Painted Stones

Many of the stone walls of Petra were rough uneven and unsightly. To make them look good the workers put heavy amounts of plaster on the walls and drew in the stone blocks to make the wall look neat. Some of the walls were so uneven that the plaster in places were almost a foot thick. Workmen still do that to some degree.

I had some work done on my house and noticed some big cracks between joints. I asked the workers about the cracks in the wall. 

Their reply was, "That is why they make painters putty." Sure enough they filled the cracks with putty and painted over the error. Some things never change.

Caged Art

Here is a follow up picture of the caged art and you can see  how much has been chipped of and damaged over the years. There is also smoke damage from cooking fires. You can see why it had to be protected.

Take Lots of Pictures

One of the things we do during a dig season is take lots of pictures. I am so thankful for the invention of the digital camera. I took hundreds of pictures and did not have to develop any of them to see them. It was so easy to shoot and then look at the picture. If it was a bad shot I deleted it and retook the photo.

In this picture my friend Eudora is taking a picture of two thousand year old art work. It is behind bars to protect it from tourist who use to remove small pieces of it. Grrrr.