Today Gadara is Um Qais, Jordan.
The most dramatically sited Decapolis city is ancient Gadara, at the modern village of Umm Qais, a 90-minute drive from Amman. Perched majestically on a long promontory overlooking the Jordan Valley, the Golan Heights and Lake Tiberias, Gadara was also founded by Hellenistic soldier-settlers and joined the Roman Decapolis after 63 B.C. It was renowned for its artists, poets, philosophers and learned men.
Since part of the modern village has been built over the ancient citadel, Jordanian, German and Danish teams have excavated other parts of the city during the past 20 years. Their discoveries include the ancient forum in front of the North Theater, a colonnaded main street, with chariot wheel marks still visible in its paving stones, and a better preserved West Theater, with its white-marble-goddess statue contrasting vividly with the black basalt stones. Above the North Theater was a major Roman temple, later turned into a Byzantine church. There are also a multi-story baths complex built by the Romans and a fine subterranean mausoleum with a colonnaded forecourt.