Udhruh
1:
UDHRUH (M.R. 207971). A site, some 20 km NW of Ma’an and 15 km E of Petra on the edge of the Jordanian desert, which is watered by a perennial spring. The site has therefore attracted settlements throughout antiquity. Excavations (1980–1985) have concentrated on the town of Udhruh, and at the same time a detailed survey has been undertaken of the region from Ma’an-Ain Musa-Shobek-Ma’an (800 km2).
The first historical record of the town is a reference by the geographer Ptolemy in the early 2d century a.d., although inscriptions and literary sources emphasize the wealth and importance of the town in Byzantine and Early Islamic times. The only serious archaeological work at the site was a five-day survey in 1897 by Brünnow and Domaszewski (1904). In 1980, rescue work began because a modern village had expanded westwards over the architectural remains and removed many of the walls.
The architectural site of Udhruh consists of a large Roman-walled town with twenty-four projecting defensive towers. Several towers still survive to first-story height, and sections of the town wall stand 7 m high. Other extant structures in the town include a Roman basilica, a Byzantine church, and an Ottoman fort. However, surface surveys indicate occupation as early as the Paleolithic and continuing into the Chalcolithic periods. A dense scatter of Neolithic tools and flakes outside the town implies the existence of a Pre-Pottery Neolithic settlement. EB and LB ceramics show a continuity of occupation, but late Iron Age walls in the lower levels of a deep trench near the spring are the earliest structures so far found in the town.
The Nabateans are best known for their capital at Petra, but their pottery is also one of their most remarkable legacies. The very fine and delicate ceramics have more of the texture and quality of porcelain than one would normally associate with earthenware. In fact, the fineness of the techniques used in both manufacture and decoration are unparalleled in earthenware in antiquity. Finds from the Udhruh pottery kiln include over 1,000 kg of Nabatean ceramics, spindle sockets for potter’s wheels, an iron trimming knife, and a bronze spatula identical to that used by modern potters for shaping and smoothing.
Excavations have shown that Udhruh had a sizable Nabatean settlement, which was partially underground with tunnels and semisubterranean structures quarried into the limestone hillside S of the town walls. One underground passage, over 20 m long, yielded a mass of Nabatean ceramics and glass.
The town walls were probably constructed at the same time as the Via Traina Nova in 112–14 a.d. A papyrus from Egypt mentions legionaries at work in regional quarries at this time, and the reference may refer to the most extensive quarries in Jordan, discovered in the 1980 survey, one km W of Udhruh. The town walls probably stood 12 m high in antiquity and would have presented a formidable obstacle to marauding desert tribes from the E. The walls were rebuilt in the Byzantine period, but were not significantly altered throughout the site’s later phases, which continued without major break into the 16th century. Several of the towers and gateways have been excavated, and a central large administrative building has been exposed together with its colonnaded courtyard.
In 1980, a detailed survey of the region was initiated, and over two hundred new sites have been found, including a Roman construction camp for the town of Udhruh and a complex series of forts and towers forming a defensive frontier along the Roman highway. Tell Udhruh (500 m from the main site) was excavated in 1985 to reveal an extensive Iron II settlement terraced on the hillside. Over 110 sites have been found in the survey with Iron Age to Roman period ceramics on the surface.
Bibliography
Brünnow, R. E., and Domaszewski, A. 1904. Die Provincia Arabia I. Strasbourg.
Killick, A. C. 1982. Udruh, 1980 and 1981 Seasons. ADAJ 26: 415–16.
———. 1983. Udruh—The Frontier of an Empire. Levant 15: 110–31.
———. 1986a. Udruh—eine antike statte vor den Toren Petras. Pp. 44–57 in Petra neue Ausgrabungen und Entdeckungen, ed. M. Lindner. Munich.
———. 1986b. Udruh and the Southern Frontier. In The Defence of the Roman and Byzantine East, ed. P. Freeman and D. Kennedy. BARIS 297. Oxford.
———. 1986c. Nabatean Pottery Legacy. Illustrated London News 274: 7059 (Oct.).
Alistair Killick
Freedman, D. N. (1996, c1992). The Anchor Bible Dictionary (6:694). New York: Doubleday.
