★ UNESCO
World Heritage
World Heritage
📷 Jan Simons · Pexels
Where in the world
Jordan
The site
Petra is the rock-cut capital of the Nabataeans, carved into the rose-colored sandstone cliffs of southern Jordan. Famed for facades like Al-Khazneh and an ingenious system of water conduits, this desert trading hub grew wealthy on the incense routes, peaking around 20,000 people in the first century CE. A UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the New Seven Wonders, it still draws over a million visitors a year.
Field notes
- civilizations
- Nabataean
- types
- City
- built
- 800 BCE
- occupied
- 800 BCE — 700 CE
- visitors
- 1,142,000 / year
- country
- Jordan
- elevation
- 800 m above sea level
See it in 3D
Figures of this place
Laid to rest, born or died at Petra
FI†
Flavian II of Antiochdied herePatriarch of AntiochC✶
Callinicusborn here3rd-century Greek historian, orator, rhetorician and sophistG✶
Genethliusborn hereancient sophist from ArabiaPictured through the ages
Artworks that portray Petra
