Older blog 26 September, 2009
I
am second from the right, next to the Jordanian Archaeology student
(you gotta admire the strength of her religious conviction, because
wearing this hijab under that sun was beyond what I could bare). You
cannot tell from the picture how hot it was and how dehydrated, hungry,
and tired I was.
I
cannot show detailed pictures of the dig site because the results have
not been published yet. But here is a touristic picture of the site
without identifying any architectural features.
The
paved road that you see is the main straight road of the town. The
Romans liked their square grid, the basis of their standard urban
planning. But in order to satisfy your curiosity for Roman ruins here
are some pictures of Jarash itself.
By
the way “Roman” does not mean that the inhabitants of the town spoke
Latin or that the town was built by the Roman state. In fact, the town
was built and beautified by its inhabitants who were a mixture of
Aramaic and Arabic speaking locals (that is before the Islamic period),
and perhaps some Greek-speaking clergy and officials who also could be
from mixed origins. Then, as it is today, what made you a citizen of the
empire was not your ethnicity but your buying into its promise and its
constructed identity.
I vowed never to return, but now I dream about it every day. My
conviction now is that the field of Medieval Islamic History must
continue hand in hand with the field of Islamic Archaeology. I encourage
all students of Medieval Islam to join a dig for a month or a couple of
weeks. It is enlightening.
al-Jumhuriyya
