Petra Tour: Wadi Farasa East
Coming from Jabal al-Madhbah, the tour continues through the idyllic valley. Highlights are the Garden Triclinium, the Soldier Tomb complex, with the large colourful triclinium, and the Renaissance Tomb.
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This building was first described by researchers as a garden tomb, then as a garden temple and garden triclinium. The original function is still not clearly evidenced. Archaeologists involved in the long-term International Wadi Farasa Project (IWFP) found out that it was definitely not a burial site and that it was not a temple, but had a secular use. It could have been an inhabited garden house in a park-like area of Wadi Farasa East. The close constructive connection with the large cistern and the corresponding basins, channels and smaller cisterns suggests that the inhabitants of the house were responsible for their maintenance (see also the photos and information about the cisterns).
The building probably originated in connection with the Soldier Tomb complex, which closed off access to this upper part of the wadi, in the second to third quarter of the 1st century AD.
The 8 m high stone wall next to the garden triclinium belongs to a huge cistern, one of the biggest water collecting reservoirs in Petra (more info and photos).
© Photo, text: Haupt & Binder
Coming from Jabal al-Madhbah, the tour continues through the idyllic valley. Highlights are the Garden Triclinium, the Soldier Tomb complex, with the large colourful triclinium, and the Renaissance Tomb.