6 nights from £575
Many will be familiar with the story of the discovery of the lost city of Petra (and subsequently Abu Simbel) by the Swiss born explorer Jean Louis Burckhardt (1784 – 1817). Commissioned by the African Association promoting African discovery he visited Egypt and Syria (1809 – 13); re-discovering Petra in 1812 and then, posing as a learned Muslim, became the first Christian to reach Medina. He died whilst preparing to set out from Upper Egypt for his original goal, the Niger River.
Whilst his visits to Petra and Abu Simbel were short his extended stay in Syria was to study the Arab language and way of life and his local expeditions included Damascus, Palmyra and the ancient Roman sites of Apamea and Bosra. Set in the deserts of western Syria, Palmyra became wealthy as an oasis at the western end of the Silk Road and a frontier between the Persian and Roman empires. Queen Zenobia even profited from temporary Roman weakness in 272AD to extend her domains as far as Egypt and Turkey before the emperor Aurelian reasserted the authority of Rome. The conversion of the Bosra Roman theatre into an Arab fort has radically changed its external appearance but paradoxically the filling of the interior with rubble has preserved it as arguably the most intact of all surviving Roman theatres.
In the summer of 1909 T. E. Lawrence began a walking tour in Syria, Palestine, and parts of Turkey and in his subsequent thesis on ‘The Influence of the Crusades on European Military Architecture‘ he described Crac des Chevaliers as ‘the finest castle in the world’.
VJV Special Event - Dining in the Old Town
In Damascus we have arranged a special dinner with music and dance in a traditional house which is now a restaurant. Click here for more exclusive arrangements by VJV.
