Gone East: Part 3

All the best road movies seem to be in the desert. I think it's the solitude of the desert that lends itself to the story lines of movies like Bullet, or Easy Rider. The lone hero traverses the lifeless desert on a path of both external and internal examination. In many of the movies there are the one-stoplight towns. The hero, rolls up to the solitary stoplight with the engine purring and attracts the attention of the locals. After the brief pause the engine roars, and the hero leaves the town with a dust cloud behind him.

Azraq, is the Jordanian incarnation of the generic one-stoplight town. It is a jumble of dusty two or three story buildings clustered beside a dyeing oasis. The mud puddles that now pass for Azraq Wetlands National Park were once great pools of year round water. For centuries they had been the lifeblood of movement between the Mesopotamian river valleys and the Mediterranean coast. Since groundwater pumping began in the 1970’s however, the the life giving waters have been receding. Now it is muddy green smear across the otherwise beige desert.

The town itself had, until one year ago, been reborn as a desert way station. The foundation of the modern incarnation was based on the trucks and cargo that used to run 24 hours a day between Amman and Baghdad. They had fueled the “rebuilding” of Iraq post 2003. It also was the main conduit by which Iraqi refugees escaped the ever increasing violence. The lonely dust blown town of Azraq was the first substantial settlement to greet the newcomers to Jordan. Concrete and re-bar were shipped by the ton, replacing people who were escaping in the thousands.

By 2004, with the Mahdi Army offensive in major southern towns of Iraq, like Karbala and Najaf, it was becoming too dangerous to ship through the southern Iraqi port of Basra. Instead more and more freight was going to Aqaba first, and then being put on trucks to Baghdad via Amman. It is not a stretch of the truth to say that the destruction wrought on Iraq represented a significant business opportunity in Jordan. Azraq represented a small microcosm of that new found opportunity. An insignificant desert oasis given a new breath by the destruction next door.

Of course, in 2014 the US ground forces were leaving along with their coalition partners. Their absence allowed what was a serious insurgency to spawn into what amounted to civil war. Running lonely desert highway between Amman and points in Iraq became even more dangerous. The now infamous “Sunni Triangle”, also known as the “Triangle of Death”, is bisected by the east-west highway with its eastern nexus in Azraq. The shipping began to decline as the number of kidnappings, roadside bombings, and the level of extortion went up. Until in mid-2015 the border was closed all together by the arrival of the so called Islamic State into Iraq.

Ever since then Azraq has slipped back into poverty and anonymity.

We had had arrived in Azraq at noon; a fitting hour for our own version of a road movie. Our fire engine red Picanto was no American muscle car but it did look about the most flashy thing in town. We had come of course not on our way to Iraq, this would be the farthest west we would go, but to see the basalt castle of Azraq. Built by the Romans at a date as yet unknown to stand watch on the ragged edge of their then massive empire.

The rectangular castle was in the words of both Pete and Claudia: “A proper castle”. It had four high walls. It had been built on a low rise offering maximum visibility to warn against invaders. Not that one would have trouble seeing the invaders across the vast treeless desert. The walls was near three feet thick and constructed out of locally quarried black basalt. The deep black color gave the whole structure a certain evil feeling to it. Surely in a Tolkien story this would be the shattered lair of some great villain. It had guard towers, arrow slits, a proper gate, and vaulted store rooms.

In many ways Qasr Azraq is much the opposite of Kharana. It's purpose could not be more clear: protect the desert oasis and its accompanying caravan trade. It's lineage is clear as well: Nabatean settlement, Roman castle, then Byzantine, expanded by the Muslim caliphs, disuse, Lawrence of Arabia.

The final occupant in particular is interesting. Lawrence did infact use the ruins of The castle as a headquarters for his ongoing Arab revolt.The large room above the main gate was converted into a command and control center, and it was here that he penned the majority of the Seven Pillars of Wisdom. It is considered his most seminal work.

The castle deteriorated more since Lawrence's tenure but the makeshift command and control center above the main gate still exists. It is strange to stand in a empty room and imagine planning a raid on the Hijaz railway from such a place. Perhaps

it was also in that room where Roman commanders planned their raids on Sassanid settlements in the Tigris and Euphrates valleys. Perhaps the Uthman caliphs dined in that room before continuing to an orgy in Qasr Amra to the east. In a car, without stopping, it would have taken us and hour and half to make it from Amman to the small room overlooking the forlorn town of Azraq. It probably would take the truckers less time given the speed they travel.

By horse, camel, or by foot it would have taken days. It would have meant traversing, without getting lost, the vast and indistinguishable desert. It meant avoiding bandits, and having water the whole time. It also meant avoiding any other number of misfortunes that may befall people in wild places. After Azraq there was very little until the fertile river valleys of Iraq. This then was the very limit of exertion of mighty Roman’s power. It watched the blossoming Islamic empire. And it was the nerve center of the British backed insurgency that was to inspire Arabs in many ways to a level of nationalism they had hitherto not experienced.

Now it's just a room in a ruined castle hemmed in by the town that borrows the namesake.

Despite being ruined now there is enough still standing now to appreciate the building just on its own. It required a certain amount of innovation in order to construct the compound in the first place. Palm trees are the only substantial trees that grow in the oasis’ harsh environment, and are highly unsuitable for building. That means that Azraq is several hundred kilometers from the nearest suitable hardwood resources.

In order to compensate for the lack of wood for flooring, joists, as well as scaffolding, the Romans cut ten foot “timbers” of basalt. Some of these have aged better than others in the ensuing millennia years since they were quarried. It makes exploring the place a rather fraught business. Walking along the upper level is fine until you realize the beams holding you up are shattered at one end. Along with the meager timber resources, the Romans had to contend with a limited amount of metals tools. This seriously limited their ability to hew the stone once it was quarried, and in turn made the walls of Azraq one of the the world's largest jigsaw puzzles. Each piece of the walls is its own unique shape and consistency. One can only help but to sympathize with the poor soul whose job it was to align all of the millions of stone pieces.

The only use for the proliferating palms of the area during construction was for their oil. Palm oil it was the only lubricant available to grease the joints of the enormous slabs of stone that acted as gates. Each was a single page of basalt that must have weighed several tons.

The only surviving example is a final example of how ingenious, as well as dedicated, the original architects must have been.

Claudia, naturally never let us forget this as we dined in the only restaurant we could find.

“They were amazing! Really it's incredible”. Yes, we agree. “It says in the guidebook that there is another Roman castle! Hallabat! Let's go there next”. We quickly consulted the map. Discovering that it lay beside one of the two routes back to Amman, we made Qasr Hallabat our next destination. Angled the car back onto the arrow straight highway with dust blowing across it, and gunned it west looking for the final castle of the day leaving the stillness of Azraq behind us.