Qasr Amr is located on the desert road to Azraq and is possibly the highlight of the chain of desert castles built in eastern Jordan. It was built by Caliph Walid I in around 715AD. As the name suggests, it was originally part of a castle, but now all the remains is a small stone structure which was built as a royal retreat, away from the noise and prying eyes of Damascus.
Renowned for its painted frescos on the interior walls and roofs, Qasr Amr is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The paintings, amongst other things, depict pagan images, animals, hunting scenes and naked women. Qasr Amr is widely to be considered what would these days be called a Pleasure Palace, and seemed to be a placed where the Caliph and his associates could cast off the stricter teachings of Islam.
It is a useful study place for those interested in the development and take-up of early Islam, in that some of the earlier followers found problems reconciling their new faith with their established cultural heritage. In a similar way, there are examples of coinages from Damascus and Jerusalem that show the slow evolution from Christian Byzantine coins to more recognizably Islamic coinage, something that took several decades.
For perhaps a thousand years, the building was lost from popular memory until its rediscovery by Alois Musil in 1898. The frescoes were restored about 70 years later. Many paintings show influences of Persian culture and wildlife, perhaps due to the mother of Caliph Yazid III, who was from there. There is a victory image of the Caliph’s 6 major enemies; these being the Byzantine Emperor, Roderic; the Visigoth king; Sassanid, the Persian Shah; the Negus of Ethiopia; a Turkic rule from Central Asia; and an Indian Raja. One of the rooms has depictions of animals performing human actions, overlooked by an Angel and three figures of whom the middle is thought by local Christians to represent Jesus.
The domed roof of the hot bath room has a painted representation of the night sky, with 35 recognizable constellations on show. It is thought to be the first pictorial representation of the night sky on something other than a flat surface. It should be noted that however unexpected the interior images might be to modern visitors to an apparently Islamic building, the painting also followed the advice of contemporary Arab doctors, who believed that bathing drained the life force and spirit of bathers, and that the only way to recover their spirit was to surround themselves by the animal, the natural and the spiritual.
This is obviously something that those who enjoyed Qasr Amr took to heart. Qasr Amr is well worth a visit to anyone in or visiting Jordan since it is just meters off a main desert highway, and less than an hours drive from central Amman. A day trip can be made by visiting some of the other nearby castles, some of which are in better condition but none as unique.
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