Palmyrena
Palmyrena or Palmyrene, also referred to as Solitudines Palmyrenae in Latin sources, was the vast region surrounding and controlled from the ancient city of Palmyra, in Syria. Archeological research dedicated to Palmyrena truly began in the first half of the 20th century, conducted by Alois Musil, Antoine Poidebard and Daniel Schlumberger.
History
Originally inhabited by Arameans who spoke Aramaic, Palmyrena, like all of Aram, was later conquered by the neighboring Neo-Assyrian Empire and afterwards ruled by the Achaemenid Empire. By the 1st century BCE, Palmyra became a client city of the Roman Empire and became part of the Roman province of Syria. In 194 CE, Palmyra became part of Syria Phoenice as a result of the division of Syria by Septimius Severus. In the 3rd century CE, under Queen Zenobia, the city led a short-lived breakaway state known as the Palmyrene Empire, controlling much of the Eastern Mediterranean before being reconquered by Rome.Geography
Palmyrena encompassed the oasis city of Palmyra and its surrounding desert hinterlands, forming a key stop along trade routes connecting the Mediterranean world with Mesopotamia and the Iranian plateau to the east, and with the Arabian Peninsula to the south. Its location made it an important center of commerce and cultural exchange.Quoting Richard Stoneman,
Boundary markers
In 1939, Daniel Schlumberger identified three boundary markers of Palmyrena: two were discovered during excavations at Jabal al-Bilas, marking the northern boundary of Palmyra, although the identity of the neighboring region remains uncertain; the third marker was discovered in 1936 at Qasr al-Hayr al-Gharbi, marking the western boundary, which bordered Emesena.Settlements
According to Ptolemy, Palmyrena included the following settlements:Interaction with Palmyra
In his 1951 thesis La Palmyrène du Nord-Ouest, Daniel Schlumberger analyzed the remains of villages in Northwest Palmyrena, shedding light on the interaction between Palmyra and its hinterland. He showed that the image of Palmyra as an isolated city in the middle of the steppe had to be reconsidered. These villages, located in an arid region where only cisterns made habitation possible, could only have come into existence with financial support from Palmyra, and were created to meet the needs of the great metropolis through a specialization complementary to the agricultural oases of the rest of the steppe. Schlumberger hypothesized that some of the archaeological sites he studied were the stables or ranches essential to the famous Palmyrene cavalry. According to Stoneman, “Palmyra needed to control a sizeable hinterland simply to feed itself if it was not to import basic foodstuffs”.Language and culture
The population of Palmyrena originally spoke Palmyrene Aramaic, a dialect of Aramaic written in its own alphabet.However, at some point the countryside began to be increasingly influenced by Arab culture, in terms of both religion and language, with archeological traces of the worship of Arabian deities and Safaitic inscriptions marking this cultural shift, whereas Palmyra was becoming more and more westernized as Greek and Roman influences increasingly pervaded the city.
Jean-Baptiste Yon adds to this discussion by suggesting that these Safaitic inscriptions found in the countryside may have originated during Palmyra’s height, not necessarily after its fall, suggesting that Arabization of the countryside may have been present even at the peak of Palmyra’s power. Regardless of when it occurred, this Arabization of the countryside ultimately left Palmyra standing, in the words of Schlumberger, as “an Aramean island in a world overwhelmed by the Arab ethnic tide, relatively unaffected by this vast movement of cultural penetration”.