There is a wonderful place to explore in Jordan in the region of Wadi Feynan. 

Getting there: Wadi Feynan is located about 200 miles southwest of Amman and represents one of the regional centers of the ancient metallurgy in the Middle East. The industrial-scale copper production started in the Early Bronze Age and continued during the Roman-Byzantine Period while the final exploitation of copper occurred in Mamluk Period.

The copper was transported to other parts of the region but this trade isn’t what we’ll talk about. It’s what you are going to do there.

Feynan Ecolodge is one of the most basic and eco-friendly places in Jordan. It is also considered a top 50 eco hotel in the world. There’s no electricity in the hotel except for the kitchen, bathroom and showers. You won’t find plastic bottles, meat and alcohol – though you can bring your own.

The hotel is built in the middle of nowhere between the Dana Reserve on the mountain plateau and the valley where only four-wheel vehicles have access. The nearest road is miles away and the area is tough but good for a rugged hike and stargazing in the evening.

At night, the hotel is lit by candles produced by the local Bedouin community.

Rooms are nice but minimalistic while hefty price tag could be a big turn off for people used to luxurious accommodation or those who would rather choose one of many Bedouin camps in Wadi Musa and Wadi Rum. However, most visitors won’t stay more than a few days due to complete isolation from civilization. On the other hand, tourists who enjoy solitude can get the full board of breakfast, lunch and dinner. For most visitors, breakfast and dinner are included in the offer.

In the wintertime, the lodge can be freezing due to the lack of electricity so the hosts provide very thick blankets and hot water bottles. During the summer, the main issue is the scorching heat as temperatures range between 38 and 45 Celsius for most of the days between June and September.

The best period for hiking is fall and spring.

When it was established in 2005 by Jordan’s Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature, the Feynan Ecolodge was to offer travelers, particularly hikers and young people, the opportunity to learn more about untouched wilderness, the ancient history of Wadi Feynan and local communities.

Built as traditional waystations that are scattered throughout the Middle East and Central Asia, the Feynan Ecolodge uses solar panels while the inner courtyard is designed for stargazing or meteor showers.

In the Dana Biosphere Reserve

At the lodge, hot drinks and non-alcoholic beverages are served while guests can bring their own alcoholic drinks but are advised to use them discreetly because Jordan is primarily Muslim and alcohol is not permitted. Read more here about Muslims and alcohol.

Solar –generated electricity is used to light the bathrooms, kitchen, mobile phones and laptops. One can’t find an electric outlet in the rooms, but cameras, laptops and mobiles can be recharged at the front desk.

The lodge is smoke-free but travelers can go outside the lodge and smoke in a smoke-designated area. Because of the solar system, each room has enough hot water for the whole year.

The main outdoor activities are a sunrise hike, a sunset hike, the Feynan area plants, hiking between ruins of ancient civilizations and exploring famous mines. So hiking. Or doing nothing. Or exploring the area ion mountain bikes as well as interaction with local communities. Normally, hikes last between two and four hours and guests are escorted by a guide.

Spending a day with a local shepherd or cooking Arabic coffee, the weaving of a goat hair tent,preparing eye makeup called kohl and making arbood bread are interactive activities that would help a tourist understand the heritage of locals in Wadi Feynan. Highly recommended.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bcl4XwEH1hi/

One of shortcomings of the lodge are flies especially in the summer and the lack of access for visitors with disabilities. The terrain around the hotel is very rough and the hotel has no elevator to the first floor.

To summarize, the ecolodge is an excellent place for travelers interested in meditation, extreme sports and physical isolation from modern civilization. Disadvantages are unreasonably high prices for a spartan accommodation, exposure to the elements –  hot summers and freezing winters – and a staff that barely speaks English.

If you are looking for wild travels in the Middle East or North Africa, try this eco hotel in Morocco. 

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Somewhere halfway between Jerusalem and Ashkelon, there is a place known as Tell es-Safi and it represents a multi-period site – where numerous cultures over time lived and overlapped and built again. It teaches us that history was never black and white, and that interactions between different cultures has never been a smooth ride, but always in motion, as shown unearthed in ancient dig sites.

Although Philistine and Judahite states have been perceived as rivals, recent finds highlighted very complex religious, mundane, linguistic and commercial ties in the Iron Age found at Gath, also believed to be the hometown of the biblical giant Goliath.

In the Bible the settlement was known as Gath and scholars have reference to the site in various biblical sources as well as in Egypt’s Amarna letters and Assyrian texts, notes Professor Aren Maeir from Bar Ilan University in Ramat Gan, Israel who leads The Tell es-Safi/Gath Archaeological Project.

Goliath, the giant who was overtaken by King David’s slingshot, is described in the biblical Book of Samuel as a Philistine giant defeated by the young David in single combat. It is believed that Goliath was originally from Gath.

Tell es-Safi had an extensive population in the Early Bronze Age III (2700 to 2200 BCE), the Late Bronze Age (1550 to 1200 BCE) and the Iron Ages. The site was  one of the most significant pre-classical settlements in the southern Levant.

Three notable groups lived there: the Israelites, the Canaanites and the Philistines lived in the area and their relations were complex: “At times friendly, at times less. There were differences between the cultures but also similarities,” Maeir underlined.

As a testimony of turbulent political times, Gath was destroyed in 830 BC by King Hazael of Aram-Damascus, “and this event is mentioned in the Bible  – II Kings 12:17/18 –  and on the site is evidenced by a massive siege system and a sitewide destruction,” Professor Maeir elaborated, adding that the site was again destroyed in the Iron II B (late 8th century BCE) most probably by the Assyrians.

In Iron Age, Gath was one of five cities of the Philistine “Pentapolis”, and Hazael’s demolition of the site can be interpreted as consolidation of his political power in the southern Levant.

A pentapolis is a geographic and/or institutional grouping of five cities. Like the boroughs of New York. Cities in the ancient world probably formed such groups for political, commercial and military reasons, as happened later with the Cinque Ports in England.

According to Maeir, the evidence of the conquest and destruction of Tell es-Safi by Aramean forces is supplemented by a large siege system that is connected to this campaign.

He expands: “The system included a deep trench and a berm that surround Gath, clear evidence of which was found on the eastern, southern, and western sides of the site. In addition, at least two, and perhaps three, towers that are associated with the trench and berm have been noted, as well as hints to the possible existence of other features, such as camps, in other nearby locations.”

“The trench itself was dug into the bedrock to a depth of about eight meters and a width of up to five meters, and the materials from the trench were consistently piled up on the side away from the city, forming a berm/embankment. All of these elements formed a siege system, similar to a Roman circumvallation, constructed to enclose the besieged city, preventing the defenders from escaping and receiving supplies, and from attacking the besieging forces,” Maeir emphasized.

The mention of a similar siege by Bir-Hadad, Hazael’s son, in the Aramaic Zakkur Inscription from northern Syria, strengthens this interpretation, the archaeologist said.

Pottery found at the site is a testimony of the interregional trade and intercultural links between Gath and other states and cities of the region. The socio-economic and geopolitical relations are manifested by trade and cultural influences between the Philistines and other peoples of the area.

While in the past it was often assumed that during the early Iron Age, after the initial appearance of the Philistine culture, there was little foreign connections with Philistia, in recent years, more and more evidence of various types of connections have emerged and the excavations at Tell es-Safi/Gath have provided relevant evidence for these connections from different stages of the Iron I and Iron IIA, Dr.Maeir stressed, adding that this includes exchange of decorated pottery between Gath and other cities in Philistia as well as an ivory bowl similar to bowls found in Megiddo.

On the other hand, the copper found in Tell es-Safi originated from Wadi Faynan in Arabah region on the East Bank while pottery forms had been imported from Judahite-controlled territories.

“These and other finds are an indication of the different levels of inter-regional trade and inter-cultural connections that went on during the Iron I and Iron IIA, including the close connections between Gath and the Judahite region,” Maeir pointed out, noting that Gath was a center of copper trade between Arabah and the coastal area.

Although Philistine and Judahite states have been perceived as rivals, recent finds highlighted very complex religious, mundane, linguistic and commercial ties in the Iron Age. The peak of the copper trade in Wadi Faynan corresponds with the zenith of Gath as the most eastern Philistine city, Maeir underscored.

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Plagues are no stranger to the western east: The Plague of Amwas (Arabic: طاعون عمواس‎, romanized: ṭāʿūn ʿAmwās), also spelled plague of Emmaus, was a bubonic plague epidemic that afflicted Islamic Syria in 638–639, toward the end of the Muslim conquest of the region. It killed about 25,000 Muslim troops and led to some interesting religious rulings on plagues in general.

As we know relations between humans and disease are one of the oldest, older than agriculture or formation of the first urban centers. Different pandemics were sometimes turning points in human history when they caused economic losses, depopulation, political instability, and the collapse of the state.

In 2020, we are witnessing the impact of COVID-19 on the global economy and countries around the world. Five months since the World Health Organization detected COVID-19, epidemiologists still have no clue how to curb the disease while economists didn’t evaluate the final impact of this crisis on the world’s financial system. The blockade will likely continue for the rest of the year, and in the coming years, we will have to fundamentally change our social and work habits, like working from home and teleconferencing. 

During the time of Khalif Oman Ibn Khattab – 634 to 644 years CE – Muslim armies were engaged in the series of military campaigns in the Levant against Byzantine troops. Soon after the conquest of Syria (634-637 CE), something unpredictable happened in 638/639 CE when the plague broke out in the village of Amwas (Ancient Emmaus), about 20 miles southeast of Jerusalem.

Emmaus is a town mentioned in the Gospel of Luke of the New Testament. Luke reports that Jesus appeared, after his death and resurrection, before two of his disciples while they were walking on the road to Emmaus. It is now located in Israel and around it is the home to a national park called Canada Park.

The Plague of Amwas was one of the series of pandemics called Justinian Plagues that ravished the Eastern Mediterranean for centuries. It began as usual from rats living and traveling on merchant ships in 540 to 541 CE and lasted with recurrences until 750 CE.

The Plague of Amwas was the first major pandemic that hit the early Muslim communities. The event is famous in Islamic tradition for debate between Caliph Omar Ibn Khatab and prominent Muslim commanders who refused Omar’s advice to withdraw to Medina and the outcome of the pandemic that killed between 25,000 to 30,000 people including Companions of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad.

The plague spread to Syria, Iraq, and Egypt, and the pandemic was preceded by a severe famine in the southern Levant. 

Upon receiving news that the plague broke out in Syria, Caliph Omar Ibn Khattab left the capital Medina to personally monitor what measures were taken to isolate the pandemic. Leaders of the Sham arrived in Sargh to greet Caliph Omar and among them were Amr Abu Ubeidah Bin Al Jarrah (commander of armies that captured Damascus and Jerusalem), Khalid Bin Al Walid (the commander during Ridda Wars that broke out after Prophet Mohammed’s death), Amr Bin Al Aas (the later governor of Egypt), Yazid Abu Sufyan (the commander in the conquest of Palestine) and Suhail Bin Amr (commander of one of the brigades in the Battle of Yarmouk in 636 CE).

During the meeting, the situation in Syria was discussed and one group supported the return to Medina while others insisted on continuing the campaign despite the plague. After Caliph Omar decided to withdraw to Medina, Abu Ubeidah and his supporters returned to Syria.

In the long run, because of his moral and leadership qualities, Omar Ibn Khattab was planning to appoint Abu Ubeidah as his imminent successor, and to save him from the raging plague, he sent a letter to him urging Abu Ubeidah to immediately come for consultations in the capital Medina. Abu Ubeidah read between lines and refused the order telling the caliph that he can’t forsake his men who were dying from the plague. Soon after this reply to the caliph, Abu Ubeidah perished in the plague and very soon after him the newly appointed governor of Syria Muath Bin Jabal faced the same fate.

Words of Wisdom from Muslim Scholars

The Plague of Amwas depleted Muslim ranks in Syria but also showed what steps should be taken in the times of pandemics.

According to Hadiths, Prophet Muhammad reportedly noted: “When you hear that a plague is in a land, don’t go to it, and if it occurs in a land that you are already in then don’t leave it.” (Al Bukhaari [5739] and Muslim [2219)] narrated from ‘Abd ar-Rahmaan ibn ‘Awf.)

Later on, the episode was used for theological debates on predestination, free will, theodicy, and causality as well as jurisprudence (the permissibility of entering or leaving a plague-infested area), and medicine (the nature of contagion, disease transmission, and treatment of the plague or other contagious diseases).  Muslim theologians also hint at another debate: the belief in the transmissibility of the plague and the conviction that dying of the plague while trusting in God results in martyrdom.

What is similar to modern-day measures on COVID-19 is the principle of quarantine: the important element of every pandemic is the human to human contact which should be minimized or completely eliminated during the outbreak. The principle of life protecting in Islam refers to protecting the public and personal health. Therefore Muslims are obliged to follow instructions of experts and in the case of pandemics virologists, epidemiologists, and other specialists.

More stories below that explore Muslim faith and human life:

https://www.greenprophet.com/2018/03/shaving-in-arabia-the-halal-and-the-haram/

Why Muslims don’t drink alcohol

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The local Bedouin knew about them for thousands of years but in the 1920s, pilots of the Royal Air Force flying over the deserts of Israel, Jordan and Egypt saw mysterious line shapes in the ground that they named “Desert Kites” Because their outlines, as seen from the air in their planes, reminded them of airborne kites.

The Middle Eastern deserts hide many traces from the dawn of mankind. Some of them are so-called desert kites, structures used to capture game animals: gazelles, wild asses, Arabian oryxes, onagers, hartebeests, ostriches and ibexes. From the satellite images, these structures look like gigantic kites that intrigued scholars who spent years researching uninhabited areas of Eastern Jordan, Sinai, Negev Desert and Saudi Arabia.

For many years scholars thought that some of the desert kites represented the border between the Roman and Sassanian empires in the Syrian Desert or water channels, but recently scientists reached a consensus that these structures served Neolithic nomads.

According to a French anthropologist Remy Crassard, it is possible that the “desert kites” in Jordan are some of the oldest in the world.

“Until now, we can estimate the use of the kites in Jordan and most probably in the neighboring regions to the end of the Neolithic, which was around 8000 years ago,” said Crassard in an interview for the Green Prophet. Crassard who leads the “Globalkites Project”, added that in northern Saudi Arabia, hunting traps were later constructed while in Armenia, where some 200 kites have been found, they appear to be used during the Bronze Age (around 5000 or 4000 years ago). By 2022, 6500 had been located in the Middle East.

The desert kites were found in areas far from the Middle East, like Kazakhstan where this human-made traps likely remained in use even in the medieval period.

Kites are different in shapes and sizes, the scholar continued, noting that thanks to a statistical approach, we are now able to propose groups of kites that show a real regionalization of them through time and space.  Also, kites might have been used not only for the hunting of wild animals but for their domestication in the Neolithic communities.

In northeastern Syria deposits of animal bones found near desert kites indicated non-selective hunting of animals whose age and sex varies. Some petroglyphs also depict scenes from gazelle and ibex hunting. The most common types of desert traps are bag-shaped kites, star-shaped kites, star-shaped kites with returned enclosures and clover –leafed kites.

In addition to the function of the desert kites, they consist of long dry-stone walls converging on a neck which opens into a confined space that ancient people used as the killing floor.  These walls can be hundreds of meters long and in more recent times, during the British and French mandate, pilots who flew over desert first spotted them in the1920s. T.E Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia, recorded desert kites in the Negev in 1913 while he explored the area before World War I.

Regarding other finds, the excavations of the kites do not yield any artifacts, Crassard underlined, saying that the research team is also looking for datable elements, so that they can date the structure itself.

“During our last season of excavations in October 2019, we even found some prehistoric gazelles in one of these traps! After analyses, we will publish very soon our results in scientific journals,” Crassard noted.

Describing these enormous structures made to trap various animals by people from Neolithic period, he said that the research team recorded more than 6000 of them from Saudi Arabia to Uzbekistan in Central Asia.

“This is fascinating to study such mega-structures that were not so well understood before being excavated,” he stressed, underscoring that the new project will now provide many clarifications on the function, the dating and distribution of the desert kites that were until recently considered enigmatic structures.

In order to understand the economic and environmental impact of the desert kites, interdisciplinary studies are needed and they gather not only archaeologists but anthropologists, archaeozoologists and geo-archaeologists. The plan of the team of researchers gathered at The Globalkites is to analyze traps in different parts of the world and reconstruct the way game animals and Neolithic people interacted.

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The relations between the Herodian Kingdom and the Nabatean Kingdom were very complex and involved political, economic and marriage ties. Through the institution of marriage with local dynasties, Herodians consolidated power in the southern Levant and later became Rome’s client state.

Intermarriage between religious groups was not uncommon, people were open-minded, until they were not. Here’s a little history of the way things were in the Levant, where major world religions brewed and fed each other:

The most prominent ruler of the dynasty, Herod the Great who ruled from 74/73 BCE to 4 CE, was a controversial figure according to historical sources, and one of main villains of The New Testament.

However, despite the popular tradition his rule was characterized by colossal buildings in Judea, including a renovation of the Second Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, construction of the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, the fortress Masada on the eastern edge of the Judean Desert, the maritime port Caesarea Maritima, and monumental palaces like Herodium, 10 miles south of Jerusalem, and Machaerus, 18 miles southeast from the mouth of the Jordan River.

Although his father Antipater I Idumaean (100 BCE to 43 BCE) was an Edomite and his mother Cypros I, a Nabataean, Herod was raised as a Jew. How about that?

An ancient matchmaker

Herod used marriage to bring together different ethnic groups within his realm and making political alliances with other rulers in the same area. In the First Century BCE many members of the Judean elites were Hellenized, which was also the case with Herodians. The process of Hellenization enabled these elites to consolidate and expand their rule in the southern Levant.

The founder of the dynasty, Antipater I already designed a marriage strategy to boost his influence in the region and took a Nabataean noblewoman Cypros I as a wife. She was related to the Nabataean King Aretas III, also known as Philhellen which means Friend of the Greeks.

Kings as babysitters

Relations between them became so cordial that Antipater I would entrust the Nabataean king to take care of his sons while he was participating in the military campaigns against Hasmonean Aristobulus II (66 BC-63 BC).

According to Flavius Josephus, a Jewish historian (37 CE to 100 CE), Antipater I used the Nabataean backing to contact Pompey and Roman generals in the east. Then Antipater I forged an alliance with Caesar, and for his ongoing support of Rome he was awarded with the prize of not having to pay taxes. 

His ascendants automatically became the Roman citizens, therefore his marriage to Cyprus I is only one aspect of a much broader policy that sees Antipater I taking advantage of multiple social, religious and ethnic identities.

However, political relations were not always idyllic: when Cesar was assassinated in Rome in 44 CE the East entered a period of chaos and the Nabataeans mistakenly sided with the Parthians. After the Romans defeated the Parthians, the Nabataean Kingdom was obliged to pay tribute to Romans.

The Roman state used Herod I to punish the Nabataeans when they failed to pay the tribute on time and in 36 BCE Herod I expanded his realm at the expense of the Nabataean Kingdom taking its northern swaths. Wadi Mujib, the biblical Arnon Stream, was a border between Nabataean and Herodian states and, according to a Greek archaeologist Konstantinos Politis, the late researcher Taysir Atiat found a Nabataean temple and a watch tower on the mouth of Wadi Mujib.

Within a Herodian Kingdom there was a port on the eastern side of the Dead Sea called Ain –ez Zara, with rooms for shops as it was part of the incense trade route. Further up an ancient road connects Ain ez-Zara with Machareus fortress, a border stronghold and a palace of King Herod the Great. It was a part of the defensive line with a small settlement under the palace, which was a place where St. John the Baptist was beheaded around 29 CE.

A breakup that leads to war

Herod Antipas (20 BCE to 39 CE) was one of sons of Herod the Great and ruled the Galilee and Perea, where in the former province established a city of Tiberius named after his patron Emperor Tiberius. Continuing practice of his predecessors, he married Phasaelis, a daughter of the Nabataean King Aretas IV. The breakup of that marriage was a pretext for the war between Aretas IV and Herod Antipas as the former invaded Perea and defeated Antipas.

According to Josephus, Jews attributed the defeat of Herod Antipas in 36 CE to the beheading of John the Baptist.

A few generations earlier, the romantic relation took place between Salome, the sister of Herod I, and the Nabataean vizier Syllaeus, who came to Jerusalem in 20 BCE to negotiate a loan of 60 talents on the behalf of the Nabataean King Obodas III.

Afraid of the pagans at Petra

Despite the objections from Herod the Great, his sister continued to date the ambitious Nabataean deputy.  Herod I had tense relations with Obodas III and paranoid, as he was, Herod I thought that Syllaeus would depose him and become the ruler of Judea. Several months later, when Syllaeus returned to Jerusalem to propose to Salome, Herod I added the condition that he had to become a Jew and undergo circumcision.

Fearing the reaction and potential stoning by his fellow pagans in Petra, Syllaeus backed off returning to the Nabataean capital empty handed, without love.

The identity of the Herodians was fluid and dynamic, transforming from one ethnicity, culture and religion to another. The choice of the spouse or partner depended on the constellation of power and relations with the Nabataean kings who were also politically submissive to the Romans.

When Jews rebelled in 70 CE, the Nabataeans joined the Roman army who crashed the uprising. However, the Nabataeans’ relative independence didn’t last for too long and Emperor Trajan annexed their kingdom in 106 CErenaming it in the province Arabia Petrea.

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Neolithic game boards from Jordan. In some places like Petra they were carved into walls of the city for leisurely play? The early mancala game we know today is likely from this, but no one really knows the rules of the ancient games. But archeologists do know that they were a way for socializing people through the ages.

Ever thought about those new and interesting board games that are popping up? Like the ancient game Mehen, based on an Egyptian god and the path to enlightenment. As kids get overstimulated from technology and smartphones, a new trend is to get them to play board games. And now ancient games like mancala and mehen, much lesser known games than chess, are making a comeback. Historically, board games were played by ancient civilizations to socialize. And here we learn more about games from the western east.

According to American anthropologist, Gary Rollefson, western east area board games such as mehen, senet, and later mancala and chess (brought from India to Persia), have been an integral part of the human experience for at least 5000 years. While chess was invented in India it was brought to the world through the Persian empire when the Arabs conquered Persia. Chess was taken up by the Muslim world and subsequently spread to Southern Europe.

And all these old games we played have a history. We interview an anthropologist to find out more.

Over the past two decades what looks like game boards fashioned out of stone have been recovered from sites around 9000 years old, along with game pieces, explains Gary Rollefson, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at Whitman College, Walla Walla, Washington.

Archeological records show how the less complex communities than Old World civilizations (Mesopotamia, Ancient Egypt) we know today enjoyed an extensive period of social interaction of this kind.

“Board games were widely played throughout the Mediterranean into Africa and the Near East during the Classic period,” Rollefson tells Green Prophet and similar forms of game boards were also popular during the Bronze Age, about 4000 years ago.

“Origins of complex gaming remain debatable, but there is now a wealth of examples of analogous game boards that date from the Neolithic period in Jordan, Israel, Syria and Iran,” he said.

| Neolithic people or the New Stone Age era people, was the final stage of cultural evolution or technological development among prehistoric humans. |

Researchers discovered prehistoric game boards north of Petra, the gorgeous Pink City in Jordan built by Nabateans, at the site called Beidha. It happened in 1966 when Diana Kirkbride discovered them in Beidha.

Games found in ancient garbage

“Evidently made of local sandstone, one complete and three fragmentary examples were recovered from almost the entire span of the 8th millennium BC in domestic and trash contexts,” Rollefson pointed out, noting that all share similar traits, including two rows of depressions.

The depressions are approximately 1 inch in diameter and one quarter inch deep, he explained, adding that the complete “game” has four such holes in each row, all linked by shallow grooves: “the groove link is missing, but two separate grooves between the two rows trace a shallow sinusoidal pattern,” he points out.

Games ancient Iranians used to play

On the other hand, a different kind of board game can be found in Iran from Chagha Sefid found by Frank Hole: the board, made of gypsum, is broken and has 13 holes or traces of holes arranged in 3 parallel rows. The holes are small, measuring only a quarter inch in diameter and depth and the board comes from the Sefid phase, dating to 7400 to 6700 BCE, about 8000 years ago.

Games scratched into the city walls, beginnings of mancala?

Ain Ghazal is a well-known site on the northeastern outskirts of Amman, where two complete game boards came from. The ancient Nabataeans scratched what looks like game boards into flat surfaces all over the city. And they can be found all over the city. While the adults are looking at the big, huge tombs and carvings, send the kids to find the game boards.

Play board games like an ancient Egyptian

Depressions were pecked about a centimeter into the limestone and had a diameter of almost an inch, and the rows converge from the wider end toward the narrower end of the board.

More ancient games in Jordan

“The second specimen from ‘Ain Ghazal [northeast Amman] was recovered in 1996; it is much less intensively worked than the 1989 example. Two rows of four very shallow depressions [less than a centimeter deep and about 3 cm in diameter] were pecked into an almost circular hard limestone slab that is convex on the obverse side,” said Rollefson, noting that the lack of definition of the holes might be an indication that it was not finished, perhaps due to its extraordinary hardness compared to the softer kind of limestone of the other game board.

The stone was later used by ancient architects to serve as a base in a posthole that was part of the roof support system of an apsidal building that may have been used in a cult practice by a kinship group, he speculated.

On a terrace high above the lower Wadi Al Hasa in central Jordan, Adamanitos Sampson excavated two game boards from the site of Wadi Hamarash 1, including a complete and very elaborate specimen, Rolleson underlined, adding that it was made of pink sandstone, and it represents the largest Neolithic game board discovered so far. See top photo.

Game boards have been also found west of the Jordan Valley, in Jericho, when a single fragment of a game board came from a Pottery Neolithic era Rollefson elaborated, noting that only two circular depressions were preserved (and one was nevertheless incomplete) with a narrow channel connecting them.

“Two Late Neolithic game boards were excavated at Shir an agricultural village about 10 miles north-northwest of Hama in the Orontes Valley of Syria. One of the game boards was incorporated as a wall stone in a house; the second game board is a small fragment,” the scholar emphasized, adding that like the odd arrangement of holes in the stone from Chagha Sefid in Iran, the complete Shir game board has three parallel rows of ten shallow holes.

How were ancient games played?

Scholars in general assumed that board games were played by objects such as pebbles or seeds, a Japanese archaeologist Sumio Fujii claims that at Wadi Abu Tulayha colorful semi-translucent pebbles were found that are not available locally, implying that they must have been brought to the site from elsewhere.

One of the major problems regarding the interpretation of human activities and social habits in prehistory is the lack of material evidence, not to mention written sources.

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Zakat represents the old social safety net that alleviates economic problems of vulnerable communities within a Muslim society. The word zakat means “to clear, to purify” when extra wealth that is believed to be acquired with the help of divine power is shared with less fortunate members of the community. There are charities that provide a zakat calculator. 

In a materialistic world we live in, zakat is an attempt, a mechanism of dealing with enormous social and wealth gaps. Various Muslim organizations distribute food, water, money and clothing to needy in the predominantly Muslims societies and outside of them, in Europe, Americas, Southeast Asia and Australia. And religious Muslims estimate what they owe, this year by Ramadan 2020.

Zakat is mentioned multiple times in Koran and is one of five pillars of Islam with the profession of faith (Shahada), daily prayers (Salat), fasting during Ramadan (Saum) and pilgrimage to Mecca (Hajj).

The zakat is levied on five categories of property—food grains; fruit; camels, sheep and goats; gold and silver; and movable goods—and is payable each year after one year’s possession.

According to Emanuel Shaeublin, a Swiss anthropologist from University of Zurich, zakat is considered in Islamic tradition as a contribution or “a tax serving purpose”.

Shaeublin argues that the practice of zakat is central to the Islamic tradition of applying Islamic scriptures to regulate the social life.

“As such, zakat practice takes on different forms according to changing contexts,” he tells Green Prophet.

“In the nineteenth and early twentieth century zakat practice in Palestine was closely tied to mosques, which constituted spaces of teaching, hosting travelers, healing and collecting and distributing charitable funds.

“In the twentieth century, zakat practices in Palestine began to be institutionalized under the hierarchical administrative structures of various modern governments,” Shaeublin explained to us. 

What can be given as zakat?

What types of wealth are included in Zakat? Assets that are included in the Zakat calculation are cash, shares, pensions, gold and silver, business goods and income from investment property. See how this Saudi man started giving away food with an open fridge concept.

Personal items such as home, furniture, cars, food and clothing (unless used for business purposes) are not included.

In the last decades, the notion of zakat has inspired the rise of a heterogeneous Islamic charity sector connecting Muslim communities worldwide, Shaeublin continued, adding that certain types of zakat practice have taken shape as institutions registered by the administrative apparatuses of modern states.

Other types of zakat practice, however, have continued to operate on an informal, personal level.

Historically speaking, during early Muslim states, zakat was a state affair, while in modern times, it’s left to an individual to decide whether or not they will donate money to the needy.

The Muslim countries where zakat is law

More recently, in 6 out of 47 predominantly Muslim countries zakat is mandatory and they are Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Yemen, Pakistan, Malaysia and Libya, though at least two of them are engulfed with the sectarian and tribal conflicts.

Koran and Hadith (sayings and practices of the Prophet Mohamed) underlined voluntary almsgiving, while in Shiite Islam it is required a payment of an additional one-fifth of the tax to the Hidden Imam and his deputies.

Eid Al-Adha: Getting close to your meat

The nineteenth century Dutch Orientalist scholar Snouck Hurgronje (1857-1936) interprets zakat within the context of the Islamic teaching and the changing political context leading to its institutionalization in the first Islamic polity in Medina. The move to Medina came to be known as the Hijra (migration), and marks the beginning of the Islamic calendar.

Hurgronje’s analysis of zakat rests on the distinction between revelations occurring in Mecca and those occurring in Medina, elaborates Shaeublin, adding that his argument is that “zakat was slowly transformed from a virtuous gift into a justification used by the nascent Islamic polity led by the Prophet to extract public contributions from Muslims”.

Looking at the Quranic verses on zakat revealed in Mecca, Hurgronje, who later converted to Islam, observes “an intimate link between zakat and virtues such as justice and piety”. He draws the parallel between zakat of the Aramaic work zakut, which means merit, justice and was used by both Jews and Christians of the area.

How much do we give in zakat?

Zakat is based on income and the value of all of one’s possessions. It is customarily 2.5% (or 1/40) of a Muslim’s total savings and wealth above a minimum amount known as nisab, but Islamic scholars differ on how much nisab is and other aspects of zakat.

In addition, the late Suliman Bashear( 1947-1991), who was the author of books Studies in Early Islamic Tradition and Arabs and Others in Early Islam argued that during the time of the Prophet Mohamed zakat wasn’t yet an obligation to pious Muslims regulated by religion and that it was instituted after his death.

Zakat, sadaqa and waqf? What is the difference?

The two are different in their own respects. Zakat means growth, purification and blessing in Arabic. Sadaqa or sadaqah means sign of sincerity of faith. While Zakat is obligatory, Sadaqah is voluntary.

Besides zakat, there is also sadaqa (sounds like tzedakah – the Jewish charitable giving) that is additional, voluntarily donation and it’s not specified in terms of assets.

Sadaqah encompasses any act of charitable giving done out of compassion, love, friendship or generosity. 

Sadaqa includes the notion of waqf (endowment of property), and it is a social cement that connects human, physical and financial elements. Waqf endowments were behind mosque building, establishment of hospitals, public buildings, fountains, waystations on the pilgrimage roads and bridges.

We hope more will be made in the name of the environment and improving social conditions between people of all faiths. 

Muslims Should Waqf for Water Because It’s Good for the Environment

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The first people to green the desert? Nabateans who built Petra were like the Mayans of the Middle East. The ancient people were developed in agriculture, spirituality and architecture. Archaeologists dig into how they dealt with drought in Jordan, one of the driest countries on earth. 

Water harvesting, flood control and water storage were essential for the survival of the Nabataeans in the arid area of Petra, which is modern day Jordan. One of the driest countries on the planet, the early settlers there had to invent novel ideas to survive. They brought in engineers from afar, Rome probably, and built aqueducts and a water storage system that might be even able to produce drinkable water by today’s standards. 

The book, The Petra Siq: Nabataean Hydrology Uncovered, published in 2003 by a Swiss architect and archaeologist Ueli Bellwald dealt with the very complex hydrological (water collection) system of the Nabataean capital, instead of the well-known temples and necropolis. Water collection was an every day and activity and we are grateful that researchers look into the past so we can understand how to survive tomorrow. Green Prophet interviews Bellward to learn more. 

The location of Petra was significant and it provided indispensable water supply and flash flood retention systems, explains Bellwald who spent decades studying and writing about the hydraulic network of the Nabataeans.

Without the flash flood system, they wouldn’t last a year

According to Bellwald, who has also lived at Petra itself, the city was built inside a widening of the Wadi Musa, a natural runoff water drainage channel for a surface of 87 square kilometers; he added that without the construction of the highly sophisticated flash flood retention system Petra would not have survived a single winter rainy season.

Due to a geographical and a geological location of Petra there were no springs inside the city area which made thing more difficult for its inhabitants. Because of the geological conditions, all main springs in the area are located on the terraces of actual Wadi Musa, at a height of about 1,300 meters above the sea level, Bellwald explains, noting that the drinking water had to be led down to the city by long aqueducts.

The areas of the tombs and sanctuaries around the city served for collecting and storing water in large cisterns, and that water was used for agricultural purposes, he underlines.

The Nabataeans constructed a complex network of aqueducts and cisterns that is not in use now.

Stay in Petra, in an underground cave with this Bedouin

“If you take the number of drinking water reservoirs fed by the aqueducts and the number of cisterns for the storage of collected runoff water known up to today, you get a total number of more than 200 storage facilities with a capacity of about 40 million liters of water,” Bellwald underlined.

It is obvious that at the beginnings, when the city was established, there was no sufficient local expertise that would meet the requirements of the hydraulic systems to be built.

Just like today they brought in engineers

“I myself discovered a lot of features which did not fulfill their duties and were heavily damaged during their first strain and had to be rebuilt afterwards,” Bellwald noted, adding that very close similarities with other hydraulic installations in Rome and mainly in the Ionian cities, like Pergamon, lead him to the conclusion that the Nabataean authorities employed engineers from abroad and then adopted and further developed the basic expertise.

“For instance the remains of the very first spring water aqueduct which I excavated in the Petra Siq and another section which Graf, Schmid and Bedal [archaeologists specialized in the Nabateans and Petra] excavated in 2004/05 near the Temenos Gate, built in the middle of the 1st century BC, follows closely the model of Aqua Marcia in Rome, whereas the Khubtha North Aqueduct, the actually visible Siq Aqueduct and the Ain Braq Aqueduct follow models from Pergamon, mainly the Kaikos Aqueduct,” Bellwald elaborated.

However, we still don’t know names and biographies of the Nabataean engineers who realized these projects in the ancient times and their life remains a mystery to us.

What is more important for us today is how to utilize their expertise in a region that is overburdened with high natality and lack of water resources. In that regard Bellwald maintains that the Nabataean runoff water collection systems could still nowadays serve as a model for water collection and storage in arid regions.

“There is no agriculture without water, either from natural precipitation like barley fields in Thugra, or from irrigation,” stressed Bellwald, adding that irrigation may tremendously change the appearance of a landscape and may have great, positive impact on the climate.

A center for wine and olive oil

Moreover, in ancient times Petra was a center for wine and olive oil production and wine and olive presses scattered in Petra and its hinterland are the evidence of ancient agriculture.

What the scholar explored were runoff water retention dams with an extended catchment basin and maintenance stairs leading from the wadi (valley) bottom to the top of the dam.

“Experimental archaeological trials I made in the Thugra area showed that with the Nabataean runoff water collection systems you may even get drinkable water,” Bellwald concluded.

The post Learning the art of ancient irrigation the Nabatean way appeared first on Green Prophet.

They built fortresses and forts like Petra and collected rare rainfall. Who were the Nabateans?

Nabateans were Arabian nomads from the Negev Desert who amassed their wealth first as traders on the Incense Routes which wound from Qataban (modern-day Yemen) through neighboring Saba (a powerful trade hub) and on toward Gaza on the Mediterranean Sea.

The Nabataean Kingdom stretched from the north-western part of  the Arabian Peninsula on the east to the Sinai Peninsula on the west and as far north as Damascus, which was incorporated into their kingdom between 85 and 71 BCE.

The three wise men?

The main source of economic prosperity was the incense trade and the Nabataeans not only controlled trade routes in the region but had their merchant posts as far as Rome.

The economic prosperity was followed by the formation of the pantheon of Nabataean gods, similar to other Semitic people in the area or Greco-Roman deities. However, gods of the Greco-Roman tradition were  anthropomorphic and we all learned about their mishaps and human-like behavior and follies. 

Unlike Greco-Roman perception of Titans and Olympians, the ancient Nabataeans represented their deities in the form of stealea, which were blocks or rocks set upon the end or visual representations curved into a stone. The Nabataeans represented their deities in the form of a tomb fasade, a painted pottery, coins, lamps and jewelry. You can see these majestic carvings up close and personal in Jordan, near the Red Sea. 

A desert Zeus?

Some gods, like Dushara, became more significant with the political and economic development of the state, said Professor Robert Wenning, who received his PhD in Classical Archaeology from University of Munster. Dr. Wenning for many years studied the Nabataean sites and religious practices.

He tells Green Prophet: “Being a regional god of the rocky area of Petra and the close by Shara Mountains, Dushara became the city god in the middle of the 3rd century BC when Petra was established as a station on the old incense road from south Arabia to the Mediterranean Sea,” Wenning noted.

Dushara means the “Lord of Mountain” and he was considered a supreme god not only in Petra but other parts of the realm.

Other major gods were: Al Qaum, Al Kutbay, Al Uzza, Manawat, Allat and Obodat.

Al Qaum was a god of war, equivalent to Greek Ares, and he protected caravans and clans.

Al Kutbay was “more intellectual” and he was the patron of learning, trade and writing, and he was the local equivalent of the Greek god Hermes.

Al Uzza was a goddess associated with power and later during the process of Hellenization of the southern Levant she was the Nabataean equivalent of Aphrodite.

Manawat was a goddess of destiny, and consequently during Hellenization she was associated with Nemesis.

Allat was a goddess of fertility comparable to Athena. 

Obodat, who is most probably the deified King Obodas I (96 BC-85 BC), was a god associated with the dynastic cult.

Representation of deities in an abstract form was also practiced among Semitic nomads who dwelled in deserts of the Arabian Peninsula before they converted to Islam in 7th century AD.

Religious syncretism

According to Wenning, in ancient times a specific deity would become the supreme god, like Assur of the Assyrians, Marduk of the Babylonians and Milcom of the Ammonites.

Usually in the ancient religions there is a hierarchic structure in the relations between the deities, Wenning told us. However, “the Nabataean religion preserves only few elements of such structures and does not create a real pantheon,” the scholar highlighted.

After the Roman Emperor Trajan’s incorporation of the Nabataean Kingdom into Provincia Arabia in 106 AD, Dushara remains an important god. His anthropomorphic images became minted in various coins of that period.

The Nabataean belief system was characterized by one supreme god or goddess who meets all requirements of their worshippers, Wenning underlined, adding that a few other deities can be associated to Dushara like Al Uzza, his mother.

“Other deities cover some special aspects or the needs of particular groups. The Nabataean society was complex and Nabataean religion always reflects different local situations,” the scholar explained.

For centuries after the conquests of the Alexander the Great the Greek language was the lingua franca of the Middle East and it remained after the Roman occupation of the area. Even Jupiter was referred as Zeus in the Roman East, and another supreme Nabataean god Odoba (Avdat) was worshipped as Zeus Oboda, Wenning highlighted.

On the other hand, many scholars agree that Qasr Al Bint, a temple at Petra, was a sanctuary of Dushara.

“The Egyptian goddess Isis was the most famous female deity in Petra, even more prominent than Al Uzza following the evidence,” Wenning noted, emphasizing the religious syncretism typical for the paganism. One of such syncretists was the Roman Emperor Elagabulus ( 218 AD -222 AD) from the Severan dynasty, whose brief reign was marked by promulgation of the Middle Eastern religion as he took a baetyl of Dushara with him to Rome. However, his reign didn’t end up nicely when he was assassinated by Praetorian guards.

Inter-religious harmony

The ancient Nabataeans were religiously tolerant and their society integrated other gods and their cults into their own belief system. The Egyptian goddess Isis was very much venerated in the Nabataean Kingdom and scholars speculate that cultic material found at the Temple of the Winged Lions in Petra point to that direction. See below.

The temple was probably dedicated to Al Uzza and under the Greeco-Roman influence the Nabataeans began to depict their deities in human forms. A ring-seal displaying a nude goddess riding a dolphin, feline statuettes, a feline head made of bronze and”Eye-Idol” blocks highlight religious syncretism that characterized the polytheistic coexistence.

What happened to Nabatean tolerance? 

Unfortunately, modern societies in the Middle East are often religiously intolerant and not only that three monotheistic religions often have antagonistic attitudes towards each other, but within each of them different schools or denominations believe that they are the only chosen one, while the rest are condemned for the whole of eternity.

Professor at Queen’s University Barbara Reeves underlined in her research the harmonious interreligious ties between Roman military stationed at Humayma (some 280 km south of Amman) and the local Nabataean population.

The garrison had around 500 soldiers and controlled the water springs and major roads. The “new harmony” is depicted most clearly in a community shrine where a betyl (standing stone) representing the Nabataean town god stood side-by-side with an altar honouring the Roman garrison’s god, Reeves pointed out.

Furthermore, a rock carving from a cult site in the hills also shows a Roman standard-bearer making an offering in front of both his garrison’s god and a larger-than-life-size gazelle that represents the local god Reeves stressed.

“Their side-by-side placement at the focal point of the community shrine advertises harmony between the town’s Nabataean civilians and Roman soldiers,” Reeves underscored.

The post The Mysterious Nabatean Gods of the Ancient Middle East appeared first on Green Prophet.

The harsh desert climate created all kinds of models for the survival of humans and their livestock – just look to the Nabateans and how they dealt with very low rainfall in the Levant. In the summer when a temperature reaches 122 degrees (50 degree C) finding water resources and preserving food is of particular importance for Bedouins. Searching for grazing and water, Bedouins – nomadic people – move from one place to another with their sheep and goats far from major towns and roads. Dealing with scorching heat, desert nomads applied inherited skills and innovated the new ones.

Making whole animal cheese

Milk and dairy products are essential part of the Bedouin diet, and to prepare cheese Bedouins put milk into messah, a part of the stomach of a young lamb that has to be dried with salt. The cheese is called laban or labne and it’s still eaten widely today in the area. Messah is like rennet for the Bedouin.

“After it gets completely dried up a small part of it is taken and wrapped in clean sheep wool or a piece of textile. It is then put into a bowl of milk using the fingers for a few minutes, and then the milk will begin to coagulated,” said Professor Fawzi Abudanah to Green Prophet.

Abudanah is a professor of Archaeology at Al Hussein Bin Talal University in Maan (in southern Jordan) and as a child he experienced firsthand some of the Bedouin lifestyle. His family still kept and fed animals in the traditional way.

Keeping meat with cheese

The large textile bag in which jameed (hardened laban or labneh cheese) was kept is used for preservation of meat when cooked pieces are placed inside the bag. Due to a high concentration of salt in jameed (a hard dried laban made of ewe’s or goat’s milk) the meat can be protected from rotting for a few days.

Traditional water cooler using an animal hyde

For water cooling, Bedouins use either goat or sheep skin called qirbah, which is first cleaned and then tanned.

“Leather tanning is common among the Bedouins in southern Jordan,” the professor continued, adding that they get the necessary material for this process from the oak trees at Al Hisheh forest, northeast of Petra.

Hygiene is a serious problem for anyone who spent even two days camping, not to mention people who are outdoors for years. Running water, boilers, different kinds of soaps, refrigerators and freezers, skin creams and perfumes of well – known brands don’t exist in the wilderness.

Natural SunIn and hair rinse for weary nomads and travellers

To wash hair, Bedouins make use of a shrub called adhuo or the shnan in Arabic – latin name Anabasis Syriaca as an ash-based soap and the hair goes blond if the washing continues.

However, the shrub should be prepared first: “Shnan should be burned and its ash is then collected and soaked in a pail of water. The liquid is then used for hair washing,” Abudanah underlined, noting that to purify drinking water nomads use flour or alum.

When Bedouins collect water from depressions, ponds and springs a small amount of flour or alum are added to the water in a large basin, after a while the sand and impurities will sink on the bottom.

Bedouin folk medicine by Miriam Aborkeek

Barnooq is another shrub used as a color fixative when wool of sheep has to be dyed for the production of a rug by weaving.

Scorpion immunity for babies! Ancient vaccines in action

In order to boost the immunity of a new born babies, the father collects scorpions, burns and crushes them, and then mixes their charred remains with olive oil. After that the mixture of the olive oil and crushed scorpions are applied on the baby’s body, as Bedouins traditionally believe that it would protect a child against scorpion venom.

The practice is known in other cultures and among indigenous communities where tribesmen give small dose of poison to children in order to improve their immunity and the poison may develop antibodies against stings.

Closing herd wounds with stinging ants

When their animals, sheep, camels and goats have to be operated, a Bedouin treats possible cuts and wounds with desert ants (fire ants?) that are placed on the wound where the stitches would go. Ants stick to the skin and the herder removes their heads, while their body remains closing the wound until they dissolve naturally.

Slow cooking in the ground

Regarding specialty food dishes, they are prepared in so-called Zarb, and that underground cooking isn’t typical for Bedouins from the Wadi Rumm, for instance, but it has been practiced in places as far as New Zealand and the Balkans. It is an old method when food is put on coal and covered for two-three hours. Usually, chicken, goat or sheep meat are cut into equal pieces, marinated, and prepared with vegetables.

For Professor Abudanah, these hacks are part of his heritage and culture, however, some of these old school tricks are not anymore in use due to modernization, tools and new materials.

Read more on the pursuits and woes of Levantine region Bedouin:
Egyptian Bedouin Maimed by Landmines
A Peek Inside the Bedouin Tent
Israel’s Bedouin Go for Solar Energy Power
Barefoot College for Solar Energy in Jordan
See How the Ladies of Lakia Weave Together Tales and Tradition

The post Bedouin folk medicine appeared first on Green Prophet.