Nabatian Trail | Avdat National Park

In the heart of the desert, on a hilltop above the Tsin Stream watercourse, are the impressive remains of an ancient Nabatean city. Avdat was founded by the Nabateans in the 4th century BCE. Initially it was a waystation on the Nabatean Incense Route – the ancient trade routes crossing the Arabian Peninsula to the city of Gaza and the Mediterranean Sea. These routes served the camel caravans, mainly carrying spices and incense. The city developed in the days of King Obodas II (1st century BCE), and was named after him. A temple, an army camp, and other buildings from this time have been found.

At the end of the 1st century CE, the city’s inhabitants moved over to agriculture as their main livelihood, and an inscription from this period found at the site mentions the Nabatean king Rabbel II – “Restorer and deliverer of his people”. Apparently under pressure of the heavy hand of the Romans, who damaged the Nabatean economy, he laid the foundation for the development of agriculture and animal husbandry. In the year 106 CE, after the death of the king, Avdat was annexed to the Roman empire and continued to develop. The height of its prosperity was in the Byzantine period (4th – 7th centuries CE). The city’s inhabitants converted to Christianity and built magnificent churches, developed intensive agriculture, constructed water storage systems, and dug many caves in the hillside.

The caves were used mainly as workshops and storerooms for keeping and processing the agricultural produce. Towards the end of the Byzantine period the security situation in the city was undermined. In around 630 the city was damaged by a strong earthquake, and shortly after, in 636, the area was conquered by Arab tribes. These two factors together sealed its fate and the city was abandoned.

Modern archeological study of the city began in the 19th century, and in 1870 a researcher by the name of Palmer identified the site and determined that it was the city of Avdat. Methodical archeological excavations began in 1958, under Michael Avi-Yonah and Avraham Negev, of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In the 1970s further excavations were carried out at the site. In the 1950s an agricultural farm was established by the city (Even-Ari Farm), in an attempt to reconstruct the ancient farming methods and ways of storing water.