Google Earth reveals three Roman camps: “Emperor Trajan’s secret mission”

Not only roads, palaces and aerobatics, but also authentic archaeological finds, such as the defensive walls of Roman camps, with their typical orthogonal geometric formation. “electronic” eye Google Earth I actually intercepted an unknown heritage from two thousand years ago. using satellite images It was possible to detect the presence of Ben Three Roman camps The millennium is hidden under the sands of stratigraphy Southern Jordan desert. What were they doing there? Why was it built there? It might have been functional for one person Military mission in the second century AD. And here comes the beauty of discovery. Actually backstory. A story within a story. Indeed, there is no trace in the historical sources of a Roman military incursion into this region. For this reason, archaeologists believe that the fields may have been part of A planned covert attack on the Nabataean city of Dumat al-Jandal.

The importance of discovery

Hundreds of Roman structures that can be associated with military settlements in Europe have been identified. Today, however, there are only a few in the Middle East. That was why the presence of three intact camps in this region was an extremely rare fact. Each site has the classic “playing card” look of Roman military bivouacs. The defensive walls were built by piling up rocks, and in front of each entrance were small fortifications called “tetuli”. Basically, Google Earth has only been able to image the geometrical outlines of the fields, also because excavations have not yet begun to illuminate any remains of buildings or tall walls. The news, which was published in a study in the scientific journal “Antiquito”, was reported by the LiveScience website. Discovery has to deal with history, and even rewrite it.

Secret mission

As LiveScience explains, in the second century, the southern part of Jordan was controlled by the kingdom of the Nabataeans, a people apparently allied with the Roman Empire. The layout of the newly discovered camps seems to follow a strategic route (unusual, different from the routes usually taken, because the usual route to the city was north, from Azraq) towards the Nabataean city of Dumat al-Jandal, which is now located in Arabia. The team of scientists led by Michael Fradley, a landscape archaeologist at the University of Oxford, assumed this The camps were part of a secret Roman mission to attack from an unexpected direction. Roman records indicate that after the death of its king in AD 106, the Nabatean kingdom passed peacefully under Roman rule during the reign of Trajan.. But the new findings suggest that the transition to Roman rule may have been more violent than previously thought. Anything but a ladder.

How did the discovery happen?

It all started a year ago when Fradley was using Google Earth to examine images of the desert near Jordan’s southern border with Saudi Arabia as part of the Endangered Archeology of the Middle East and North Africa project, for which researchers are using satellite imagery. It was at those stages that Fradley became acquainted with the classic “playing card” form of the Roman camp. Not just one. The real surprise was another: “Less than 24 hours later, he met two more, which led in a direct line from Oasis to Bayer southeast of the desert.”

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