🇯🇴 Jordan
Amman
Amman (عمّان — population 4.1 million in the greater metropolitan area, making it the largest city in Jordan and one of the fastest-growing capitals in the Arab world) is the capital of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and one of the most historically layered capitals in the Middle East, built across the seven (now 19) jabals (hills) of a landscape of white limestone that gives the city its characteristic bleached appearance in the harsh Levantine sun. Amman is a city of contradictions: it is simultaneously one of the most ancient continuously inhabited cities on Earth (the Ammonite capital of Rabbath Ammon (the "Great City of the Ammonites"), which was Hellenized as Philadelphia during the Ptolemaic and Roman periods (the Roman Decapolis city whose monuments still stand in the old city), Arabized during the Umayyad Caliphate period and eventually abandoned in the 13th century (the city was depopulated and forgotten), then resettled in 1878 by Circassian refugees from the Russian-Caucasus War and designated the capital of the Emirate of Transjordan by the British in 1921) and one of the newest: the city that was a village of 2,000 people in 1900 and is now a metropolis of 4 million. Amman is the safest capital city in the Arab world for tourists — the exceptional Jordanian hospitality (Diyafa — the Arab tradition of hospitality as sacred obligation), the relative political stability of the Hashemite monarchy, and the extraordinary Roman ruins (the Citadel (Jabal al-Qalaa), the Roman Amphitheater (6,000 seats, one of the best-preserved Roman theaters in the world)) make it the most accessible entry point to the Arab world for first-time visitors.