The Sculptures of Petra / Petra Sculpture Project (PSP)

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Robert Wenning
• Subject Area: Classical, Roman, Christian and Islamic Archaeology ; Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies
• Term: from 2013 to 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 246076072

All available sculptural monuments of the Hellenistic-Roman period from Petra will be systematically researched by Prof. R. Wenning, Münster, and Prof. T. M. Weber, Jordan University Amman, in close cooperation with Mohammad Abd el Aziz al-Marahleh, Petra Museum. Further cooperation with the Department of Antiquities of Jordan, the Jordan University and archaeological institutions and colleagues in Jordan and abroad is desirable and necessary. Research means a complete recording of the monuments enlarged by analysis, classification and interpretation. Finally, the sculptures go to be published in a monograph. The sculptures are preserved at buildings, in rock-face and standing in the field in Petra or are kept in museums and collections in Jordan and abroad. The definition of sculptures concerns sculptural three-dimensional objects worked in stone, metal, plaster or bone except the terracotta figurines and the betyl-niches, regardless the size and the preservation. Some sculptures are well-known, but they shape only about a third of the available sculptures at all. Even those better known sculptures often are only partly documented. All objects should be shown in frontal, side and back view. Measurements and other data and a bibliography of each object are given. It can be shown that the corpus of the sculptures from Petra is different to corpora of many other cities in the Roman East. The original context of the sculptures will be researched wherever it seems to be possible. The peculiarities of Petra and the character of the Nabataean society are considered when interpreting the sculptures. The corpus and the interpretations make the sculptures accessible to other scholars dealing with political, social or religious aspects of the Nabataeans and the Roman Near East. The monograph completed the prepared or published corpora of Hellenistic-Roman sculptures from Syria and Northern Jordan.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: Jordan
• Participating Person: Professor Dr. Thomas M. Weber