The strategic position of the Azraq Oasis, on the route to Baghdad, ensured that it was fortified and protected by all the successive rulers of Jordan, from the Romans to the Ottoman Turks. The present castle was built around 1237AD by the Mameluke dynasty, using large blocks of the volcanic basalt which litters the surface of the landscape all around and gives the area it's name - the 'Black Desert'.
This picture shows the heavily buttresed outer wall and the small gateway, surmounted by a machicolation from which fire could have been rained down on attackers.
Lawrence of Arabia and his companians took over-wintered here in 1917 during the Arab Revolt - Lawrence's quarters were in the room over the entrance. Standing there on a swelteringly hot September day, with the heat bouncing off the black rock, making the whole place feel like a furnace, it was hard to imagine that some of Lawrence's men actually died of hypothermia that winter.