hard at work. They've been building a series of terraces out here, but now they're hunched over the soil, digging holes for all the tropical plants that have been chosen to decorate this part of the complex. The servant heads to a small pavilion, painted in red and deep blue.

Here he brushes down his tunic and straightens up before carefully carrying the basket inside. In the center of the room, and comfortably out of the sun, King Aretas IV lies on a couch strewn with fabrics. From where he lies he can see the sandstone peaks of the arid mountains that surround the city. Though the landscape is dominated by sand and gritty soil where few plants grow, now in Petra it's a different story.

The servant offers the fruit, but the king waves it away. What he wants instead is water. A cup is passed to him, and he takes a long drink and then smiles. Today, of all days, he knows there's plenty more where that came from. Now another attendant enters and gives Aretas the news he's been waiting to hear. It is ready. The king rises and heads outside, followed by his courtiers. The workers stop to bow as he crosses the garden, and he takes a moment to appreciate its splendor.

He's sure it'll be far more beautiful than the famous garden created by his late son-in-law, King Herod, at Herodion. But of course, the garden isn't the star attraction today. Aretas comes to a stop in front of a huge pit surrounded by tall stone columns. It's enormous, maybe as long as 20 camels standing nose to tail. And now it's filling with water. The king hunches down at the edge of the pool.

He splashes his hand into the cool, fresh water, marveling at the sheer quantity of it. It's been brought here from the mountains by a complex system of rock-cut channels and ceramic pipes and aqueducts, especially crafted by his skilled team of laborers. Now the king lowers himself into the water, instantly refreshing. It's a blissful moment. And he laughs out loud as his staff and workers cheer and applaud. He's done it.

He's made the impossible possible. He's created the most magnificent swimming pool in the ancient world right here in Petra city center in the middle of a baking desert. The permanent water supply is one of the key reasons for Petra's success as a trading post. It's so important that many believe it's a site of great religious significance. Its name, Musa Spring, refers to Moses.

Some claim it's the place where the biblical figure struck a rock with his staff, making water gush from solid stone. In creating this kind of lush, green, watered landscape in the middle of a hyperarid environment, this is a symbol of power. The king is like a god because who else can bring water and vegetation? This is an act of creation.

The Nabataean kings aren't the first to demonstrate their power in this way. The royal leader of a neighboring territory created a giant pool and garden complex at his palace a few years earlier. King Herod, best known for the "masker of the innocents" described in the Bible, designed his own lush complex to impress his people and link him to miraculous acts of creation. Under Aretas IV, the Nabataeans take it to another level.

Their complex water supply system comprises a series of rock-cut channels, ceramic pipes, aqueducts, and reservoirs to bring water from the sacred spring into the heart of their city. It provides a reliable and clean running water supply for residents and the many visiting merchants. But it's also used for cultivation of crops around the city and to supply the pools and gardens of a temple near the center.

To boost supply, the Nabataeans also build dams and cisterns to capture rainfall and excess water from occasional flash floods, especially in more mountainous parts of their territory. With these engineers at the helm, not a single drop of water from the spring or from the sky goes to waste. One of the reasons they're so important is because they were able to adapt to a hyperarid environment.

And they did this in remarkable ways. And it wasn't a one-size-fits-all. In other words, it's not like there's one magic bullet that the Nabataeans invented to manage water in a hyperarid environment. Having a permanent source of fresh water in a hyperarid environment automatically makes something extremely special. And in the ancient world,

Water is one of the big powers of nature, but even more so in the ancient world. So it's not just the water, it's the fact that it's like a divine kind of sacredness that water would have in an environment like that. While some workers focus on building and extending the water supply system, others concentrate on developing the city itself. In the first century AD, the Nabataeans start to work on the earliest of Petra's iconic buildings.

The treasury, known as al-Khasna in Arabic, will be the first thing merchants and traders see when they emerge from the narrow gorge known as the Sikh. Starting from the top of the cliff and working downwards, the masons cut directly into the red sandstone. Little by little, they transform the rock face into a tomb with an elaborate Hellenistic facade similar to those found in the temples of great European cities like Athens and Rome.

But while the style is inspired by the Greeks, the Nabataeans are creating a city like no other. Using scaffolding and iron tools, teams of workers carve six tall columns on the ground level, three on each side of a small doorway that leads to the burial chamber within the rock face. On top of the columns, they carve out a triangular pediment known as the tympanum.

The design of the next level is similar, but it's decorated with a giant stone urn, complete with statues flanking the sides. It's deliberately dramatic, designed to impress and to demonstrate the wealth and power of the city's people. But it doesn't stop there. A few streets away, more laborers create a monumental complex known as the Great Temple, close to the swimming pool and gardens.

and high above the main city, at the top of an 800-step stairway, stands the monastery, which rivals the treasury in its scale and beauty.

The thing I think would strike many people is not just the quality of the carvings, but in the case of the Hasna, for example, the obvious Greek and Roman influence on the style of the carvings. It's clear. I mean, it's carved to look more or less like the facade of a Greek temple or a Roman temple. There are some differences, but very, very strong Greek influence, Hellenistic influence. And that is

It's not surprising because the Nabataeans were part of the Hellenistic world, a broader Hellenistic context, the context of the centuries after Alexander the Great's conquests. They bordered on other areas which were inhabited by peoples who also were either Greek or influenced by Greek culture.

So, not surprising to see that they incorporate elements of Hellenistic styles of architecture and whatever in the tomb facades as part of the larger context that they live in. But there is one key difference. In Rome and Athens, large buildings lie behind the spectacular facades. There, the frontages are the gateways to temples, palaces, government buildings, and elaborate homes with mosaic floors, painted walls, and warrens of rooms.

And though visitors may expect the same in Petra, when they step between its elaborately carved columns and beautiful doorways, they're in for a surprise. Because despite the majestic exteriors, little lies beyond. In the treasury building, a doorway on the ground level leads to a simple chamber, believed to be the tomb of Aretas IV. Beyond that, there's just solid rock. Time and again at Petra, the Nabataeans create facades without any buildings behind them.

Why did they do this? Well, probably because that's what you have at Petra. The whole site is just steep cliffs. It's not like a flat area where the natural thing would be to bury your dead in the way that we do today in a trench grave. Depending on your level of wealth, you could maybe afford a more elaborate tomb.

but the actual concept is something that seems to just be suited to the landscape of Petra. There actually was already a tradition, both in the Nabataean realm and in some of the neighboring areas, of what we call rock tombs. You can see them around Jerusalem. So it's not necessarily unique to the Nabataeans, but it's certainly, you're much more of it at Petra than you do elsewhere. The first time I went, I was just

shocked at the size of the site. I had no idea that it went on and just on and on and on for as far as the eye could see, cliffs with these carved rock-cut tombs visible in the facade. Many of the tombs are used as family mausoleums for generation after generation. And it's not only residents of Petra who bury their ancestors here. It's thought that Nabataeans from across the territory used the capital city as their cemetery.

But this isn't a city built only for the dead. In fact, more than 30,000 live in Petra at its peak in the 1st century AD. By now, in addition to hundreds of tombs, the Nabataeans have built an open-air theater, most of which is also cut straight into the rock. The wider city features marketplaces, bathhouses, public squares, and residential areas, some of which are freestanding. It's a thriving, bustling place.

Stretching for more than 100 square miles, Petra is around twice the size of modern-day Disney World in Florida. The Nabataeans, for so long a nomadic tribe, have created a vibrant city of rock that attracts an endless stream of visitors. Those who live here are kept busy. Male residents of Petra turn their hands to trade, construction, administration, and cultivation. In their leisure time, they visit markets, bathhouses, and theaters, and enjoy wines made from local grapes.

Women, though, have fewer choices. We have very little in the way of writings by women about themselves from the ancient world. If the same picture holds for the Nabataeans as it does with other ancient peoples, then presumably women would have been responsible for certain types of activities, especially within household contexts. It's possible that some women, particularly of lower classes, would have had to have worked outside the house, maybe in agriculture or maybe trade.

As Petra's fame grows, it catches the attention of Western leaders. The Romans are expanding east, and there are few greater prizes than a trading post as successful as this one. Though Petra was first conquered by Roman troops in 64 BC, the takeover was peaceful, and the Nabataeans retained their independence. When Emperor Trajan returns to Jordan 70 years later, the city is an even greater success.

King Aretas IV has been dead for more than 60 years, but the water systems and monumental architecture he commissioned are still functioning. They attract a steady flow of traders who bring money, goods, and vitality to the desert. Now Trajan wants to make sure the Romans get their share. He tightens Roman control over the region, and in 106 AD he makes Petra capital of a Roman province called Arabia Petraea. It's still an important city,

but no longer independent. After almost 400 years in power, the Nabataeans lose control of their magnificent desert home. But despite the loss of autonomy, Petra and its community continue to grow, and trade thrives. The Romans use the buildings and pools created by the Nabataeans, but leave their own distinctive mark on the city. At the entrance to the Sik, they construct a magnificent triumphal arch connecting the two sheer walls of the gorge.

And in the center of Petra, they create a trademark Roman road, one of many built in towns and cities across the world. Known as the "Colonaded Street," it is six meters wide and lined by rows of sandstone columns. Workers clad the local stone in marble and create shops with covered porticos. The Romans also enlarged the open-air theater, more than doubling its original capacity.

The rock-cut theater of the Nabataeans can now hold an audience of more than 8,000 people. In 131 AD, the city is graced by a visit from Emperor Hadrian himself. As ruler of the vast Roman Empire, Hadrian thinks differently to his predecessors. Instead of concentrating on expansion, he wants to visit the lands already conquered. He believes that's the best way to consolidate and maintain power in even the furthest reaches of his empire.

By the time he arrives in the Jordanian desert, he's been emperor for 14 years and has traveled thousands of miles across Europe and the East. Almost a decade previously, he visited Britain and ordered the construction of his Great Wall there, sealing the northwest frontier of the Roman Empire. In Italy, work continues on the enormous Temple of Venus and Roma, the largest in ancient Rome.

Over in Greece, a new monumental archway will soon be built to mark the arrival of the emperor to Athens. Here in Petra, coins are minted featuring his face, and the city is renamed in his honor. For now, it will be known as Hadrian Petra.

Petra continued to exist, and at that point was the capital city of a province that the Romans created. The caravan trade sort of declines, apparently, or at least the Nabataean control of the caravan trade declines. But the city continued to be inhabited. It continued to flourish, apparently, for a long time. But the fate of the city closely follows the fate of the Roman Empire. Changes are afoot.

In 324 AD, Emperor Constantine I moves the capital from Rome to Byzantium, modern-day Istanbul. As the first Christian Roman emperor, he sparks the spread of this new religion across his vast territory. At some point, the Nabataeans became Christians. So after Christianity becomes the legal and official religion of the Roman Empire in the 4th century,

In the course of the next couple of centuries, a lot of the population of the Eastern Empire converted to Christianity, and that was true also of the Nabataeans. But it's not only the religion that is changing. Innovations worldwide in shipbuilding and navigation transform trade, shifting the focus to sea routes. Towns and cities on the ancient overland routes suffer as a result, Petra included. And fewer traders means less money.

363 AD sees a massive earthquake devastate the region. It causes damage to some of Petra's buildings and the complex water system, but repairs are made and once again Petra rises up to challenges and survives against the odds. When the Roman Empire splits in two at the end of the 4th century, Petra becomes part of Byzantium. Some of the ancient tombs are used as Christian temples, and in the years that follow, three free-standing churches are built in the city.

One is built from Egyptian granite. Another, sitting on elevated ground in the city center, features typical Byzantine design and decor, including elaborate floor mosaics with colorful images of people, plants, and animals. But another earthquake hits in the summer of 551. In the decades that follow, Petra changes hands again during the rise of Islam in the 7th century. And Petra's glory days, it seems, are already over.

You have people who are wealthy because of not just trading contacts, but because they are administrators or have connections to government or whatever. If all of that kind of comes to an end or moves to other sites because the centers of power move.

at some point, then it would make sense that you get not necessarily an overnight decline, but people then would start moving out and resettling depending on where they could earn a living, depending on where the center of administration was located. By the 8th century, the once thriving city is abandoned by most inhabitants and traders. Some of the dwellings are used as temporary shelters by nomadic tribes who still roam the region. But for the rest of the world,

Petra disappears from the map. No European visits Petra again for hundreds of years. Rumors abound about a lost city deep in the desert of Jordan. Locals are reluctant to reveal the location, fearing an influx of treasure hunters. But eventually, in August 1812, Swiss explorer Johann Ludwig Buchhardt finds his way in.

The 27-year-old is on the road to Cairo when he hears rumors about a magnificent lost city lying close to the tomb of Aaron, brother of Moses. Determined to find it and any treasures it might hold, the explorer disguises himself as an Islamic pilgrim and convinces a local guide to lead him there. Later, he chronicles about what he considers his "discovery," alerting the Western world to its existence.

Soon, a new wave of visitors will make their way across the desert to the ancient city of Petra. It's important to know that this was in the context of a much broader wave, a much larger wave of European exploration of the Holy Land at that time. It was actually an interest in exploring, in finding sites associated with the Bible.

There had always been pilgrimage, but this is different. This is scientific exploration where what you have are these Western explorers who are attempting to identify the remains of sites that are mentioned in connection with the Bible. And so this then sparks a whole wave of tourism, basically. Some of it was religious, but not necessarily devoutly religious, but a whole wave of tourism to the Holy Land. One of the best-known travelers of the time is American writer Mark Twain.

In 1869, he publishes a travel book called "Innocence Abroad", also known as "The New Pilgrim's Progress". The best-selling book chronicles his five-month journey through Europe and the Holy Land, mainly on board a chartered steamship. Although he doesn't visit Petra, his book shines a light on the region. Years later, teams of European archaeologists make their way to Petra.

1929 sees the arrival of British archaeologists Agnes Conway and George Horsfield, who launch a project to excavate and survey the city. But the site also draws treasure hunters, including some who believe the urn on the front of the treasury building isn't solid rock at all, but a receptacle for gold coins and more. Bullet holes mark the spot where members of the Bedouin tribe try to shoot it open to access its riches. But even though all they get for their trouble is rock dust instead, the rumors prevail.

By the 1970s, a few thousand tourists are visiting every year, despite ongoing tensions and violence in the Middle East. Many arrive by bus from Jerusalem, a drive of around four hours. Though much of the wider site is hidden under centuries of shifting sand, the most famous facades in the city look much the same as they did in ancient times. While the ancient cities of South America were swallowed by thick jungle vegetation, the land around Petra is dry and barren.

Its intricate frontages have been protected from rain damage thanks to the Nabataeans who carved them with an overhang to ensure water didn't drip down the cliffs and erode them. Tourists are not permitted to stay in the ruins of Petra, so the nearby town of Wadi Musa establishes itself as the visitors' gateway to the ancient site. Locals turn their hand to hospitality, opening hotels and restaurants, and offering tour guide services.

Wadi Musa, meaning the Valley of Moses, is located a short distance from the entrance to the Sikh Gorge. From there, visitors travel by foot or pack animal into the ruined city, following the footsteps of traders and merchants of centuries past. Once again, the streets of Petra are bustling with guests from across the world.

In 1985, UNESCO recognized Petra's elaborate tomb and temple architecture, which it says demonstrate a "unique artistic achievement" and name it as a World Heritage Site. But though it's good news for Jordan's tourism industry, it's bad news for local Bedouin tribes who live in and around Petra. After UNESCO takes an interest, the government removes tribe members from the site and relocates them in purpose-built homes nearby. Some refuse to leave.

Others move into houses, but later return to the caves where they and their ancestors have lived for hundreds of years. Complaining that the new homes are too cramped, they ask the government to allocate them more land and build more houses. In the meantime, many work at Petra, offering services and souvenirs to the tourists who visit. And they're not the only ones coming to Petra for work.

In 1989, the city is propelled into the limelight by the arrival of Harrison Ford and Sean Connery, here to record Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. The closing scenes of the blockbuster movie feature the pair bursting from the seek, then exploring the Treasury Building in search of the Holy Grail. Earning more than $474 million worldwide, it is the highest-grossing film of 1989. Petra is very much back in the public eye.

Visitor numbers drop off during the Gulf War in the Middle East, but a series of peace treaties signed in the 1990s once again bring stability to the region. With cheaper air travel and improved infrastructure in Jordan, tourism surges. The 1990s also see the arrival of a team from the American Center of Oriental Research, a non-profit institution. But few could have predicted what treasures they'll uncover. It's December 1993.

The ancient city of Petra is busy with tourists. Some explore by foot, walking for hours on rocky, dusty ground. Others ride camels led by locals. In front of the major monuments, tour guides enthusiastically explain the history, while visitors snap photos. But on a hillside high above them, a team of archaeologists are kneeling on the floor of a ruined fifth-century church. Dating from the Byzantine era, it was once the most impressive of the city's three churches.

Gripping the handle of a small brush to gently clear dirt and dust from the floor, one man is hard at work. Painstakingly, he reveals part of an elaborate mosaic that has been hidden for centuries. As he brushes, the face of a woman appears, drawn out in tiny stone blocks of white, yellow. He and his team have been here for months, working to uncover ancient treasures like this one. It's slow work, but satisfying.

And usually it's beautifully silent, a contrast to the bustle of the tourist site below. But now there's a commotion. The man looks up, startled, as someone shouts his name and calls him into a small storage room at the side of the church. He lays down his tools and carefully picks his way over the dry, rocky ground until he reaches a few workers gathered in a group, chatting excitedly. They've been preparing the ground for the construction of a shelter to protect the church from the elements.

when something stopped them in their tracks. As the archaeologist approaches, the group step back to reveal what they found beneath tons of stone and sand. The archaeologist kneels down, eyes narrowed. To begin with, all he can see is the blackened debris left over from a fire that blazed through the church in the seventh century. Everything was destroyed, apart from the stones and the mosaics they're rediscovering now. The wooden beams and decorations and anything else that could burn was lost forever.

or so they had assumed. But as he peers closer to the blackened ground, what he sees makes his heart thunder in his chest. He reaches for his tools and gently uncovers a burned fragment embedded in the earth. He can barely believe what he's looking at. It's an ancient scroll, a roll of burnt papyri that somehow survived the fire. Next to it, there's another one and another. There are dozens of them, all blackened and fragile.

but still intact. He's unsure when they're from, or what they say, or how they survived. But he is sure of one thing: the Petrus scrolls will go down in history. The research team uncovers a total of 152 rolls of papyrus, dating from the 6th century. More than 20 of the scrolls contain continuous text segments, and another 19 provide fragments of information written in Greek and some Latin.

Many deal with matters such as tax, property sales, and dowries. Others give details about desert agriculture in and around Petra, confirming the production of wine, wheat, and fruit from orchards. Some scrolls provide detailed descriptions of architecture in the city. Together, they offer a remarkable insight into 6th century society and show how Petra continued to be an important trading city after the Romans took control.

The excavation and the conservation of those documents was really an amazing feat. These are actual ancient documents that are Nabataean documents, admittedly late in the history of the Nabataeans, but still. So they first of all give us information about, you know, the local Nabataean population in this period, and more broadly about some of the peoples living in this region in this period, right? Because they're not living in isolation, they're part of a much larger context.

So it gives us information about, you know, what kind of laws were being issued in the capital, Constantinople, but then being observed in a place like Petra. What kinds of taxation the people were subject to, how were land ownership issues resolved, you know, all sorts of stuff like that. So it's really, it's incredibly valuable. We just don't have a lot of documents like that from this region. Excavations continue at Petra even today.

After decades of archaeological research, experts believe 85% of the site is yet to be uncovered. And 40 years after Bedouin tribe members were removed from Petra, around 150 families remain in their traditional cave dwellings here. Many work as local guides, some offer camel and donkey rides or sell souvenirs, while others offer refreshments to visitors. And for the moment, business is good.

From 100,000 tourists annually in the early 1990s, within a few decades that's up to 1 million a year. Though photos of the site are readily available online and on social media, for many explorers, nothing can replace experiencing the magic of approaching Petra through the Sikh for themselves. But its appeal is not without its risks. The biggest threat to Petra today, I think, is tourism.

And this is true of a lot of archaeological sites. And so it is also with Petra. It's a wonderful site. And obviously, everybody wants to visit it. And it is worth visiting. And I hope everybody visits it, right? But how do you protect...

The monuments there, how do you protect the site with so many tourists? And not just tourists, but everybody there who's catering to the tourists. All the guys who are running the donkeys that go in and out and all of that. So I would have to say that, you know, tourism is the biggest challenge that we face with regard to the preservation of the monuments there. Political instability in the region is another continuing threat. While Jordan itself sustains peace within its borders, violence is almost constant nearby.

Ongoing conflicts in Gaza, Israel and Syria impact tourism. But while a lower footfall may benefit the preservation of the ruins, it causes untold damage to the local and national economy. Throughout history, Petra has survived seemingly impossible conditions. Despite earthquakes and invasions, more than 2,000 years after it was built by a tribe of nomads, it's been voted as a new wonder of the world.

The towering facades, admired by traders of frankincense and myrrh in the ancient world, are now posted all over social media by a new generation of travelers. But nobody can be sure what the future holds for this rock-cut city in the desert. Perhaps we can look back to the work of the Nabataeans and find answers to some very modern problems. This ancient tribe, known by so few, used knowledge, skill, and experience to achieve the impossible.

In terms of modern climate change problems and sustainability and environment, there's so much that we can learn from the Nabataeans. They truly, in my mind, are a model for how people can live in an environment that looks like people couldn't live there. They didn't just live there. They thrived. They flourished. I teach at a university.

And a lot of the university curriculum, not just at my university, but in general today, is focused on the contemporary world. And in many ways, the study of the distant past, the human past, has become marginalized and thought to be unimportant and irrelevant. And I think that the Nabataeans can show us just how important and relevant the study of the past is. Next time on Short History Of, we'll bring you a short history of Queen Victoria.

Victoria's legacy is huge. She is one of the most recognisable royal figures in history and across the world. And I think it's a real testament to her strength of character and the strength of her image that she weathered that very dangerous storm of public disapproval when she retired for pretty much a decade after Albert's death. But they forgave her.

And then, in fact, they loved her even more than they had before. So I think that's a big part of why we're still talking about and in some cases celebrating Queen Victoria. That's next time.