Indiana Jones’ Petra has a worthy rival in Hegra, Saudi Arabia
With none of the crowds but much of the mystique of Jordan’s Petra facades, Hegra is a history-rich highlight in newly accessible Saudi Arabia
In 1845, theologian John William Burgon wrote one of the most quoted lines in English poetry: “Match me such marvel save in Eastern clime, a rose-red city half as old as time.”
Petra, his only poem, was written in homage to the well-hidden labyrinth of rock-cut tombs, temples and monuments that was the capital of the 3rd century BC-1st century AD Nabataean kingdom, and whose remains lie in modern-day Jordan.
Few images are more striking than that of the ornate pink two-storey frontage of the tomb known as the Treasury, seen cropped by the dark slit of the Siq, the narrow waterworn passage through which it is approached. It’s a view familiar to many from the climax of the 1989 film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
