The Nabataean Towns of the Negev

1 · POSITION

The Nabataean towns of the Negev — Haluza, Mamshit, Avdat and Shivta — with their forts and two caravanserais were inscribed by UNESCO in 2005 as the Incense Route – Desert Cities in the Negev. They are the western end of the road that carried frankincense and myrrh from southern Arabia to the Mediterranean, and the register holds them as proof that a desert crossing could be made survivable by building. [1, 2]

2 · A HUNDRED KILOMETRES OF DESERT

The inscribed sites stretch across a hundred-kilometre section of the desert, from Moa on the Jordanian border to Haluza, with four fortresses — Kazra, Nekarot, Makhmal and Grafon — and caravanserais at Moa and Saharonim. All four towns lay on the main road from Petra to Gaza. [1, 2]

3 · WATER MADE BY HAND

The towns lived on runoff: dams, channels, cisterns and reservoirs gathered the desert’s rare rain and supported farming on a scale the land could not otherwise bear. Haluza was famous for its wine in the fifth century, surrounded by vineyards; Mamshit bred Arabian horses; every town had its wine presses. [1, 2]

4 · THE FOUR TOWNS

Avdat was a stop and camping ground for the caravans; Mamshit, the smallest, is the best restored; Shivta is argued by some to have been a Byzantine farming colony and a rest stop for pilgrims to Saint Catherine’s; Haluza, near Beersheba, kept a theatre and two churches. The register holds Avdat, Shivta and Mamshit under their own codes. [2]

5 · ⚑ CANDOUR

⚑ UNESCO dates the trade’s end to the second century in one place and the fourth in another. The towns’ Byzantine and later phases are long; the register reads them chiefly for their caravan centuries. [1–2]