The Ḥarrat al-Shām (Arabic: حَرَّة ٱلشَّام),[1][nb 1] also known as the Black Desert,[2] is a region of rocky, basaltic desert straddling southern Syria and the northern Arabian Peninsula. It covers an area of some 40,000 km² (15,000 sq mi)^{[citation needed]} in the modern-day Syrian Arab Republic, Jordan, Israel and Saudi Arabia. Vegetation is characteristically open acacia shrubland with patches of juniper at higher altitudes[3]

Ḥarrat al-Shām Black Desert
Location within the Levant of the wider volcanic province it is part of
Part of	Syrian Desert
Offshore water bodies	Lake Burqu' (see Qasr Burqu') Qa Shubayqa
Age	Oligocene, Neogene, Quaternary
Geology	Basaltic volcanic field
Volcanic field	Harrat Ash Shaam Volcanic Province (HASV)

The Harrat has been occupied by humans since at least the Late Epipalaeolithic period (c. 12,500–9500 BCE).[4] One of the earliest known sites is Shubayqa 1 (occupied c. 12,600–10,000 BCE),[4][5] where archaeologists have discovered the remains of the oldest known bread.[6]

Geology

The Harrat comprises volcanic fields formed by tectonic activity from the Oligocene through to the Quaternary period.[7] It is the largest of several volcanic fields on the Arabian Plate,[8] containing more than 800 volcanic cones and around 140 dikes.[7] Activity began during the Miocene; a younger eruptive stage, at the SE end of the volcanic field, occurred during the late-Pleistocene and Holocene.[9] It is known to have erupted in historic times.[10][11]

The Jabal al-Druze, al-Safa and Dirat al-Tulul volcanic fields, among others, form the northern and Syrian part of the harrat. The Saudi Arabian portion of the Harrat Ash Shamah volcanic field extends across a 210 km (130 mi)-long, roughly 75 km (47 mi)-wide NW-SE-trending area on the NE flanks of the Sirhan Valley and reaches its 1,100 metres (3,600 ft) high point at Jabal Al-Amud. It is in the Tabuk Region of northwest Saudi Arabia.[12][13] and is one of a series of Quaternary volcanic fields paralleling the Red Sea coast.

Archaeological sites

• Desert kites

Jordan

• Jawa, Early Bronze Age proto-urban settlement
• Qasr Azraq and Qasr 'Ain es-Sil, ancient fortified sites in the Azraq Oasis
• Qasr Burqu', ancient "desert castle"
• Qasr Usaykhim, ancient fort northeast of Azraq
• Shubayqa 1, Stone Age (Natufian) hunter-gatherer site with oldest bread-making find in the world

See also

• Badia region
• Hauran, historical region partially overlapping with Harrat al-Sham
• List of volcanoes in Saudi Arabia
• Sarat Mountains
  • Midian Mountains

Notes

References

Further reading

• Ilani, S., Harlavan, Y., Tarawneh, K., Rabba, I., Weinberger, R., Khalil, I., and Peltz, S. (2001), "New K-Ar ages of basalts from the Harrat Ash Shaam volcanic field in Jordan: Implications for the span and duration of the upper-mantle upwelling beneath the western Arabian plate" Geology 29(2):171–174
• Kempe, S. and Al-Malabeh, A. (2005), "Newly discovered lava tunnels of the Al-Shaam plateau basalts", Geophysical Research Abstracts 7, European Geosciences Union
• Salf, S.I. (1988), "Field and petrographic characteristics of Cenozoic basaltic rocks, Northwestern Saudi Arabia" Journal of African Earth Sciences, 7(5):805–809
• Weinstein, Y., Navon, O., Altherr, R., and Stein, M., (2006) "The role of lithospheric mantle heterogeneity in the generation of Plio-Pleistocene alkali basalt suites from NW Harrat Ash Shaam (Israel)", Journal of Petrology 47(5):1017–1050
• Al Kwatli, M.A., Gillot, P.Y., Zeyen, H., Hildenbrand, A., and Al Gharib, I., 2012. Volcano-tectonic evolution of the northern part of the Arabian plate in the light of new K-Ar ages and remote sensing: Harrat Ash Shaam volcanic province (Syria). Tectonophysics, 580, 192–207.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Black Desert.

•  Saudi Arabia portal
• "Harrat Ash Shaam". Global Volcanism Program. Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved 2021-06-25.
• VolcanoWorld information and aerial photograph

На других языках

[fr] Harrat Ash Shamah