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Archeologists Discover a Huge Monument in Petra, Jordan

Petra Jordan

Archeologists have discovered a huge monument buried under the sands at the Petra World Heritage site in southern Jordan.

The monument near the ancient city’s center was found after archaeologists used satellite images, ground surveys and drone photography to locate the structure.

The detailed results of this study, carried out by Sarah Parcak of the University of Birmingham, and Christopher Tuttle, executive director of the Council of American Overseas Research Centers, have been published in the Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research.

Petra was founded by the people of an Arab tribe known as Nabataean in fourth century BC. The city served as the capital of Nabataean people, who also lived in different regions of modern-day Iraq, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. The site was essentially abandoned in the seventh century AD – at the end of the Byzantine period.

The modern-day Petra is visited by thousands of tourists each year, although numbers have dwindled in the past few years due to conflicts with ISIS. Petra World Heritage site is famous for the Treasury Building, which was carved from beautiful red sandstone. The building has also appeared in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Petra Archaeological Park encompasses an area of about 102 square miles, but the city’s center covers an area of only 2.3 square miles.

The newly discovered structure consists of a 184 x 161 foot platform. It is about as long as an Olympic swimming pool and twice as wide. It is located about 800 meters south of the center of the ancient city. Within the large platform is contained a slightly smaller platform, whose eastern side was lined with a row of columns.

Archeologists have found surface pottery items from the site which suggest that the platform dates back mid-second century BC. The structure was probably built for a ceremonial purpose.

“This monumental platform has no parallels at Petra or in its hinterlands at present,” the researchers wrote.

“To my knowledge, we don’t have anything quite like this at Petra,” said co-author Christopher Tuttle, who has worked at Petra for about 15 years.

“I knew something was there and other archaeologists – who have worked in Petra for the last, God knows, 100 years at least – I know at least one other had noticed something there,” he said.

“But the structure’s sides resembled terrace walls common to the city.”

“I don’t think anybody paid much attention to them.”

Tuttle carried out this research in association with Sarah Parcak, from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, whose job was to use satellites to survey the site.

“Petra is a massive site, and we chose the name for our article [‘Hiding in plain sight’] precisely because, even though this is less than a kilometer south of the main city, previous surveys had missed it,” Parcak said.

The researchers currently have no plans to excavate the site, but hope they might get a chance in future to work at this site.