Philadelphia / Amman

SCHOLARLY AND FICTIONAL WORKS: see Category:Philadelphia (subject)
ANCIENT SOURCES: see Philadelphia (sources)

Philadelphia (now Amman, Jordan) was an Hellenistic polis, one of cities of the Decapolis.

Overview

The ancient capital of the Ammonites was conquered by the Assyrians, followed by the Persians, and then the Greeks. Ptolemy II Philadelphus turned it into a Hellenistic polis and renamed it Philadelphia. The city was conquered by the Seleucids in 218 BC and it gradually passed into the Kingdom of Nabataea.

After the Roman conquest in 63 BCE, the city became the southernmost member of the Decapolis.

Later in 106 AD, when the Nabataean Empire was absorbed by the Romans, Philadelphia became part of the new Province of Arabia. The 'Via Nova Traiana', which linked Aqaba with Damascus, connected Philadelphia to the other cities in the province.

Philadelphia continued to flourish in the Byzantine period (when it was the seat of a diocese) and in the early Muslim period (when it was renamed Amman). A series of natural disasters then reduces the city to a small village, until the late 19th century. In contemporary times the city has expanded dramatically as the capital of new State of Jordan.