Palmyrena or Palmyrene (from Ancient Greek ; , short for , or , ), 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 (and not just Palmyra) 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 (2nd century CE), 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.Gelin in : “D. Schlumberger a pu montrer comment subsistaient les sites de Palmyrène, qu’ils étaient indissociables de la ville de Palmyre romaine et que l’image de la cité isolée au milieu de la steppe devait être reconsidérée.” 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.: “Ces villages, implantés dans une region aride, que seules des citernes rendaient habitable, n’ont pu naître qu’avec l’appui des capitaux palmyréniens et pour suppléer aux besoins de la grande metropole par une spécialisation complémentaire à celle des oasis agricoles du reste de la steppe ; M. D. Schlumberger verrait volontiers dans les établissements qu’il étudie les haras ou les ranches indispensables à la fameuse cavalerie palmyrénienne.” 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.: “Palmyrene Aramaic had become an official idiom in the region with its own version of the Aramaic script”
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. : “Voir les remarques de D. Schlumberger, dans PNO, par exemple p. 133 : « Il est clair que nous sommes, à la campagne, dans un milieu beaucoup moins occidentalisé qu’à la ville. Et il est clair aussi que nous sommes dans un milieu plus fortement arabisé » et il prend appui sur les divinités arabes qu’on retrouve dans le panthéon de ces régions et sur la présence de textes safaïtiques (10 sur les 93 inscriptions découvertes dans cette zone). H. Seyrig pensait que ces dix textes émanaient « probablement de l’époque où le pays était redevenu désert après la ruine de Palmyre » (H. Seyrig, 1970, p. 88. n. I). Il est pourtant tout à fait possible qu’ils datent plutôt de l’époque de l’apogée de Palmyre, mais je ne sais pas si ce débat est susceptible d’être tranché.”
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”.: “Ce n’est donc pas la Palmyrène, mais Palmyre seule qui, dans un monde envahi par la marée ethnique arabe, peut apparaître encore comme un îlot araméen, relativement peu affecté par ce vaste mouvement de pénétration.”
See also Damascena
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