Day 277: Al-‘Ula and Hegra (Mada’in Salih)

Jan 5 - The region in and around Al-’Ula has a lot to offer for dramatic scenery and history. At first it seems perplexing how extensive human habitation has been in this area, and how much energy they had to create the structures they did. This region gets very hot during most of the year, excessively so, and water supply is always a problem.

However, the valley now occupied by Al-’Ula has a decently proximal water table, hence reliable wells have existed since antiquity here. Somewhere around 130 have been identified from Nabataean times. In addition, the desert conditions made the inhabitants extremely water efficient, finding many ways to channel and collect any storm runoff that happened by. All this kept the water supply sufficient to grow longstanding settlements. Today we take a tour that focuses on the Nabataeans, who occupied the region between 2nd century BCE and 2nd century CE.

Al-’Ula is in the very early stages of developing its tourist industry. It was meant to start up in 2019 with the relaxing of visa requirements for foreign tourists, but COVID but a kabosh on everything until 2021. So what we see here today is basically the launch of what will almost certainly become the largest tourist attraction in the country.

It is a useful thing to keep in mind for us. The website to book our tour has only been in operation since for about six months, and for much of that time it wasn’t even clear how it worked (can we get a ticket for all major archaeological attractions, can we drive our own car there, is there hiking, etc). As such I didn’t book anything ahead. Only yesterday did I inquire and find out the best way do it.

KSA has taken a full-on approach to tourism here, with good and bad aspects.

The good: From the start, they are being extremely careful in keeping tourists in manageable groups, and keeping them from just walking all over the monuments. Rather than people driving their own cars out into the desert, many of the sites are reachable only by the state-run tour buses. All these transports leave from a convenient parking lot and the process of getting tickets, and on the bus, is all well organized. All of the infrastructure is brand new, with many park workers on hand to offer free refreshments and snacks several times during the tour. The guides (at least all the ones we had) do a great job of describing the history of what we were looking at. There is a huge amount of coordination that has gone into all of this, undoubtedly helped by the deep government pockets funding it all. At least for the time being, ticket prices are quite reasonable considering all the attention you get. Today’s tour took us about four hours to complete at our own pace (the buses are hop-on, hop-off) and the total price was $60.

The bad: Well, I really do like to just walk around and look at stuff, and it is a bummer to find out that a fair amount of the desert is off limits. There are not hiking trails at all, and there is nothing sillier than getting on a bus to drive literally two minutes to get off again.

Having said all that, today we arrive at the designated parking lot and I have our entry tickets scanned for the ‘Hegra Tour’. We get on the bus and head out to our allotted five stops, each of which we can take as long as we like, just getting on the next bus that comes when we are finished.

Hegra (also called Mada’in Salih) is the name for the area of tombs, along with a recently discovered town, that pertains to the time of the Nabataeans. The same people who constructed Petra (the architectural styles are very similar), but starting at a slightly later time. While Petra was always the capital, Hegra was a settlement placed strategically on the frankincense and myrrh trade route from Yemen.

They had some stuff for Odette to do at the waiting area.

The first stop is Jabal Al-Ahmar, home to many tombs of well-off citizens of the Nabataean settlement nearby.

This sandstone outcrop is riddled with tombs like the one shown.

This particular tomb was for Hinat, daughter of Wahbu. It was covered by sand since antiquity, only coming to light after a huge rainstorm in 2011. Hence, it was one of the few tombs with a body and personal effects still inside.

Like with Egyptian mummies, a recreation of Hinat’s face has been attempted from the skull.

Another tomb from Jabal Al-Ahmar, a bit eroded at the base.

Inside one of the tombs, showing deep cavities in the walls. These presumably were each for different members of the same family. Sometimes many people were buried in one tomb.

These relatively ornate tombs were for the real VIP families. The crowstep pattern at the tops of so many of the tombs reference a belief in ‘five steps to the afterlife’.

The second stop was for the tomb of Lihyan son of Kuza (also called Qasr Al-Farid). This was obviously a very important individual, but regardless, the tomb was never completely finished and therefore never used for burial. It is unique at Hegra for having four identical columns carved across the base (normally there are none, only two, or four but of different sizes).

It was an awful time if day to get a picture of this one. Here the four columns can be clearly seen, as well as the tooth-like rocks at the base which would have been removed had the tomb been completed.

One of the more photogenic sandstone outcrops at Qasr Al-Farid.

A view across the desert to more sandstone formations.

The third stop was to Jabal Al-Banat (Qasr Al-Bint). ‘Bint’ means girl in Arabic, because of a local legend about a girl who was supposedly locked away in one of the tombs because she was too beautiful to allow free in the town.

This tomb is useful to illustrate some points: The cornices below the crowsteps are almost straight out of the Pharaonic Egyptian style. The columns (only two large and two small in this case) are fundamentally Roman, but topped by designs found only in Nabatean art.

A few more points on this detail photo: The rectangular bit above the eagle is a plaque telling who owns the tomb in the Nabataean script. The eagle symbolizes the god Dushara, one of the principle gods of the Nabataean pantheon. It was meant to protect the tomb. However, none of the eagles we saw today were able to keep their heads. The two theories are that (1) Ottoman invaders wanted to destroy the heretic iconography, or (2) the heads were originally made in gold or some other metal, hence were stolen. Below the eagle is another head with snake-like hair protruding from either side, which is though to be a local interpretation of Medusa.

Like Petra, all of these structures were carved out of the rock rather than built. The tomb above was cut rather deep, and must have been very expensive to make.

Qasr Al-Bint has at least 30 tombs, all around the outcrop.

$An example of a curved arch entrance. Note the eagle, carved only as a relief in the wall, did not have its head removed. A section of the crowstep has fallen out along a natural fracture in the sandstone.$

An example of a curved arch entrance. Note the eagle, carved only as a relief in the wall, did not have its head removed. A section of the crowstep has fallen out along a natural fracture in the sandstone.

A detail of one of the tomb inscriptions. It is written in Nabataean Aramaic, a derivative of Western Aramaic, and may be linked to a since-abandoned Achaemenid script.

This was the only doorway I saw at Qasr Al-Bint that showed lions holding the six-petalled flower.

The fourth stop was to Jabal Ithlib. It is a siq, or narrow natural passage through the rock, that leads to a sacred spot for rituals. It is like a mini-version of the Siq in Petra.

The siq is just visible in the dark cleft.

Standing at just the right spot make it look guitar-shaped.

This large room is thought to have been used for meetings, possibly among priests, called a diwan. The room sits at the entrance to the siq. Off to the right is a system that funneled water down from the top of the overlying sandstone into a pool.

The remains of a temple, constructed at the far end of the siq, and probably off-limits to everyone except the priests.

The inscription above this wall relief (called a bethyl) describe it as a representation of a Syrian god, hence not a local one.

The bethyl of one of the old Arab gods, named Al-Lat. Any phonetic similarity between this and any later deities of the Arabian Peninsula is surely coincidental.

The last stop on today’s tour was to a small house (brand new, like everything) where I thought we were going to be paraded through a phantasmagoria of souvenirs. Instead, it was a workshop for us to try our hand at making clay pots.

Odette and her new-found friend from Greece wait their turn at the potter’s wheel.

Stuff like this was not what I was expecting to see in KSA. This little shop was well-staffed by women who really took the time and effort to help people try this activity.

After the tour, go with a Greek family we met to the old town part of Al-’Ula. They are on winter vacation and chose KSA, more or less for the same reasons I did. Like others we’ve met before here, they seem to pick spots for vacation that are well off the regular tourist trail.

“Old Town” Al-’Ula is all new, but done in a sort of old style, with cafes and restaurants. We eat a rather expensive dinner here.

A view east across the valley from old town.

The pedestrian streets are works of art.

Nice backdrop for the mosque.

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