This morning we headed out of Amman to Jerash, a city about 30 miles north. The city goes back to neolithic times, but is known for its well-preserved Roman city. The Greeks proceeded the Roman’s here, with Alexander the Great likely establishing a city here, but the remaining Roman town is extensive. The temples here are referred to by both the Greek and Roman god names. The Romans came to the area in 63 AD. Jerash was on a trade route and became quite successful. 

Much of Jerash was under soil and rediscovered in the 19th and 20th centuries Some had been toppled by a large 8th century earthquake, but the stones were still there. The city wall is also largely intact. They have been able to reconstruct much of the city using the original stones. They continue to work on this reconstruction, as there are many un-excavated area and many loose stones. They are not doing any true modern restoration with replacement stonework.

As you come into Jerash you go past a hippodrome, where they had races, especially chariot races. This is just outside of the south gate of the city. You also encounter the Arch of Hadrian. This was erected in honor of Hadrian’s visit to Jerash.

South gate of Jerash entering the city.

Arch of Hadrian

As you come in the south gate you see the Temple of Zeus (Jupiter). It is elevated with buildings and, originally, a staircase below it. The temple has multiple Corinthian columns. 

Temple of Zeus

Facing but just past the Temple of Zeus is the oval colonnaded forum. There are 56 Ionic columns. The paving of the forum is original with some of it actually dating back to the Greek settlement.

Colonnaded forum as seen from the top of the theater. The main road is going off to the upper left.

Another view of the forum and the main road heading off. You can see the current city of Jerash in the background.

From there we went to the main and larger theater. This is not as large as the one in Amman, but it is better preserved. It seated about 3000.

Theater. Paul took this picture from the top. If you look closely you can see me at the right end of the stage petting a cat.

Our guide had a baggie of food for the many cats here. This is the cat I was petting in the picture above.

Panorama pic of the theater. That’s Paul climbing up in the middle.

This side street is not fully excavated. It joins up to the main street at the far end.

From there we went to an area behind the Temple of Artemis where 3 Byzantine churches were built side by side. The most notable of these is the Church of Saints Cosmas and Damianus. This church has a very large area of intact mosaic flooring. The middle of the 3 churches is the Church of Saint John the Baptist and the other end is the oldest one, the Church of Saint George. The Church of Saint George has a small area of existing mosaics.

The Church of Saints Cosmas and Damianus. The majority of the mosaic floor is present. You can see the columns of the Church of Saint John the Baptist behind the wall. At the far end you can see remains of the Church of Saint George.

A better view of part of the floor.

Right by the churches is the Temple of Artemis (Diana). This is the largest temple here. There are large Corinthian columns and the inside was lined with marble.

Temple of Artemis

Columns of the Temple of Artemis. As you can see, some of them are not perfectly aligned anymore.

We looked out to the north gate, but did not walk out to it.

The gate at the far end is the north gate to the city. The closer one is the Northern Tetrapylon.

Next was the second theater. This one is smaller and not as well preserved.

The second theater. We entered it from the top, which is ground level at that side.

Better view.

We then went down to the main colonnaded street. There are fountains along here. The largest is the nymphaeum.

Walking down the street.

Colonnaded main street.

You can tell where the chariots drove down the main street as they eventually wore down ruts.

The Nymphaeum (huge fountain)

Drain under the Nymphaeum fountain. The water drained out of a lions mouth (carving too damaged to tell its a lion anymore) and down through the eyes of these 4 dolphins.

After we finished seeing Jerash we headed farther north to Ajloun to see Ajloun Castle. This site was originally a Byzantine monastery, but the Castle was built here in 1184 by one of the generals in Saladin’s army. Saladin was known for fighting the crusaders and taking Jerusalem, among many other things. This castle was more of a fortress and it was placed here to prevent crusader incursions and to help maintain the loyalty of the local beduins. The Castle was expanded over time, but eventually was damaged by earthquakes in 1837 and 1927.

Ajloun Castle

One of the passageways. Most of the rooms were unadorned and unlabled, so not conducive for pictures.

Mosaic in the small museum in Ajloun Castle.

As you can see from the pictures it was cloudy all day. It did eventually rain on us, but not for long.