Rose-red city half as old as time — the Nabataean wonder carved from sandstone
Petra is one of the world's most extraordinary archaeological sites — a vast Nabataean city carved directly into rose-red sandstone cliffs in Jordan's Wadi Musa desert. The walk through the Siq gorge to the suddenly revealed Treasury façade is one of travel's great theatrical moments, and the city beyond contains over 800 carved monuments across 264 square kilometres. A UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the New Seven Wonders of the World.
Petra was the capital of the Nabataean Kingdom from around the 4th century BC, flourishing as a trading hub where caravan routes carrying incense, spices, and silk from Arabia, China, and India converged. The Nabataeans' mastery of water engineering — channels, cisterns, and dams — allowed 30,000 people to live in this desert canyon. Rome annexed the kingdom in 106 AD but the city remained prosperous; it was abandoned after the 363 AD earthquake and largely forgotten by the Western world until Swiss explorer Johann Ludwig Burckhardt rediscovered it in 1812.