The third of the four castles we visted today was al Azrak, built entirely of black basalt. It was a large fort with a plain, black basalt mosque in the center as well as many fragments of carved reliefs. Also interesting was a stone double door preserved in the original sockets and a gaming board pecked into the threshold as these are features also found in the Bronze Age.
The most exciting thing about the site, however, is this is the place where T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) spent the winter of 1917, when he was leading the Arab Revolt against the Turkish Empire in WWI. It was personally exciting for me as Lawrence is my hero and the reason I got into archaeology to begin with.
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