One monument, not the whole city
Petra is more than the Treasury, but this single facade has become its symbol. It is also the site’s most common source of misunderstanding. It was probably not a treasury, nobody has found a hoard inside, and its exact purpose and date are still discussed by specialists. What follows sets out what is reasonably established and what is not.
What it looks like
Al-Khazneh stands at the end of the Siq, where the narrow gorge opens suddenly into a small courtyard. The facade is cut directly into the sandstone cliff and is roughly 40 metres high, according to commonly cited measurements, and around 25 metres wide. It has two main levels.
The lower level has six columns with Corinthian-style capitals, forming a porch with a pediment above. The upper level has a central round structure, a tholos, with a conical roof and an urn at the top, flanked by two half-pediments, a so-called broken pediment design. Figures in relief appear between the columns on both levels. Horsemen on either side of the porch are often identified as the Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux, the twin sons of Zeus in Greek myth. Other carved figures include eagles and what may be Amazons, and a central figure in the tholos is commonly interpreted as a goddess identified with Isis or Tyche and with the Nabataean Al-Uzza. These identifications are interpretations, not certainties.
The sculpture is heavily worn. Wind, water and rock weathering explain much of that, but many faces and limbs also appear to have been deliberately damaged, and researchers have suggested that later people removed images for religious reasons. The cause for any individual figure is uncertain.
The design mixes Greek architectural vocabulary with local choices. Later monuments such as the Library of Celsus at Ephesus show a comparable two-storey columned facade, although they were built a century or so afterwards. The Treasury’s recessed position inside a narrow cleft protected it from some weather, which is one reason it is better preserved than many other Petra monuments.
Inside
Visitors are sometimes surprised that the interior is plain. Steps lead to a large main chamber cut square, with smaller chambers to the sides and rear. There is no carved decoration inside comparable with the front. The contrast between an ornate facade and a bare interior is typical of Nabataean rock-cut architecture, where the exterior carried the message.
The date
There is no inscription on the Treasury giving a date or a patron, so dating is based on style, on comparison with other monuments and on excavation nearby. The most commonly proposed date is around the late 1st century BCE or early 1st century CE, which would fit the reign of Aretas IV (about 9 BCE to 40 CE), a high point of Nabataean wealth. Some scholars have suggested earlier or later dates, and this remains a point of discussion. Treat any single date as approximate.
A royal tomb?
Most scholars regard the Treasury as a tomb, probably royal, or at least a funerary monument for a very important person. Several things support this view. It stands in a prominent position at the end of the main entrance, many Petra facades are tombs, and excavation in front of the monument in the early 2000s reportedly revealed burial chambers under the forecourt. Its sculpture also includes figures linked in Greek tradition with death and the afterlife, such as the Dioscuri.
Alternative suggestions exist. Some researchers have proposed that the Treasury served as a place of worship or as a ceremonial hall connected with a cult, possibly for a deified king, and that it may have had more than one function. There is no firm proof either way, and “probable royal tomb” is a better summary than a confident label. Despite its elegance, it is not a temple in the sense of the freestanding temples found in the city centre.
The name and the legend
The Arabic name Al-Khazneh is short for “Khaznet al-Firaun”, the “Treasury of the Pharaoh”. It comes from a local story, not from archaeology. According to the tradition, a pharaoh who pursued Moses and the Israelites hid his treasure in the urn at the top of the monument. Bedouin visitors reportedly fired guns at the urn in hopes of breaking it open and releasing the gold, and the pitting on the stone is often blamed on this.
The urn is not hollow, as far as is known, and it is carved from solid rock. The legend is a well-known example of treasure folklore, like the El Dorado legend in South America, in which a famous place gets a name tied to imagined wealth. It says more about how people explained an impressive monument than about what it was built for.
Modern fame
The Treasury has appeared in many travel books, photographs and films, including a famous scene in a 1989 adventure movie, and it is often the first image people associate with Petra. That fame brings many visitors, a conservation challenge for a soft sandstone facade. Access to the interior is typically restricted to protect the rock.
Seen alone, the Treasury offers a good lesson in how to read Petra: a striking facade, a probable burial function, an uncertain date and a name that comes from folklore. Each of those points is a reminder to separate what the stone shows from the stories later told about it.