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To know Syria is to have knowledge of a legendary world.
Palmyra is like a pearl in the heart of the desert. Rising from
the sands, is one of the most graceful and splendid ancient
sites on the East. The glory and the greatness are still evident
and fully years after its construction by the Arab Queen Zenobia.
It remains one of most famous capitals of the ancient world.
Palmyra is separated by around one hundred kilometers of steppe
from the lush valley of the Orontes to the west. There are more
than two hundred kilometers of desert to cross before you reach
the fertile banks of the Euphrates to the east.
In both, north and south there is nothing but sand and stone.
But here in Palmyra, a last fold of the Anti-Lebanon forms is a
kind of basin on where a spring rises out from a long
underground channel which depth has never been measured.
This spring in inscriptions is called Afqa (or Ephka), an
Aramaic word meaning “way out”. It is clear, blue, slightly
sulphurous water, which has medicinal properties and fed an
oasis with olives, date palms, cotton and cereals. For
generations this oasis was known as Tadmor.
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