Decoding ancient maps reveals "mysterious" Byzantine city, forgotten for thousands of years

The ancient city of Tharais , buried for centuries, has been discovered in Jordan , revealing its glorious past with Byzantine churches, strategic trade routes and traces of a Christian community.

A startling archaeological discovery has just been announced that has stirred up the global scientific community: the ancient city of Tharais, which had been buried for centuries, has been successfully excavated thanks to a three-year (2021–2024) research project led by Dr. Musallam R. Al-Rawahneh. The Associate Professor of Archaeology from Mu'tah University (Jordan) has spent much of his career solving historical mysteries deep in the soil of Karak, a southern province of Jordan that has never been fully explored.

The start of this groundbreaking discovery came from an ancient source that seemed all too familiar: the Madaba Mosaic Map, made in the 6th century and now kept in the Church of St. George, Madaba. The stone mosaic map, more than 1,500 years old, is a magnificent geographical picture depicting the Byzantine Holy Land in detail. However, what caused a stir was that during the process of digital analysis combined with comparative stratigraphy, Dr. Al-Rawahneh's team discovered a detail that had been overlooked for decades: the location of Tharais, an ancient city that had only been mentioned sporadically in religious history books.

By comparing the map data with archaeological data from the field, the team of experts pinpointed the location of Tharais between the Moabite plateau and the southeastern edge of the Dead Sea – an extremely strategic location during the Byzantine period.

Tharais was more than a mere settlement. Archaeological evidence suggests that it was a thriving city, an important pilgrimage center, and a trading post on the route from Zoar (now Ghor es-Safi) to central Jordan. The biggest discovery that has shocked scholars is the remains of a Byzantine basilica – with a rectangular stone entrance, intricate mosaic floors, and stone doorways similar to those of other major religious structures in the region.

The presence of such a large-scale religious structure reinforces the hypothesis that Tharais was not only a place of habitation but also an iconic pilgrimage site, attracting thousands of Christians during its heyday.

Not stopping there, the excavation also brought extremely impressive discoveries about the level of economic and technical development of the ancient residents here. They found olive oil presses, grape presses, water mills, traces showing a thriving food production system, capable of feeding the local population and serving merchants and travelers from all over.

Tharais seems to have developed an agricultural economy that combined commerce and religious services, a perfect triangle that helped the city achieve prosperity beyond its time. Experts do not rule out the possibility that Tharais was an important link in the food and oil supply chain of the entire post-Roman Levant region.

Another iconic find is the tombstones inscribed in Greek and Latin, dating from the 5th to the 7th centuries. These steles not only record the names of the inhabitants, but also clearly reflect the religious, linguistic and cultural characteristics of the Christian community living here.

The inscriptions on the tombstones are "the last echoes of a once-brilliant civilization," Dr Al-Rawahneh said, revealing direct links between Tharais and major centers of power in the Byzantine world.

One of the biggest questions today is: how did a city with such strategic location, economic prosperity, and great religious significance like Tharais fall into oblivion? There are no clear records of Tharais' decline, but archaeologists suspect that geopolitical upheaval, religious wars, and depopulation due to disease may have led to its gradual abandonment, which was eventually buried under the dust of time.

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