JORDAN'S HISTORY AT A GLANCE
8500-4500 BC
Neolithic Period 4500-3300 BC
Chalcolithic Period 3300-1200 BC
Bronze Age 1200-539 BC
Iron Age 539-332 BC
Babylonian and Persian Periods Fourth Century BC-106 BC
Nabatean Kingdom 332-63 BC
Hellenistic Period 63 BC-324 AD
Roman Empire 324-640
Byzantine Period 640-1291
Islamic Middle Ages 661-750
Umayyad Caliphs 750-969
Abbasid Caliphs 969-1171
Fatimid Caliphs 1171-1263
Ayyubid Caliphs 1099-1291
Crusaders 1250-1517
Mamluk Caliphs 1517-1918
Ottoman Empire 1916-1918
Arab Revolt 1921
Ernirate of Transjordan established 1946
Transjordan gains independence 1950
New Name: Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan
AMMAN
The capital of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan since the country gained
independence in 1946, Amman is an ultra-modem metropolis that boasts a
history of nearly continuous inhabitation over the past 9,000 years.
Recently, it has grown dramatically. Its residential and business
districts extend over an ever-growing number of hills that are connected
by a sophisticated and efficient road network, and its population
numbers 1.5 million people.
Amman is Jordan's business and administrative center. By day, its
open-air markets bustle with people buying everything from food to
furniture in stalls and shops that line the streets and alleyways.
Countless grill restaurants beckon, offering local delicacies such as
kabob, felafel, hoummus and assorted other meats and salads.
First mentioned
in the Bible in Deuteronomy 3, as Rabbat-Ammon, the capital of the
Ammonites, the prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel each predicted that
Nebuchadnezzar would conquer the city, but they were proved wrong; the
Babylonian ruler took Jerusalem instead.
In the Hellenistic Period (about 300-65 BC), the city was ruled by the
Syrian Seleucids and the Egyptian Ptolemies, who conquered it from each
other several times. In the third century BC, it was renamed
Philadelphia by Ptolemy II Philadelphus, who conquered the city and
wanted to associate it with his own name. Later, the Nabateans held it
briefly, but Herod took it from them.
Philadelphia was one of the ten cities of the Roman Decapolis, and the
Romans built it rapidly and ambitiously. The most impressive remnant of
their rule is the well-preserved theatre at the heart of the city.
Philadelphia prospered throughout the Roman, Byzantine and Arab
periods, but it then began to decline. By the fifteenth century, it was
empty and in veritable ruins.
Through 400 years of Ottoman Turkish rule, the city remained neglected,
although the Sultan did send a small community of Circassians to settle
among the ruins in 1878.
Only in 1921, when Emir Abdullah of the prestigious Beduin Hashemite
family took the reins of the new entity of Transjordan and chose Amman
as his capital did the city begin to thrive again. It grew steadily, and
after Jordan gained independence in 1946 its population was bolstered by
successive influxes of newcomers.
Today, the historic area of Philadelphia lies at the heart of a
sprawling, aesthetically pleasing mixture of private homes, apartment
complexes, office buildings, public facilities, parks and open spaces.
THE ROMAN THEATER
Built into
the side of a mountain in the late second century AD by Antoninus Pius,
the theatre has room for 6,000 people. Restoration began in 1960, and
the theatre today is a prime example of Roman architecture. Adjacent is
the remain of the Odeon, or covered hall, which was built in the third
century AD.
CITADEL HILL
High atop the Roman Theatre and the rest of downtown Amman, this plateau
is the site of the ancient city of Rabbat-Ammon. Amid the Byzantine and
Umayyad ruins, the main attractions are the panoramic view of the
sprawling city and the surrounding desert plains, and the Amman
Archeological Museum, which is nestled behind the remains of a second
century Roman temple.
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