On October 6, Firas, Ana and I spent a second day visiting sites with Byzantine churches in the Kerak Plateau.
In the morning we first went to the city of Kerak to see the modern Roman Catholic church and we saw the basement apartment there where Firas and his parents had once lived.
We also stopped by the Greek Orthodox church, but no one was there.
We then spent the rest of the day seeing sites in the north Kerak plateau. We went to the town of Adir, north of Kerak, where we saw the modern Roman Catholic church and a cave of no particualar importance in the compound; we then saw the Greek Orthodox church there.
We then went to the uninvestigated site of Khirbat Da‘udiyah and then the major Roman and Byzantine ruins in the city of al-Rabba, with a large church in the middle of the site.
We then proceeded north to the site of Tadun, where we saw some recent illicit digging in the large unexcavated church there.
Next was the church site at Ja‘dat al-Jabur, which has suffered badly since I had worked briefly there in 1994 and 1996, and the nearby uninvestigated church at al-Dann wa-al-Baradan.
The next site was the hilltop of Shihan with its church. The Georgian project to work there that I had a tangential role in a few years ago never got off the ground.
We then went to the tourist restaurant overlooking the Wadi Mujib. The restaurant has high, rip-off-the-tourists prices; curiously the restaurant owner assumed that Firas was the local driver that Ana and I had hired, so he gave Firas a sizable payment as Firas’ cut for having brought us to the restaurant. That made the price for the lunch buffet more reasonable.
We then continued north across the Wadi Mujib and stopped at the major site of Dhiban, with its two badly preserved churches that I have never been able to identify among the rubble of the site.
On the way back to Amman at the end of our two-day trip, I got out in Madaba, so that I could spend the next few days checking some details at the Madaba Archaeological Park.
In the morning we first went to the city of Kerak to see the modern Roman Catholic church and we saw the basement apartment there where Firas and his parents had once lived.
Firas in the church basement
We also stopped by the Greek Orthodox church, but no one was there.
We then spent the rest of the day seeing sites in the north Kerak plateau. We went to the town of Adir, north of Kerak, where we saw the modern Roman Catholic church and a cave of no particualar importance in the compound; we then saw the Greek Orthodox church there.
The cave in the Roman Catholic compound in Adir
We then went to the uninvestigated site of Khirbat Da‘udiyah and then the major Roman and Byzantine ruins in the city of al-Rabba, with a large church in the middle of the site.
The church at al-Rabba
We then proceeded north to the site of Tadun, where we saw some recent illicit digging in the large unexcavated church there.
The illicit digging at Tadun
Next was the church site at Ja‘dat al-Jabur, which has suffered badly since I had worked briefly there in 1994 and 1996, and the nearby uninvestigated church at al-Dann wa-al-Baradan.
The church at Ja‘dat al-Jabur
The church at al-Dann wa-al-Baradan
The next site was the hilltop of Shihan with its church. The Georgian project to work there that I had a tangential role in a few years ago never got off the ground.
The ruins at Shihan
We then went to the tourist restaurant overlooking the Wadi Mujib. The restaurant has high, rip-off-the-tourists prices; curiously the restaurant owner assumed that Firas was the local driver that Ana and I had hired, so he gave Firas a sizable payment as Firas’ cut for having brought us to the restaurant. That made the price for the lunch buffet more reasonable.
Firas, Ana and I at the restaurant overlooking the Wadi Mujib
We then continued north across the Wadi Mujib and stopped at the major site of Dhiban, with its two badly preserved churches that I have never been able to identify among the rubble of the site.
Recently excavated trenches at Dhiban
On the way back to Amman at the end of our two-day trip, I got out in Madaba, so that I could spend the next few days checking some details at the Madaba Archaeological Park.
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