Treasures of the World with Bettany Hughes - Season 2, Episode 3 Jordan
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00I'm traveling across the world, exploring secrets and wonders.
00:09This is really tight.
00:11So I asked my friends here if they could get me access off the beaten track.
00:16And I have 100% definitely got what I asked for.
00:21An adventure by land and sea to the most fascinating places.
00:26It is just extraordinary.
00:30Where I've been given special access to significant and surprising treasures.
00:35Some of the most remarkable artworks to survive from antiquity.
00:40Buried in ancient sites, extraordinary buildings and glorious works of art.
00:47I'm in search of the treasures that help to explain the story of us.
00:53Journey with me to discover how the past shapes our lives.
00:58I'm here to uncover the rich history of the ancient kingdom of Jordan.
01:04A vital crossroads between East and West and a cultural hub for millennia.
01:11Enjoying privileged access to the secrets of one of the world's most spectacular wonders, Petra.
01:18Exploring an ancient city dubbed the Pompeii of the East.
01:22The mountaintop palace where John the Baptist was beheaded.
01:27And fearsome fortresses of the Crusader knights.
01:31And discovering how Jordan is a mosaic of civilisations.
01:35Welcome to the Treasures of Jordan.
01:47Jordan and its capital, Amman, has long been a melting pot of culture.
01:53Where ideas have met and mixed and flourished.
02:02Jordan's been described as a cradle of civilisation.
02:10Its capital, Amman, is one of the oldest continually inhabited settlements in the world.
02:17Whose history stretches back over 4,000 years.
02:24MUSIC PLAYS
02:33Amman offers an immediate taste of Jordan's rich and varied past.
02:40My first treasure is hidden in the desert over 150 miles south of Amman.
02:47Voted one of the new seven wonders of the world,
02:50the archaeological park of Petra is up there with the most iconic ancient sites on Earth.
02:57I've been here before, but now I'm back to explore areas most visitors don't get to see.
03:12I'm approaching Petra on a major ancient trunk road
03:16that connected Arabia and the Middle East and the Levant and Egypt.
03:21And in antiquity, this is how thousands and thousands of people would have arrived here.
03:27And I'm coming this way because now I want to share with you some of Petra's secret treasures.
03:38This beautiful city from the 4th century BCE was at the heart of the ancient kingdom of the Nabateans.
03:46Masters of the lucrative trade routes that pass through this dramatic landscape,
03:51they were the key power players in the region.
03:58And up here, at the end of a punishing mountain climb,
04:03over 700 feet above the main site below, hides a spectacular clue to Petra's story.
04:16I've never made it up here before, and it is just extraordinary.
04:22So you can see that this building, which is called the monastery, has been hacked out of the raw rock.
04:29And this whole courtyard has been cleared by hand.
04:32It's 47 metres high and 48 metres across.
04:37And it's been used as a place of worship since the Middle Ages.
04:41It's 47 metres high and 48 metres across.
04:46And we don't know what it was used for.
04:48We don't know whether it was a tomb or whether it was the host for kind of cultic activity.
04:53But what effort and what beauty right on the top of the mountain here.
05:00Dubbed the monastery because locals discovered crosses inscribed on one of the back walls,
05:06the Nabateans probably built this around the middle of the 1st century CE.
05:11It's a real mosaic of architectural influences with ancient Greek columns
05:17and a large Mesopotamian-style single entrance.
05:21Tawfik, a local Bedouin tribesman, is going to help us out.
05:25Tawfik, a local Bedouin tribesman, is going to help me climb inside.
05:30So this could be interesting.
05:32I remember this guy says, Tawfik.
05:36Hi.
05:38Hi, how are you?
05:40Nice to see you.
05:42He was here last time I came.
05:44How great to see you. How are you?
05:46Good, good.
05:48God knows how I'm going to get in there.
05:50Okay.
05:52Okay.
05:54Okay.
05:57Whoa, listen to it.
06:00Oh my goodness.
06:03Listen to it. Can you hear the sound?
06:06Whoa.
06:08Oh, it's beautiful in here.
06:11The colours are incredible, aren't they?
06:14The colours are beautiful.
06:15It's so frustrating because we don't really know what they use this for.
06:20It would have been like a church
06:22because you get this amazing, booming acoustic
06:27that have used this for some kind of ritual with mosaic.
06:32Yeah, because for the voice, it's got more like...
06:37Yeah.
06:39Just think of the people.
06:41Yeah.
06:43Just think of the people who came in here for centuries and centuries.
06:48Nabatean.
06:50I feel very happy to be here.
06:54Here where I born.
06:56Here where I like.
06:58Even if I go somewhere outside for two days, three days,
07:02I feel I am not right.
07:04I have to come back again.
07:06This really is your home.
07:08It's an amazing privilege.
07:11To come in here. We're very lucky.
07:13We're very lucky.
07:15Thank you. Thank you.
07:17I hope to see you again here.
07:19I'll come again.
07:21I'll come again. Definitely.
07:23If you can get me into these places again, definitely.
07:26I'll come again. Definitely.
07:28Shukran.
07:31After years of coming to Petra,
07:33this time I'm heading to some of the more remote sites
07:36that people don't usually get to see.
07:41You know, it's really beautiful
07:43because I can just see the kind of larks darting across the roads
07:47and there are goats around.
07:49Oh, hello, and a donkey.
07:51It's kind of fantastic.
07:53It's a bit like travelling in time,
07:55coming back to this part of the cultural suburb.
07:59Petra lies on the slopes of the Shara mountain range,
08:03which provided the Nabateans with spring water,
08:06fertile land for agriculture,
08:07and raw materials needed to fuel their growing empire.
08:12This is genuinely mind-blowingly amazing
08:16because everywhere you look,
08:18you can see these tombs carved into the rock.
08:20I mean, you know, at least four miles
08:23outside the centre of the site now.
08:26They're just everywhere, in all of the rocks,
08:29and you've still got people living in front of them.
08:38So I asked my friends here
08:40if they could get me access off the beaten track,
08:43and 100% definitely got what I asked for.
09:08Oh, my God, look at that.
09:13That is a view of Petra.
09:26As your eyes get used to the landscape here,
09:29you start to pick out these astonishing views.
09:32I don't know if you can see it,
09:34so there's a kind of rectangular block,
09:36and then that's a curling snake's body
09:39with a snake's head on the top.
09:42The truth is, we don't know exactly what this was used for.
09:46It's been called the snake's pyramid,
09:48and it's really enigmatic,
09:50but we think because for the Nabateans,
09:53snakes were thought to protect tombs
09:56or to be the guardians of the land.
09:58Snakes were thought to protect tombs
10:01or to be the guardians of altars,
10:03and sometimes they were thought to be vehicles to the afterlife
10:07because when a snake sheds its skin,
10:09it's almost as though it's reborn.
10:11So it's holding on to its secrets,
10:14but whatever it is, it's telling us something
10:17about the Nabatean worldview
10:19and how central this landscape itself was to their beliefs.
10:29But Petra wasn't just about spectacular temples and mausoleums.
10:34It was also a city where people lived.
10:48You could make a statement about just how wealthy you were
10:52by building a really swanky villa like this
10:55that dominated the valley.
10:56that dominated the valley.
10:58This private home from the 1st century CE
11:02lies off the beaten track from the main site.
11:07So I have just got to show you what's in here.
11:14So this place even had its own sauna and steam room,
11:19like a kind of Turkish hamam,
11:21decorated in the very latest fashions.
11:25Even some of the gold paint they used has been preserved.
11:30Even some of the gold paint they used has been preserved.
11:34With lavish decoration and its own private bath,
11:37hot water and underwater heating,
11:39the family here had their every need catered for.
11:44This is great.
11:46So this is the kind of industrious business end of the villa
11:50because we know that the people who lived here
11:52made their money from trade but also from local produce
11:56because vines were grown all round here and olive trees.
12:00So this was probably somewhere where they were producing
12:03either wine or rich olive oil.
12:11For those who could afford it, even death could feel luxurious.
12:17The Nabataeans often placed their rich tombs
12:20in prominent show-off places.
12:32I'm being allowed into a tomb that's closed off to the public
12:36because the wall paintings inside are so fragile.
12:51The funeral would have taken place just outside the tomb,
12:55with the family burning incense, making offerings and sharing food.
13:02We know that Nabataean women often commissioned and paid for tombs
13:07and they had real standing in society,
13:10which, of course, is unusual for the ancient world.
13:13It seems as though the Nabataeans were a much more democratic society.
13:18All of these things are reasons why it's really worth
13:22winkling out their secrets and their stories
13:26because the Nabataeans are a civilisation worth caring about.
13:33And there's one final secret corner of Petra I want to explore.
13:38Two miles from the city centre
13:41lies the seldom-visited suburb of Siq al-Barid.
13:45This is a part of the site that people don't normally get to.
13:49It's affectionately known as Little Petra
13:52and it was like a kind of prosperous suburb
13:56and hub for the businessmen of the ancient world.
14:15This was a kind of official meeting point,
14:19almost the equivalent of an ancient visitors' centre.
14:23So you would register up there and then come down to sleep
14:27in these chambers, which are sort of like a motel,
14:30a place like dormitories where the traders could bunk down.
14:36This is the place where the Nabataeans would meet.
14:40And further into the gorge, there's something really special.
14:44This may look like another tomb,
14:47but in fact, it was something else entirely.
14:51Up here in the rock face itself, people carved out
14:55what are basically kind of exclusive breakout rooms.
15:00This is a famous room.
15:02This is where the Nabataeans would meet.
15:05And this is where the Nabataeans would sit,
15:08and this is where they would dine.
15:11And this is where the Nabataeans would meet.
15:14And this is where the Nabataeans would sit,
15:16and this is where they would sit,
15:19these kind of exclusive breakout rooms.
15:22This is a thing called a biclinium.
15:25It's a very special dining room,
15:28and you can see that men would have stayed on two sides here
15:32and talked business and looked out at the stars.
15:35I mean, talk about a room with a view.
15:38But there's something extra special about this place,
15:42and it is so unique. It's so fragile, it's gated off,
15:46Look at that.
15:46So underneath soot and grease and grime,
15:51these amazingly delicate frescoes.
15:55So you've got desert flowers there and vines and grapes.
15:59So that's an association with Dionysus or Bacchus,
16:03the Greek god of ecstasy and excess and drinking.
16:07And there are little cupids playing flutes
16:11and they're connected to Aphrodite or Venus,
16:14the goddess of love and sex.
16:17So the message that's being sent out by this
16:20is that this is a place that you come to eat and drink
16:22and be merry and basically have a fantastic time.
16:26But the quality of it is extraordinary.
16:29So they've used Egyptian blue and white lead oxide
16:33as even gilding and glaze on some of the foliage.
16:37I mean, this really, really is the best that money can buy.
16:44It is fascinating, isn't it?
16:54Because the Nabataeans are surrounded
16:56by a landscape that is literally a palette.
17:00And yet they choose to take the effort to plaster and paint
17:05and glaze and gild their tombs and their dining
17:09rooms and their halls.
17:11And I think that is a mark of the ferve and vividness
17:15of the culture.
17:28What I love about Petra is how it
17:30encapsulates both the ancient Greek and Arabian worlds.
17:36Petra is a dynamic wonder that's evolved through time
17:41and because there's still 85% of the site left to excavate,
17:46it hides histories that we can learn from in the future.
17:54This treasure has been called the Pompeii of the East.
17:59It's in a verdant river valley in the north of Jordan.
18:02It's the beautiful Jerash.
18:12I've travelled just over 100 miles north of Petra
18:15to Jerash, one of the best preserved
18:17Greco-Roman cities in the world.
18:27This city is a treasure, but it's also a reminder
18:30that civilisations have a life story, that they rise and fall.
18:41Enticed by the valley's fertility and abundance,
18:44people settled here over 9,000 years ago.
18:51It was the Romans who left the greatest mark on the city
18:54from the first century CE, when Jerash
18:57had a population of 20,000, more than matching Pompeii.
19:05As the Romans dynamode their way to becoming
19:08one of the most potent imperial powers the world has ever known,
19:13their general Pompeii made his move east,
19:17taking ancient Syria and one of its greatest cities, Jerash.
19:26The city prospered, becoming a key outpost
19:29for the Romans in ancient Arabia.
19:33Jerash has everything you'd expect of a Roman period town.
19:37So there's a handsome theatre, a magnificent temple to Zeus,
19:42there are baths, a very impressive forum,
19:45and then, because the Romans loved their money,
19:48a huge area devoted to trade and shopping.
19:56Jerash was a vital hub for the Romans,
19:58with connections to all corners of their massive empire,
20:02which came to reach a fifth of the globe.
20:06This is Jerash's main street, or cardo.
20:09Literally, it means it's centre, or beating heart.
20:12And it would have been crammed with traffic.
20:15You can still just about make out the ruts in the road here.
20:19You'd have heard around five languages spoken,
20:21because this connected directly to a road network
20:24that linked Petra to Damascus, deep into what's now Iraq,
20:29the ports of Tyre and Jaffa,
20:31and right across to the western Mediterranean.
20:37The vast, oval-shaped forum,
20:39amongst the best-preserved Roman architecture outside of Italy,
20:43feeds directly into the cardo,
20:46and the city boasted not one, but two theatres.
20:52The citizens of Jerash really enjoyed their wealth,
20:56and they did not keep quiet about the fact
20:58that they splashed their cash around.
21:00They were very, very generous,
21:02and they were very, very generous,
21:04and they did not keep quiet about the fact
21:06that they splashed their cash around.
21:08And we can see that here from this lovely inscription
21:11that tells us that men here helped to pay
21:13for the building of this fantastic theatre.
21:15And the clue is this word here, drachmas,
21:18which is the ancient Greek for drachma,
21:21which was the currency that was used at the time.
21:24It was all fantastically well-organised,
21:26because every single seat has a mark.
21:29So there you can see it's alpha, which is like RA,
21:33gamma, which is the equivalent of RG,
21:36delta, and then epsilon, which equates to RE.
21:40And these markings carry on right the way across the theatre
21:44on all of the 3,000 seats.
21:49Enjoying some of the most fertile land in the region,
21:52and with fresh water all year round,
21:55the city's patron deity was a goddess
21:58synonymous with natural abundance.
22:01Artemis, the goddess of hunting and wild nature,
22:05was the patron goddess of Jurassic,
22:07and her sanctuary here was planned to be
22:10the biggest in the Roman world.
22:12And it does actually stretch a third of a mile
22:15from one end to the other.
22:17But it was never finished, and we know that
22:20because there is no evidence at all
22:22that a roof was ever put on the top of that temple.
22:32Elsewhere, roads stop halfway.
22:35It seems the Romans ran out of the time, or cash,
22:38to fulfil their ambitions.
22:40This is a place where you can physically,
22:43visibly chart the passage of time.
22:46The earlier Hellenistic foundation
22:48gives way to a premier Roman city.
22:51Rome evolves into the Christian Byzantine Empire,
22:55which swiftly gives way to the new superpower of the region, Islam.
23:02All these civilisations still speak to us
23:05through the treasures they left behind.
23:12Jerash had survived war and plague and regime change,
23:17but in the end, it would be a natural disaster
23:20that delivered the killer blow.
23:22At 10am on the 18th of January, 749CE,
23:27the city was hit by a devastating earthquake.
23:31This was one of the biggest seismic events of the Middle Ages,
23:35so violent it triggered tsunamis all over the Mediterranean.
23:39And recent archaeology is revealing poignant new clues
23:43about the catastrophe.
23:45Professor Achim Lichtenberger has been running the excavations here.
23:50This is an extraordinary part of the site.
23:53I'm finding it a bit hard to read.
23:56Where are we? What's happening here?
23:58What you see here in the collapse is all the walls of private houses
24:02that were damaged during the earthquake.
24:04From the look of it, it feels like it was a huge event.
24:07Yeah, it was a very huge event.
24:09After the earthquake, the city was more or less dead.
24:13There was no recovery of the city and the city was abandoned mostly
24:18and urban life came to an end.
24:20So this is really the end of the city of Jerash.
24:22It's a terrible irony, isn't it?
24:24Because one of the reasons that Jerash is so wealthy
24:26is because of the gifts of the earth,
24:28because of it benefiting from the spice and the incense trade
24:31and access to the seas.
24:33It's an incredible fertile valley,
24:35but then it's the power of the earth that destroys it.
24:39Yeah.
24:40And what did you discover when you started to excavate?
24:42Right where we are standing, we found a skeleton of a child.
24:46And a child that was obviously trying to escape from the house.
24:50So is this the child you found?
24:52Right, these are the bones of the child.
24:54And you can see parts of the skull are preserved,
24:57parts of the long bones.
24:59But the bones and the skull is very much fragmented due to the collapse.
25:05The child was nearly out of the house
25:08and then the walls collapsed and killed the child.
25:12And again, nobody came back to bury it.
25:15So it was really, it shows the devastation of this earthquake.
25:19How old is this child?
25:20Well, it's about 10 years,
25:22but the age difference between the teeth and the bones
25:27is about two years,
25:29indicating that it had malnutrition or illnesses, periods of stress.
25:36So it was a small child.
25:39Too awful to think about.
25:42Yeah, and really the tragic thing
25:45is that we have so many well-preserved objects up here.
25:49So the earthquake really conserved everything
25:52and we have glasses, glass bottles.
25:55They are fully preserved, not a crack in them.
25:58Well, that's awful.
25:59So the glass has survived,
26:01but the girl has been crushed by the force of the quake.
26:04Exactly.
26:05It's a thing, as you say, it preserves for us, but it destroys for them.
26:12Achim and his team have only excavated a small fraction of the site so far.
26:17The ongoing archaeology is revealing a unique picture
26:21of the life story of this city and its tragedy.
26:39Jordan has deep-rooted connections with three great religions,
26:44Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
26:48My next treasure is an exquisite survivor
26:51that maps out Jordan's place in the heart of this biblical environment
26:56and provides a vital clue for exploring Jordan's landscapes.
27:01This is the Greek Orthodox Church of St George's
27:04in the town of Madaba, just south of Oman,
27:07built in the late 19th century
27:09on the foundations of a much older Byzantine church
27:12dating to the 6th century.
27:14But it's not the church in Madaba I've come to see,
27:18rather something more exciting.
27:22What was discovered is the oldest ever map of the Holy Land,
27:28and it's under here.
27:37The mosaic had miraculously survived demolition,
27:41fires and neglect over hundreds of years.
27:50The map isn't orientated as we'd expect it to be, north to south,
27:54but it faces east,
27:56so over here you've got the tributaries of the Nile Delta
28:00and then right here is the Dead Sea.
28:04Some 157 surviving quotations, written in Greek,
28:09map out the names of places and stories from the Bible.
28:13They're surrounded by depictions of the natural world
28:16and scenes of daily life.
28:19So the fishermen here in the Dead Sea have had their faces and bodies
28:23mosaiced out from a time when images of the living form weren't allowed.
28:29But the detail is still just incredible.
28:32So this big city is Jerusalem,
28:36and this is the church of Theotokos,
28:40the church of Mary, the mother of God.
28:43And we know that that was finished in 543 CE,
28:47and there aren't any images of buildings here from after 570 CE,
28:52so that gives us a really precise date
28:55for the creation of this incredible thing.
28:59This vast stone carpet was made up of a staggering 2.5 million
29:04tiny mosaic pieces.
29:07So this is the River Jordan, full of fish,
29:10to show it's full of life and love,
29:13because down here, I don't know if you can see that,
29:16it says Bethabara, and that's what we know as Bethany,
29:20and Bethany, beyond the Jordan,
29:23is where none other than Jesus was baptised.
29:29Following the route of the river from the map,
29:32an hour's drive west of Madaba, on the border of Israel,
29:36is a place where the Bible story comes to life.
29:42This is the famed River Jordan,
29:45which has been so beautifully depicted on the Madaba map
29:48for over 1,400 years.
29:52It was here that John the Baptist practised his mission,
29:55where a 30-year-old Jesus began his ministry
29:58after being baptised in the sacred waters.
30:02Not long after Christianity
30:04became the official religion of the Roman Empire,
30:07this site, known as Bethany beyond the Jordan,
30:10became a place of pilgrimage
30:12and many churches sprang up to cater for the faithful.
30:20Just a few miles away, you'll find the Dead Sea,
30:24a place featured in the Madaba map and the Bible.
30:30John the Baptist preached radical ideas
30:33to people along the shores of the Dead Sea and inland,
30:37encouraging them to ritually cleanse themselves,
30:41body and soul.
30:44Technically a lake,
30:46the Dead Sea is an extraordinary natural wonder.
30:50The surface is over 430 metres below sea level,
30:55making the Dead Sea shores the lowest dry land anywhere on Earth.
31:00With salt levels almost ten times higher than ordinary seawater,
31:06life hardly survives here.
31:08But, surprisingly, this barren lake boasts many secret riches
31:13and is one of the oldest health spas in the world.
31:18You often find that narratives and myths and legends
31:22swirl up from places that have real historical or practical significance,
31:28and the Dead Sea is no exception.
31:31Apart from being ecologically unique,
31:34this is the source of a weird thing called bitumen.
31:38Now, bitumen is this kind of black, oily substance
31:42that bubbles up in islands
31:44and in the ancient world was as precious as gold.
31:48Bitumen was traded across continents by the Nabataeans
31:52and the original ancient word for bitumen was mumia.
31:57Now, mumia was thought to be used in mummification,
32:01which is why we call Egyptian mummies mummies.
32:14The thermal springs of Kaliroe, nearby,
32:17are also known for their health benefits
32:20and are also represented on the Madaba map.
32:24According to the ancient historian Josephus,
32:27Herod the Great, no less, came here to treat his ailments.
32:32Josephus tells us that although Herod struggled with numerous disorders,
32:38yet he still had a desire to live and he hoped for recovery.
32:42So he came to Jordan and made use of those hot baths at Kaliroe,
32:48which are sweet enough to be drunk.
32:54But it wasn't just the thermal springs
32:56that attracted Herod to this part of Jordan.
33:04You cannot argue with that, can you, as a strategic location?
33:09And this place, Machaereus, is where Herod the Great built his fortress.
33:21Located on a high, rocky vantage point, 1,100 metres above the Dead Sea,
33:27this was the perfect place for Herod the Great to build his palace,
33:32called Machaereus,
33:34probably from the Greek machaerea for sword.
33:38Ravines protect the fortress from all sides,
33:41ensuring the site was secure and incredibly hard to access.
33:46In the centre of the mountain,
33:48Herod built a palace glorious in its size and beauty.
33:55The Romans described this place as the strongest fortification in Judea
34:00and a stronghold of treasure.
34:04And we know that if Herod felt he was under attack,
34:07he could send smoke signals out right the way across to Jerusalem
34:11in what is now Israel, down to the south, to Masada,
34:15and way out to his other fortresses in the east.
34:22Archaeologists working here have identified all kinds of things
34:26that Herod built.
34:28A garden, a Roman-style bath,
34:31a very posh triclinium, a dining room,
34:34and just recently over here they identified this
34:38as where the king had his throne.
34:44But although it was Herod the Great who built Machaereus,
34:48it was his son, Herod Antipas, who'd make this place notorious.
34:53John the Baptist was deeply disapproving
34:57of Herod Antipas' marriage to his sister-in-law, Herodias.
35:03So Herod imprisoned him in Machaereus,
35:06but Herodias' thirst for revenge was far from satisfied.
35:13Herod was celebrating his birthday up here with a grand dinner party,
35:18and Herodias' teenage daughter, Salome, danced for the crowd.
35:24Herod was so delighted,
35:26he promised to give the girl whatever she wanted on oath.
35:31Salome, prompted by her mother, said,
35:35''Give me on a platter the head of John the Baptist.''
35:41Herod was horrified. He was appalled.
35:44This is not what he wanted to do,
35:46but nor did he want to lose face in front of the assembled company.
35:50He sent executioners down to the prison where they beheaded John
35:55and brought his bleeding head on a plate for the young girl.
36:11Isn't it extraordinary to think that one of those stories
36:14that so many of us have heard from childhood took place right here?
36:21Tales like these are threaded through this dramatic landscape.
36:33Biblical Jordan is the site of remarkable monuments and events
36:38and morality tales that have endured for centuries
36:42and that are cherished by multiple faiths.
36:45This is the home of some of the greatest stories on Earth,
36:50stories that are written both in man-made wonders
36:54and in the landscape itself.
37:00But my next treasure stands as a monument to a terrible time
37:04when the great faiths of Christianity and Islam
37:07were united in their hatred.
37:16EXPLOSION
37:24My next treasure is a reminder of what happens
37:27when external forces tangle with territories that are not their own.
37:36It stood for 1,000 years, bearing terrible testimony
37:40to a time when Islam and Christianity went to war.
37:46This is Shobak Castle, built by Baldwin I, the King of Jerusalem,
37:51in 1115 and the first of many crusader castles in the region.
37:56It comes from a time when the Christian West
37:59was forcing a collision with Islam
38:02for control of what was called the Holy Lands
38:05in a religious game of cat and mouse
38:08that still has implications for all of us today.
38:12An ideal vantage point,
38:15Shobak is located in the desert hills 19 miles north of Petra.
38:24This became an arena where two of the most notorious warriors
38:29of the age faced off.
38:35Raynaud Châtillon was a crusader knight
38:39who controlled this castle with a ferocity
38:42that was only matched by his cruelty.
38:45It was said that when one man owed him money,
38:48he stripped him naked, covered him in honey
38:51and forced him to spend a day out in the sun
38:54before he imprisoned him.
38:59A ruthless adventurer, always short of cash,
39:02Raynaud was known as the thief knight, even by crusaders.
39:08He seemed not to care about the honour or the principles of knighthood,
39:12only about gold.
39:22From here, crusaders could launch military campaigns in the Holy Land.
39:27They could tax and loot camel caravans
39:30that came along these ancient roads
39:33connecting Arabia and the Silk Routes
39:36and attack pilgrims on their way to Mecca.
39:41Shobak was also a rich agricultural hub in the region.
39:45Although it's hard to imagine now,
39:47this spot was once fertile with abundant vines and olive groves.
39:52Raynaud's abuse of this land infuriated the Muslim warlord Saladin.
40:01Saladin, the legendary fighter and governor of Egypt,
40:05was determined to take Shobak.
40:08He was sick of the constant attacks on the camel caravans
40:12with their precious goods,
40:14and he wanted to oust crusaders from this land,
40:17so he tried again and again and again without success.
40:27In 1187, Saladin mounted an all-out invasion,
40:31laying siege to Shobak.
40:33The crusaders held out for over 18 months
40:36thanks to a combination of water from a hidden spring
40:39and a staggering arsenal.
40:42I mean, just look at the ammunition that's still left here.
40:46If you see that firepower,
40:48you get the true, raw, brutal sense of why these castles were built.
40:58Frustrated by Crusader Raynaud's forces at Shobak,
41:01Saladin turned his attention to another of his strongholds in the region,
41:05Karak Castle, about 90 miles north of Shobak.
41:11This is Karak.
41:13There's been a fortress here since biblical times,
41:16and this is one of the largest castles in the Levant.
41:20Coming here, you understand, don't you,
41:23why Arabic sources said that this place was impregnable?
41:32And Crusader Raynaud's stranglehold in the area
41:36was physically built on foundations
41:39left by the region's previous rulers.
41:46One of the things I love about this place is that
41:50if you look at the masonry,
41:52they're reusing stone from those massive Nabataean structures,
41:58so it's just another reminder of how there is continuity in cultures
42:03in this place right across time.
42:08The seeming impregnability of his castles
42:11emboldened Raynaud to strike back at Saladin.
42:17This vast hall had multiple uses,
42:20possibly a living area for Raynaud's men and their horses
42:24and a shelter from the missiles of Saladin's siege engines.
42:29Raynaud continued his nefarious deeds here.
42:32He made a move on the holy cities of Mecca and Medina via the Red Sea,
42:38and it was said that he would put men's heads into wooden boxes
42:42and then throw them off these battlements
42:45so they could feel every bone break as they made their way down.
42:51Arabic sources at the time said that deeds like these polluted their land.
43:00In contrast to Crusader Raynaud's atrocities,
43:03Saladin earned a reputation for chivalry and honour,
43:07even in the heat of battle.
43:09We're told that when Raynaud's stepson and heir was getting married here,
43:14Saladin hatched a cunning plan.
43:17He camped a huge army out on these plains,
43:20along with seven siege catapults,
43:23but Raynaud's wife sent out tempting delicacies,
43:27begging him not to disturb the festivities.
43:30Then, and I'm sure that this bit is dramatic licence,
43:34we hear that Saladin agreed to let the lovebirds alone in their room
43:39move the army round so that they would attack a different bit of the castle.
43:45Although Kerak withstood the siege,
43:47elsewhere Saladin's army was driving the Crusaders out.
43:51Raynaud was forced to agree a truce.
43:54But once again, unscrupulous Raynaud broke his word,
43:58attacking a camel caravan,
44:01seizing its booty and imprisoning its merchants.
44:07Raynaud's luck couldn't hold forever.
44:10In 1187, Saladin routed Crusader forces in the Battle of Hittin.
44:15The Crusaders surrendered the region and Raynaud was captured.
44:19Saladin had Raynaud brought to his tent,
44:22and when the Christian refused to convert to Islam,
44:26Saladin beheaded him.
44:30Shortly after, Kerak and Shobak castles finally fell to Saladin's forces.
44:38The Crusades carried on here for centuries,
44:42and for those in power, there were opportunities,
44:46new demand for supplies and arms and luxuries.
44:51The West benefited from the import of new architectural styles,
44:55new technologies, new mathematical methods.
44:59But for the majority of people here,
45:02the Crusades brought a catalogue of suffering.
45:07The repercussions of the Crusades teach us lessons
45:11which are just as valid today as they were then.
45:26The Crusader castles of Jordan are a tenacious
45:30and in some ways terrifying treasure
45:33because these aren't romantic citadels.
45:36What these represent are medieval chains of control.
45:42Jordan is a wonder, in part because so much history,
45:47so many shared stories and beliefs originated or were nourished here.
45:52From biblical Jordan to Roman Jurassic,
45:56from the secrets and glories of Nabataean Petra
46:00to the horrors of the Crusades,
46:03there is so much to discover here.
46:06From the secrets and glories of Nabataean Petra
46:09to the horrors of the Crusades,
46:12the treasures here remind us how connected we all are across time
46:17and that although we should never live in the past,
46:21we're fools if we don't admit that we live with it.
46:36The Crusades
46:41The Crusades
46:46The Crusades
46:51The Crusades
47:06The Crusades
47:11The Crusades
47:16The Crusades
47:21The Crusades
47:26The Crusades