Treasures of the World with Bettany Hughes - Season 2, Episode 1 Arabia
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00:00I'm traveling the world, exploring secrets and wonders, an adventure by land and sea
00:14to the most fascinating places, where I've been given special access to significant
00:23and surprising treasures, buried in ancient sites, extraordinary buildings and glorious
00:35works of art that help to explain the story of us. Journey with me to discover how the
00:44past shapes our lives. I'm making my way through one of the most epic landscapes on earth,
00:52the Arabian Desert. Although when you say the word desert, you imagine a kind of desolate
00:59emptiness, this northern edge of the Arabian Peninsula has been a vital crossroads for
01:05east and west for millennia. It's only recently that a lot of the hidden treasures around
01:12me, natural and cultural, are being explored and understood. I'm here to uncover the history
01:20of ancient Arabia, from 6,000 BCE to the 3rd century CE, in northwest Saudi Arabia
01:28and Jordan. Enjoying privileged access to one of the most spectacular wonders of the
01:34world, Petra. It's a rare opportunity to make new discoveries and to uncover some of the
01:44missing links in history's big story. Welcome to the Treasures of Arabia.
01:51The
02:13northwestern Arabian Peninsula. From prehistory to antiquity, a hub of great civilisations,
02:25only now being systematically investigated and interpreted. Stretching across different
02:31territories at different times, ancient Arabia spanned a vast area, including what's now
02:38modern-day Saudi Arabia and southern Jordan. My first treasure is the staggering art of
02:46this extraordinary place, the Hizma Plateau. This remote region in the northwest of Saudi
02:55Arabia is rarely visited. Recently, it's opened up to researchers. But through the millennia,
03:04both travellers and locals have made their mark here, leaving remarkable clues in the
03:10form of a rather unique message board. These are messages that chart thousands of years
03:18of the human experience. So, right at the end there, you've got an early Islamic prayer,
03:23right from the very beginning of Islam, so that's around 1,400 years old. This big, loopy,
03:30confident writing was set down by the Nabataean civilisations, and the Nabataeans were in charge
03:35at around the time of the Romans. That odd, you see this sort of strange script here that goes
03:42up and down, that's something called Tamadik, which is from the 5th century BCE, so it's 2,500
03:49years old. And then all down here, you've got prehistoric rock art. So there are two men who
03:56are dancing, or they might be fighting, and there's somebody who looks like he's going on
04:00a hunt with a bow and arrow. There are ibex that are being hunted, and man's best friends,
04:05dogs are all around. So this is a map of time, but it's also a treasure map that leads us to
04:13the wealth on rock faces like this, and in the valleys of this incredible plateau. The rock art
04:22here takes us right back to the beginnings of ancient Arabia, before time as we know it.
04:30It's a kind of ancient pinboard, a way of communicating messages to passers-by.
04:39And there are thousands of engravings. Animals, idols, hunting scenes, travellers' tales,
04:49all painting a picture of life from the Stone Age right up to the Middle Ages.
04:55This art is always telling us something, whether it's a fact, or a hope, or a fear,
05:01or a belief, the people who made it. Now, this example is between 6,000 and 8,000 years old,
05:10so we don't know exactly what those two figures are. We don't know whether they're humans,
05:15or spirits, or the beginnings of the idea of some sort of gods, but it's definitely
05:20about people's relationship with the natural world.
05:26The carvings were left by nomads and settlers, so how did people make a life for themselves
05:33in such a barren terrain? The Stone Age images of cattle like this are a vital clue that the
05:41landscape around here was once completely different. Now, cows need a lot of greenery
05:47to survive, and images like this, combined with really recent analysis of fossils and
05:53mineral deposits, tell us that Arabia used to be much, much greener. There would have been
05:59thousands of rivers here, and over 10,000 lakes, so the whole landscape would have been much
06:06greener, more verdant, more like a kind of paradise. It was only around 5,000 or so years
06:13ago that the conditions became much drier, and the landscape turns into the desert that it is today.
06:21All explaining why this became a perfect place for some early inhabitants of the
06:27Arabian Peninsula to settle down and become farmers. And there are other tantalising clues
06:34to the lives of these Stone Age settlers. When I've been walking through this landscape,
06:40I keep on seeing these really quite strange, massive stone circles on the mountainside,
06:45which I think must be something to do with ritual. But I've managed to find an expert,
06:50Abdulaziz. He's going to decode them for me. Salaam. Hello, Abdullaziz. Hello. How lovely to
06:56meet you. Nice to meet you. Thank you so much. What an extraordinary place this is.
07:01It's one of the biggest stone structures in Neom. You can see this one contains two,
07:08one above the hill and one below. Yes. One out of the circle, one inside the circle. I'm not sure
07:14if there is a meaning, but it's very interesting. Yeah. Well, I mean, you're certainly, it's such a
07:18prominent position, this, isn't it? So you're clearly publicising, you know, status with
07:24something this size. For real. So what are we standing in? What is this? This is actually one
07:29of the biggest burial here in Hisma Plateau. So a burial for one person or for a family?
07:36It's burial for more than one person, actually. It's round burial. And each stone, heavy, like
07:43around from five to 10 kilogram. And in one metre, you might find from 50 to 70. So we can imagine
07:48how many tonnes it needs to do this structure and how many times as well. So do you think,
07:54because the circles seem to be different sizes, so is it somebody of massive status who's got a
07:59massive circle? We believe that the bigger the circles, the bigger the position of the
08:05family or the person who was in this burial. But again, a lot of mystery is there, and we need to
08:11do a lot of excavation to understand more. This is a really big circle, but it looks like, to me,
08:17like there are others in the landscape? Actually, yes. In each hill and road, I mean, you can find
08:22those big structures. And actually, we were amazed. When we were young, I mean, we came here
08:29like doing picnics and stuff, but we did not understand what's this. Now it's time to understand
08:34what's the value of those structures. As this land became more like a desert,
08:44farming slowly gave way to trade. And ancient trading roads here, with the establishment of
08:51Islam, became pilgrimage routes for many making the Hajj to Mecca. The faithful etching messages
08:58and prayers on the rocks as they passed. This is a really interesting example. So you've got
09:04somebody who's come here and has inscribed his name, but he's done it on top of older rock art
09:09left by locals. They're very proud of the fact that they have 10 camels here. One, two, three,
09:15four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten up at the top with two little dogs. And this guy who would
09:21have been on the Hajj, on his way to Mecca, we know his name. He was called Musa, son of Salam.
09:28And he's obviously so delighted to be here. He's written his name again and again and again.
09:37Now, the people who witnessed all this across the centuries are the Bedouin. And I've had an
09:44invitation to meet the modern-day descendants of those eyewitnesses of history.
09:56The Bedouin tribes of northwest Saudi Arabia maintain customs dating back thousands of years.
10:05So there's this really ancient tradition of hospitality here with the Bedouin.
10:09And they heard I was in the region. And Abdulaziz has told me that they've invited me for
10:15coffee and tea, I think.
10:21Bedouin literally means desert dweller. Evidence for desert nomads in the region starts 8,000
10:29years ago. And Bedouins have both fought interlopers and offered traders and pilgrims
10:35hospitality right back to the time when travellers were creating some of that early rock art.
10:42So this is dates and with the olive.
10:46Is it like a goat cheese or something?
10:48Goat cheese, yes. With goat cheese. So this is the way they provide it in hospitality.
10:52Thank you. Thank you.
10:58Those are delicious. Those are really fresh. Fantastic.
11:04Grounded.
11:05Abdulaziz al-Sanousi is my guide and translator.
11:11Why is it such a tradition? Is it because this is a place in the world where lots of different people
11:16have been travelling for many centuries? Is that why hospitality is so important to the Bedouin?
11:35I would love to. Shukran.
11:45Songs and poetry are exchanged at family gatherings like this.
11:50Like the rock art, they've long been a way for the Bedouin to communicate stories and information.
11:57Dances too pass on tales of the Bedouin's history.
12:01The women's quarter is called the hareem.
12:13So you're giving me the recipe, aren't you? Because I understand the word mouya is water.
12:17So water and flour, and you mix it together.
12:22This is very traditional for women to be making breads, but also the Bedouin women are often
12:29trepidesses, so you'll often see them outside on the mountains, taking the goats and the sheep
12:35outside for the whole day. Oh, look at these, they're so beautiful. Hello. Hello. Hello, little one.
12:47It's a treat to meet Bedouin women in their own home.
12:52Thank you for...
12:54Thank you. It's such a beautiful tent, this.
13:15Six months. It's beautiful.
13:17And I have to say, I love your eyeliner.
13:24It's beautiful, though, because it's very... Is it the Malakai?
13:31Perfect. If I come back, will you show me how to do it?
13:37Bedouins say they give their last grain of rice and morsel of meat in hospitality.
13:44Lambs on the menu in my honour. I'm vegetarian, so I hope I don't cause offence.
13:53Thank you. Thank you.
13:59It's so sweet. So they've got that I'm vegetarian, so they've brought me a special
14:02basket of bread that hasn't been touched by the meat, and more dates and goat's butter to put on.
14:08That is so fantastic. Thank you, shukran. I suspect I might be the first veggie ever to eat in this particular tent.
14:15Looks delicious. Thank you.
14:19So, this is serious lunchtime, and I've noticed that the guys who've helped drive the sheep
14:26So, this is serious lunchtime, and I've noticed that the guys who've helped drive
14:32us on our kit here were outside, so the hospitality's been extended to the entire crew over there as well.
14:41The lambs served with broth and rice.
14:46There's this really beautiful fact about ideas that if they are kept to yourself,
14:52they're sterile and die, but if you share them, they have wings, and people think that right at
14:59the very, very beginning of human society, when you had enough people sitting around sharing a meal,
15:05sharing thoughts, that's when the modern mind developed, so that's basically when we became us.
15:11So, in some ways, this kind of thing of welcoming strangers across your threshold
15:17is how we should all understand the real beginning of the human story.
15:26And it's some of these fundamental drivers of humanity
15:30that could be traced on the fabulous rock art around here.
15:35This is ancient rock art, obviously of a lion, and it's a Barbary lion, which is now extinct.
15:40Underneath it are ostriches, also extinct, so it's sad because it tells us of the animals that were
15:45once here, but just look at this. Here is a lovely 4x4 put on by the Bedouin of today,
15:52so it's a tradition that carries on on the Hizma Plateau.
15:58These are a window into the secrets of the early inhabitants of, and visitors to, Arabia.
16:06I just love the rock art of the Hizma Plateau because it's the incarnation of our desire to
16:14share experiences and information, both with the people around us and for the future,
16:20so that we can learn from others' ideas. It really is the start of culture as we know it.
16:34But clues to the rich history of this region aren't just on land, they're under the water.
16:41One of the most spectacular natural wonders of the Arabian Peninsula has to be the Red Sea.
16:49It's an artery that connects the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean and the Pacific, so it's a body
16:55of water that holds history right around its coast and even under those waves.
17:05The Red Sea was a vital trading route for Arabian merchants, ancient Egyptians,
17:10Greeks and Romans, whose ships went as far as India and East Africa.
17:17So you had Greeks and Romans and Nabataeans and Persians and early Arabs, and then the
17:23whole Islamic world would congregate in this place to kind of trade and exchange goods and
17:28ideas. So it's not just somewhere that is a hub of culture, it's a cauldron of civilisation.
17:35New excavations on the northern coast of Saudi Arabia
17:38are revealing relics of this golden age of trade.
17:43I'm walking across a dried-out riverbed here and the excavations have only just begun,
17:48but already what they're revealing is quite remarkable, because what you've got up here
17:54is one of the busiest and most important trading hubs in the ancient and medieval world.
18:04Some archaeologists are certain this was a hub of an ancient Arabian culture,
18:09the Nabataeans, the once thriving port town of Lukekome.
18:15Ports on the Red Sea here are marked on some medieval world maps as being the most important
18:20places on Earth. Ancient sources write about this place and the descriptions match perfectly,
18:28so what you've got up there on the top of that hill are mansions that belong to the
18:33wealthy merchants and watchtowers, and then down here you've got workshops and shops and warehouses.
18:42Storing all kinds of things, we know that cotton and teak was traded across the Red Sea,
18:48from India, silk from China, and from here camel caravans carried goods on a nine-day journey
18:56to the great city of Petra and beyond.
18:59They're finding lots of pottery here, as you'd expect,
19:02but also bronze and glass ornaments and even remnants of incense.
19:10This port is pretty much the last safe harbour
19:14before sailing conditions on the Red Sea become unpredictable and treacherous.
19:22This is a bit of the Red Sea where the sea gets quite difficult to navigate,
19:28so people who would have come here would have pulled into these natural harbours
19:32and then carried on trading by land, you know, so if the boats made it up this far,
19:38they were pretty good captains and pretty good sailors.
19:42But what about those ships that never arrived with their precious cargo?
19:48To explore the lost treasures of the Red Sea, I'm joining marine conservation scientist
19:53Amir Oueda and underwater cameraman Sean Ruggieri.
20:01I'm right up on the north side of the Red Sea and it's this bit of the coastline.
20:08It's been very, very rare to get access to it, even though it's got so rich in history,
20:13so it's a kind of first time for me, but it's a first time for a lot of people
20:17to get the chance to be here. Amazing. It's amazing.
20:21OK, so why the Red Sea?
20:25Well, possibly thanks to seasonal blooms of orange-red algae,
20:30or an ancient mapping system, or because of those amazing red sands and mountains inland.
20:37It's certainly a place packed with stories.
20:40I've heard about these mysterious dugongs,
20:42but we think that's probably where the mermaid myth derived from,
20:46because they're kind of human-sized.
20:47Because they're kind of human-sized.
20:48That's right, and the ones that you see are very unique,
20:50and of course they're highly vulnerable to extinction.
20:54Someone's described this place to me as being one of the seven wonders of the underwater world.
21:00Yes.
21:01You know, can it claim that title?
21:03Yeah, absolutely. The Red Sea and the coral reefs are some of the most biodiverse in the world,
21:08and because the Red Sea closed at one point, the species in the Red Sea became trapped,
21:13and then they started differentiating and becoming different species only found in the Red Sea.
21:21The corals in the Red Sea might be some of the most resilient corals in the world,
21:26so this part could be one of the few places that actually survived the climate change crisis.
21:31And if that happens, it'll be very important for these species to keep survived,
21:36because then they can propagate outside the Red Sea when the time comes.
21:40That is remarkable, because I know that some of the coral here itself is 7,000 years old.
21:46So the coral has witnessed history.
21:49It's seen this passage of humans.
21:51So how amazing if the coral here can both be a witness to the past
21:56and potentially a witness to the future.
22:01Amir's taking me to waters by a 16th century fort,
22:05built in the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent
22:07when the Turkish Ottoman Empire ruled here.
22:11They might yield some interesting underwater treasures.
22:16Amir, why have we chosen this spot particularly?
22:19The area that we're really interested in is the area in front of the castle.
22:22That's like the lagoon, and that's where most of the boats would have moored
22:25and either dropped things or, you know, broken pottery or they chopped over.
22:31And so the majority of the artifacts we think are in this area.
22:35Great. So will you come up if you find something?
22:37I'll just be above you.
22:38Absolutely. I'll scream at the top of my voice.
22:41I'll be down.
22:47This is a real opportunity,
22:49because people haven't been allowed to dive and film here before.
22:53It's only recently that this part of the Red Sea is opening up for archaeological excavation.
22:59So the guys have been down here for about, oh, about an hour,
23:04and they've just found a selection of stuff.
23:08So it's definitely historic. There's definitely pottery.
23:11It looks like there's something maybe like a little pipe or something.
23:15Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh.
23:18So have a look at this.
23:19It's a piece of broken pottery.
23:23It's a piece of broken pottery.
23:24Oh, my gosh.
23:25So have a look at this.
23:26It's a piece of broken pottery, obviously.
23:30It's a good size, isn't it?
23:32Yeah.
23:32Hello.
23:35Excuse me. Look at this.
23:37That is a serious bit of amphorine.
23:40That's definitely, that won't be for liquid.
23:43This will be for like flour, maybe.
23:45Yeah, exactly.
23:46Chips or something.
23:48Have a look at this.
23:49This is a pattern, I think.
23:51You see the pattern here?
23:52Yeah.
23:53That's quite important to tell what era it's from.
23:56Yeah.
23:57We found this also.
23:59Remarkably, like maybe a pipe or maybe an oil lantern, right?
24:03Oh, that is very cool.
24:05This whole place is just full of this stuff.
24:07You leave things where you find them.
24:08Absolutely.
24:12Hi.
24:16He actually's got a stingray.
24:18My God, it's huge.
24:20You're going to let it go?
24:22OK, good luck.
24:27Diving here is a journey through time.
24:30And these pottery fragments are a tiny fraction
24:33of what's been lost on the Red Sea's bed.
24:36Amir and his team are painstakingly piecing together
24:39the stories behind their finds.
24:43Have a look at this.
24:45As you can see, just littered with amphoros.
24:48I mean, just absolutely covered.
24:52Look at that.
24:52Oh, that's a huge one.
24:54A huge one.
24:54And from the patterns, we think that they are from the Roman era.
24:59And we think that there's a shipwreck in that area.
25:03You can just see the outline of what looks like a shipwreck.
25:05Yes.
25:06I mean, that's going to be 2,000 years old.
25:09Whatever it is, there's a massive story to tell there.
25:12Absolutely.
25:12The Red Sea is a treasure because it's inspired so many myths and legends.
25:17It's rich with natural beauty.
25:20And it's somewhere where you can tell the story of the world
25:23from the bottom of the sea.
25:28Next, I explore one of the most mysterious civilizations
25:32of the ancient world.
25:43A long-lost culture, the Nabataeans thrived in ancient Arabia,
25:49an area that spanned what's now Saudi Arabia and southern Jordan.
25:55The Nabataeans were an enigmatic people
25:58who started off life as goats and sheep herders
26:01and ended up controlling a vast kingdom.
26:05At their height, between the 4th century BCE and the 2nd century CE,
26:10they ruled northern Arabia and the southern Levant
26:13with their capital, Petra, in what's now Jordan.
26:17This is a treasure that isn't on the hills.
26:19It's within them.
26:21It's a city of the dead.
26:25Monumental in size, these two giants were the first to set foot
26:30on the land of the Nabataeans.
26:32Monumental in size, these tombs showcase the Nabataean people's
26:37extraordinary ability to transform rocky landscapes
26:41into architectural marvels.
26:45Just in this one valley alone, you've got 16 tombs,
26:49so the whole of Nabataean society is here.
26:52The humble ones are over there.
26:53This is where the kind of middle-class, middle-ranking people
26:56would be buried.
26:57Then, as you might expect, the posh ones are right at the top.
27:02The tombs were considered the dead's eternal home.
27:06Often at the entrance and edges of Nabataean settlements,
27:10they signified that the dead maintained their presence
27:13amongst the living.
27:16OK, so the first thing to say is that, obviously,
27:20this is not a burial place for a single person.
27:22It's more like a kind of family vault,
27:25and we often find so many bones in places like this
27:28that we think that one generation after another
27:32were probably piled up on top of each other.
27:37There's been one recent discovery, very close to here,
27:41of a body wrapped in strips of linen and leather
27:45and decorated just with a garland of dates
27:48around the body's neck.
27:53The Nabataeans are a mysterious culture,
27:56The Nabataeans are a mysterious culture,
27:58partly because they never really wrote about themselves,
28:01so we have to rely on the accounts of others,
28:03of Greeks and Romans, for instance.
28:06So we have to jigsaw puzzle together their story,
28:09and tombs like this are brilliant bits of evidence.
28:18Mourners would regularly visit the deceased to celebrate them
28:22and leave gifts to take to the afterlife.
28:26How people choose to bury their dead tells you a lot about them,
28:30and for the Nabataeans,
28:32all of this was definitely a family affair.
28:35And one of the reasons we know this
28:36is because there are these lovely benches
28:38that they put outside the tombs,
28:39so you could just come and sit here
28:41and kind of commune with your loved ones.
28:45Architectural details carved onto the rock
28:48are a clue to the multicultural world of the Nabataeans.
28:53Now, this is really interesting.
28:54So I am right in the middle of the Arabian desert,
28:58but have a look at these three shapes.
29:00So they're called triglyphs,
29:02and you'd normally find them
29:04hanging underneath the pediment of a Greek temple.
29:07And how about this decoration?
29:10I mean, hello, this is a perfect Greco-Roman column.
29:15Things like this just tell us that the Nabataeans
29:17were really deeply involved in cultures and civilizations
29:21that used to pass through this peninsula.
29:25The Nabataeans worshipped deities
29:29associated with the earth, light, and darkness.
29:34One of the things you might expect to see here
29:36are images of gods and goddesses,
29:39but the thing is the Nabataeans
29:41worshipped their deities in abstract form
29:43with things like faceless square blocks of stone.
29:47And one of their premier gods was Dushara,
29:51the god of the sun,
29:53who looked after daytime,
29:54and was also the god who protected the dead in their tombs.
30:02The Nabataeans didn't just create
30:04sophisticated tombs for the dead.
30:06They built towns that rivaled
30:08contemporary Greek and Roman cities,
30:10minted their own coins,
30:12developed a written script
30:13that would form the basis of Arabic,
30:16and boasted a strong military.
30:18All thanks to their lucrative camel caravan trade
30:22in spice, incense, and other luxuries.
30:27I know if you're in the desert, you expect to see camels,
30:30but there's a very particular reason
30:32why these ones are here.
30:33Not just for hundreds of years, but for millennia.
30:36This has been where camel caravans have brought gems
30:40and luxury spices and goods from what's now Yemen and Oman,
30:44and even as far afield as India,
30:46through Arabia and out to the Mediterranean.
30:50And they're still crossing the deserts today.
30:55The Nabataeans not only traded goods,
30:58but also levied taxes on other merchants
31:00who passed through their lands,
31:02ensuring their coffers were well-stocked.
31:08Some of the most precious cargo of these camel caravans
31:11was frankincense and myrrh,
31:13which would take about 54 days to get from southern Arabia,
31:17in what's now Yemen,
31:18right up to the northern Egyptian coast to Alexandria.
31:21This was used in all kinds of ways.
31:23It was used in religious ritual, it was used in funerals.
31:26Incense has medicinal qualities as well.
31:28You can rub it on wounds,
31:30and it became worth its weight in gold.
31:34And as a result of that,
31:35the men who transported it became fabulously wealthy too.
31:43The camel was the backbone of the Nabataean merchant enterprise.
31:50I'm being pointed out which of the plants
31:53and which smell that you can eat and which smell good.
31:56This is really good.
31:57This one again.
31:59OK.
32:03Oh, it's fantastic.
32:05That is beautiful.
32:08I don't know what...
32:11Yeah, yeah, yeah.
32:12Is it?
32:13OK, maybe later we can eat them.
32:18Oh, it's really lovely.
32:18That smells like tarragon or something.
32:22Fantastic.
32:23We'll have this later.
32:25I'm told these herbs are great for coughs and bad chests.
32:32In Arabic poetry, camels are called the ships of the desert,
32:36but the Bedouin call them gifts of God.
32:38And you can see why,
32:40because they give everything.
32:41They give milk.
32:42They use their skins as water containers.
32:44They make their tents out of their wool.
32:48And, you know, of course,
32:49they can transport huge amounts of equipment across the desert
32:54over great distances.
32:55I've got to say,
32:56they do keep on offering to give me a lift and go up on one.
33:00But, you know,
33:01I sort of feel I don't need to add to the burden
33:03of any of these particular camels.
33:05And it's very calming.
33:07It's really lovely just walking at this place
33:10and travelling with them.
33:12Camels carry some of the most coveted treasures in the world.
33:20There's a brilliant story about Alexander the Great.
33:23So Alexander the Great,
33:24when he was an impetuous young teenager,
33:27was throwing frankincense onto an altar to worship the gods.
33:31And his tutor said,
33:32when you...
33:33Oh, thank you.
33:34Shukran, shukran.
33:36When you own the land that produces incense,
33:38then you can be so liberal.
33:41Alexander remembered this and went on to conquer Gaza,
33:44which had one of the main harbours that imported frankincense.
33:48And he sent back 500 talents,
33:50that's about 14 tonnes of frankincense,
33:53to his old tutor and said,
33:55now, sprinkle this liberally on the altars.
33:58You and I can afford it.
34:04The Nabataean civilisation flourished
34:06also because of its mastery of the desert.
34:11The Nabataeans worked out sophisticated ways
34:14of storing water supplies in secret underground cisterns.
34:18They even invented a kind of waterproof cement,
34:22which meant that in a harsh environment like this,
34:25they could have control over life and death.
34:32And just as their expertise with camel caravans
34:35catalyzed the incense trade,
34:37the Nabataeans were able to monetize their knowledge of water.
34:42The Nabataeans didn't just develop engineering to store water,
34:46they sold it.
34:48So this is the Makna Oasis,
34:50and it stretches down to the Red Sea.
34:52I'm standing in Asia and Africa and Egypt
34:55are just 15 miles or so across the water.
34:57And we know that for centuries,
35:00sailors would dock here to refresh their water supplies.
35:03And the Nabataeans charged them for it.
35:06And what is really cool is just over there,
35:09they've discovered a Nabataean fort
35:11that was set up to protect all that customs
35:14and all that water wealth.
35:20It's this ingenuity and ability to adapt
35:23that helped the Nabataeans become a real player
35:26of ancient civilisation.
35:30The Nabataean people are a treasure
35:33and a wonder for me
35:35because they start out in life as itinerant goat herders,
35:39and they seize the opportunity of the incense trade
35:42to become the wheeler-dealer entrepreneurs of this region.
35:46And isn't it brilliant that something as sort of useless,
35:49but also beautiful as incense,
35:52something that makes the experience of our lives
35:54richer and better and lovelier,
35:56also generated an entire civilisation
36:00that still has its descendants here today.
36:03♪
36:06Next, the Nabataeans' crowning achievement,
36:10a spectacular city carved into the landscape itself.
36:20The Nabataeans became so successful,
36:23they built my next treasure.
36:25It's one of the most spectacular
36:27and enigmatic wonders of antiquity,
36:30the beautiful rock-cut city of Petra.
36:39From the 4th century BCE,
36:41Petra was a trading centre
36:42for the ancient Nabataean civilisation,
36:45flourishing until the 3rd century CE.
36:48Archaeologists have been unearthing wonders here
36:51for over 100 years,
36:53and the site still yields treasure.
36:56Petra was built in the north of ancient Arabia,
36:59what's now Jordan.
37:03It's always exciting visiting the sites of antiquity,
37:07but this is just beyond, isn't it?
37:10This is a natural geological fault known as the Siq,
37:14and this was the ancient entrance to the hidden city.
37:18♪
37:22This canyon, the Nabataean,
37:24this canyon would once have been teeming with camel caravans
37:28and merchants bringing cloth from Syria,
37:31spice from India,
37:32frankincense and myrrh from southern Arabia.
37:37This was a practical entrance point to the city,
37:40and it was very ceremonial,
37:42but it also had a kind of spiritual aspect.
37:45So all along here, you'll see these niches
37:49that held images of the Nabataean gods.
37:52So this was actually a sacred way.
37:55♪
37:59Whether in its heyday or for the modern visitor,
38:02the reveal at the end of this winding pass
38:06has never failed to impress.
38:10This is the most famous building in the whole of Petra,
38:13and it is impossible not to marvel at it,
38:17the treasury.
38:18♪
38:21Engineering skills that defy belief
38:25enabled the Nabataeans to build into the rock
38:27and to carve jaw-dropping detail.
38:30♪
38:33This is unbelievably exciting.
38:35So I've just had a call
38:36that I'm allowed access into the treasury itself.
38:41This is really rare, I've got to say,
38:42and although I've been here lots of times before,
38:46it's never been allowed in.
38:49So you've got to forgive me,
38:50because my heart's actually beating quite fast
38:54to get this opportunity.
38:56Oh, my goodness.
38:57♪
39:00Oh, that's so beautiful.
39:04That's amazing.
39:07Just listen, can you hear the echo in here?
39:10That is super cool.
39:11♪
39:14Named the treasury
39:15because it was believed to hide gold and jewels,
39:18this is in fact a mausoleum.
39:22And then another unexpected delight,
39:25I'm on the verge of being granted a rare glimpse underground.
39:30What we're doing is just checking to see
39:32whether we can open up the grill
39:34to have a look at the tombs that were discovered under here.
39:37I think he's going to open it.
39:40It's happening, it's happening.
39:41These burials were only discovered in 2003
39:45and are hardly ever opened.
39:48This is just incredible.
39:50I had never, ever thought in my life I would get this close.
39:53So these are the burials of the great kings and queens,
39:58not as powerful women and men here at Petra.
40:01And when the bodies were discovered,
40:02so there were 11 bodies in here,
40:04the frankincense that had been burnt on the altar
40:07to help their journey into the world of death was still there.
40:12Oh, LeCron, thank you for letting me in.
40:15This is unbelievable.
40:17This is just so beautiful.
40:24The angles of the carving here seem planned
40:26to catch the sun's moving rays in a kind of natural light show.
40:33I've made it up here to give you a Nabataean eye view of the treasury
40:39and it is just extraordinary, isn't it?
40:43These engineers are making that just with pickaxes and chisels
40:47and we know they started at the top and worked their way down.
40:51It's not completely clear what method they used.
40:53I mean, it might have been ropes with a kind of pulley system
40:56or scaffolding or ledges,
40:59but whatever their method, they only had one chance to get that right.
41:08By the first century CE, a whole rock-cut city of tombs,
41:14theatres, temples, council chambers, homes was chiselled out of the sandstone.
41:21The fame of the Nabataeans and their bustling, wealthy metropolis
41:25reached as far as China.
41:28The Nabataeans clearly delighted in their internationalism.
41:36The architecture here is a living example that when you trade across borders,
41:41you get a really healthy cross-fertilisation of cultures and influences.
41:46So over there, you've got something which is brilliantly Arabian.
41:49It's a Nabataean capital.
41:51These are much more Hellenistic, so they show Greek influence.
41:55And then next door, you have the ideal Assyrian stairway to heaven.
42:00So this city is cosmopolitan in the true sense of the word.
42:05It's a city of the world.
42:11Perhaps the Nabataeans' greatest achievement was furnishing the city
42:15with an incredibly sophisticated water supply.
42:19The Nabataeans' super smart control of water has its ultimate expression here at Petra.
42:26So they channel in drinking water from a spring that's over four miles away.
42:31There are cisterns in all of those hills,
42:33and we think that almost every home had its own water tank.
42:37But it wasn't just practical.
42:39There were also ornamental gardens here.
42:41And where I'm walking now, although I know it's pretty hard to believe,
42:45but this was once a kind of sacred pool.
42:49So really what they're doing is creating a fever dream version
42:53of those desert oases right in the heart of the city.
43:01By the way, we shouldn't really be calling this place Petra at all.
43:05Petra is the name the Greeks gave it,
43:07and it's an ancient Greek word that means rock or stone.
43:11The Nabataeans themselves called this Rakhmu.
43:20And we should never forget the lifeblood of this place
43:23were the people who called Rakhmu home.
43:26Real people with real hopes, beliefs and fears.
43:30Now it can be so easy to be dazzled by all this beauty and amazing architecture
43:36and forget that this place wasn't actually built as one of the wonders of the world.
43:41This was people's home.
43:43And at its height, there were around 30,000 women and men who lived here.
43:48You'd have found a lot of them right here,
43:50because this was Petra's ancient high street.
43:58Papyrus scrolls, some only recently discovered,
44:02document legal cases often heard in this very courtroom,
44:07a fantastic window onto everyday life.
44:12There are some really tragic records.
44:14There's this particular one that involves a woman called Babatha.
44:17And Babatha's husband dies unexpectedly, and her child is taken into care.
44:23And Babatha petitions desperately to get him back.
44:27That doesn't work.
44:28The child is looked after by guardians.
44:30But Babatha will not give up.
44:32And now she says, at least give him enough money so that he can live a good life.
44:37And we have 30 years' worth of Babatha's records.
44:41So it is an extraordinary insight into the life of a woman.
44:46And these records just tell us that day in, day out here,
44:50there were hundreds of human dramas being played out.
44:53The Nabataeans were eventually subjugated by the Romans.
44:57And with the rise of new trading passages, Petra began to decline.
45:03By the 6th century, this once great civilization had fallen.
45:12Petra is a treasure because it is astounding.
45:15And because it's a reminder that the very strongest civilizations
45:19take their influences from all over in a kind of melting pot of cultures.
45:24But more than that, as well as this place having some of the most
45:28staggering architecture and monuments ever created in history,
45:33there's also evidence here of ordinary, everyday lives.
45:37So the wonders here are both epic and very human.
45:42Thank you. Good.
45:43Ah, thank you.
45:46Ancient Arabia was an extraordinary place and an extraordinary time.
45:51The treasures here speak of thousands of years of experimentation and communication,
45:57of struggles to survive and struggles to secure the most luxurious objects known to man.
46:04And the most important of all, the most important of all,
46:07the most important of all, the most important of all,
46:10the most important of all, the most important of all,
46:12the struggles to secure the most luxurious objects known to mankind
46:17of individual journeys that shaped the direction of history.