Bamuqqa باموقا

A small village looking north across the pass leading west to the Plain of Amuq and on to Antioch. House remains possibly date to the first century AD but the church was not constructed until the late sixth or early seventh century. قرية صغيرة تطل على الشمال وتقطع الطريق المؤدية غرباً إلى سهل العمق وصولاً […]

Palmyra (Tadmor) (بالميرا (تدمر

Legendary ‘caravan city’ of Rome’s Eastern trade (the ‘Silk Route’) Palmyra was known for many centuries to European audiences as simply a place of legend. The first European expedition to explore its ruins confirmed at the end of the seventeenth century that the legends were true and that much of what had been a prosperous […]

Bosra بصرى (ancient Bostra)

Bosra, Roman-era city in the Hauran with a virtually intact example of a Roman theatre. After Bostra became the capital of the new Roman province of Arabia in AD 106, the Nabataean town  rapidly acquired most of the attributes of a Roman city with a long colonnaded axis and major facilities for the Roman legion […]

Antioch انطاكيا

The young French artist, Louis-François Cassas, visited Antioch on his way to Palmyra in 1785. (See separate set on Palmyra.) The sketches he prepared at the time were later published in the form of lithographs, issued from 1799. These depictions give us important clues to the remains of the Byzantine and Crusader-era fortifications and gates […]