Petra Tour: Royal Tombs
Some of the most impressive tombs in Petra, sculpted out of the western slope of the Jabal al-Hubta rock massif, overlooking the city center.
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Tomb BD 770 is known as Silk or Streaked Tomb, because of the iridescent colours of its eroded sandstone façade.
A closer look reveal the Hegra-type architectural details:
A principal order with entablature supported by four half columns; a dwarf order with pilasters and mouldings (fascia, torus and large cavetto); and a frieze of two sets of five steps facing each other. The doorway appears to have been plain, with a loculus above it. In the spaces between the outer half columns there are framed niches with an extremely weathered relief figure.
Carved very high up on the smoothed surface opposite of the left large set of steps, there is a tiny figure of the type called "sword deity". The figure consists of a pillar body with head and stub-like arms standing on a pedestal. As Wadeson & Wenning have concluded, "it is possible that it represents Dushara, the ‘one from the Shara Mountains’. By carving the image of the deity who owns the rock, the stonemasons sought divine protection during their work," (see the sliding image above).
© Photos, summary: Haupt & Binder
Some of the most impressive tombs in Petra, sculpted out of the western slope of the Jabal al-Hubta rock massif, overlooking the city center.
Rudolf-Ernst Brünnow and Alfred von Domaszewski: Die Provincia Arabia, Volume 1.
Verlag Karl J. Trübner, Strasbourg 1904.
The catalogue of grave facades and other monuments in Petra, compiled by the researchers during their travels in 1897 and 1898, still serves as a reference today - abbreviated BD or Br. with the respective number.
Two sets of five steps over a cavetto (concave moulding) cornice, and fascia (horizontal mouldings). A non-decorative attic above the classical entablature, supported by the pilasters. "Hegra" refers to the second largest Nabataean settlement on the southern border of the kingdom, today's Mada'in Salih in Saudi Arabia.