Iram of the Pillars was a center for all things frankincense. Some scholars think that Iram is the fabled lost city of Ubar, mentioned both in the Quran and the folktale collection A Thousand and One Nights. Ubar was discovered in the early 1990s by a team under the leadership of amateur (yes, amateur) archaeologist and filmmaker Nicholas Clapp. Located in Oman near the Qara Mountains, the native home of frankincense, Ubar was in a prime location to make it rich. Frankincense, according to the Los Angeles Times, was literally worth its weight in gold. The region is now a desert, but researchers believe the climate at the time had enough rainfall to sustain the city.
Clapp first started searching after reading Arabia Felix, a written account of British explorer Bertram Thomas's failed search for the city. Clapp had a few advantages that Thomas didn't, like NASA's shuttle radar system and the insanity to ask them for help — and NASA agreed. The radar images showed the old trade routes below the sands, and Clapp's team followed them to what might be the ruins of Iram.
While excavating the site, researchers discovered that the city had indeed been swallowed by the sand. Without knowledge of basic geology, King Shaddad ibn 'Ad had built the city on top of a limestone deposit, which led to a sinkhole, which led to the end of Iram. And an exciting discovery deep in the sands.
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