once in a while, the name on the map is handiest part of the story. in the case of Jordan, it is barely a fraction. genuine, this exciting usa has simplest been painted directly to the global atlas because 1921, rising as the Emirate of Transjordan in the wake of the first international struggle before reaching complete independence from British “supervision” in 1946. however to view it as a 20th-century advent is to disregard the four millennia of civilisation that got here before.
every empire that has risen inside the center East has, sooner or later, coveted and conquered the land east of the River Jordan and the useless Sea which makes up the contemporary Jordanian kingdom. Egypt, Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome, Ottoman Turkey – they all left their imprint.
The end result, inside the twenty first century, is a rustic as rich in background as every other, no longer least because, for all of the waves of invasion, the locals had been gloriously efficient. in the south, the Nabateans reduce the city of Petra from the rocky Wadi Araba valley, likely inside the fourth century BC. and they were latecomers in comparison to the northerly Ammonites, whose key city, Rabbath Ammon, was in lifestyles in 1200 BC, early sufficient to seem inside the Bible. it's far nevertheless there these days, as the an increasing number of vibrant Jordanian capital of Amman.
What to see and how
Petra (00962 three 215 7093; visitpetra.jo; one-day tickets from 50 Jordanian dinar/£45) is Jordan’s A-listing enchantment, a “lost” citadel whose prime landmark – the carved, colonnaded wonder Al Khazneh (“The Treasury”) – has illuminated countless documentaries and movies. Familiarity does no longer decrease its majesty while you see it for your self. Nor does the sheer weight of individuals who swirl around this fantastically large ancient web site.
The Nabateans’ finest achievement lies a hundred and fifty miles south of Amman, inside day-journey range, even though Aqaba, eighty miles farther south, is likewise a solid base for a go to. A pretty port with a Mediterranean vibe, it takes up much of Jordan’s 16 meagre miles of shoreline. It additionally offers in five-famous person enclaves including the Mövenpick resort & Spa Tala Bay (three 209 0300; moevenpick-inns.com), which proffers a a hundred and fifty-metre non-public beach, rubdown remedies, scuba diving and double rooms from JD103 (£ninety three), with breakfast.
Aqaba has a place in British folklore thanks to the guerrilla heroics of Thomas Lawrence – Lawrence of Arabia – who, in July 1917, helped wrest the port from Ottoman manage because the “Arab insurrection” brought the primary global warfare to the sick empire’s lower back door. Famously, Lawrence befuddled his enemies by means of sweeping into the town from the north, via Wadi Rum. This arid landscape, without problems explored en course to Petra, is a chorus line of dramatic sandstone formations, where Jordan’s tallest peak, Jabal Umm advert Dami, rears to 6,083ft (1,854m).
Amman is laid out throughout a series of hills. Slices of the beyond – Greco-Roman temples and an 8th-century Umayyad fort – look forward to on top of Jabal Al Qal’a, the historic middle of the metropolis. Jabal Amman, the opposite “top”, is alternatively extra 21st-century, with eating places and cafés strung alongside Al-Rainbow road. Downtown Al-Balad is a haze of souks and stores, even as Ras Al-Ayn has the new Jordan Museum (6 462 9317; jordanmuseum.jo; JD5/ £4.50), wherein well-knownshows include the Ayn Ghazal statues – doll-like human figures which could date back to 7700 BC. Le Royal (6 460 3000; leroyalamman.com), the metropolis’s kingpin lodge, gives doubles for JD149 (£134), room handiest.
Amman is likewise the gateway to Gerasa (JD8/£7.20), 30 miles north in Jerash. This pocket of Greco-Roman antiquity greets traffic with the second-century Hadrian’s Arch and thrills in addition with its enormous Oval Plaza and Temple of Artemis.