Aadloun, Adloun or Adlun ( ar, عدلون) is a coastal town in South

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to the north and east and Israel to the south, while Cyprus li ...

, south of

Sidon Sidon ( ; he, צִידוֹן, ''Ṣīḏōn'') known locally as Sayda or Saida ( ar, صيدا ''Ṣaydā''), is the third-largest city in Lebanon. It is located in the South Governorate, of which it is the capital, on the Mediterranean coast. ...

famous for its cultivation of watermelons. It is also the site of a

Phoenicia Phoenicia () was an ancient thalassocratic civilization originating in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily located in modern Lebanon. The territory of the Phoenician city-states extended and shrank throughout their histor ...

necropolis A necropolis (plural necropolises, necropoles, necropoleis, necropoli) is a large, designed cemetery with elaborate tomb monuments. The name stems from the Ancient Greek ''nekropolis'', literally meaning "city of the dead". The term usually im ...

and

prehistoric Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use of ...

caves where four archaeological sites have been discovered and dated to the

Stone Age The Stone Age was a broad prehistoric period during which stone was widely used to make tools with an edge, a point, or a percussion surface. The period lasted for roughly 3.4 million years, and ended between 4,000 BC and 2,000 BC, with t ...

. The evidence of human occupation of Abri Zumoffen (or Aadloun I) has been dated as far back as 71,000 BCE with occupation of Bezez Cave (Aadloun II) dating back even further into the earlier

Middle Paleolithic The Middle Paleolithic (or Middle Palaeolithic) is the second subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age as it is understood in Europe, Africa and Asia. The term Middle Stone Age is used as an equivalent or a synonym for the Middle Paleoli ...

.Copeland, Lorraine., The Middle Palaeolithic of Adlun and Ras el Kelb (Lebanon) : First results from a study of the flint industries, Paléorient, 1978, Volume 4, No. 4, pp. 33-57, 1978.
/ref>

Pre-Historic sites

Aadloun I

Aadloun I or Abri Zumoffen is a low cave and terrace at the foot of a cliff near a beach. It was discovered and sounded by

Godefroy Zumoffen Reverend Father Godefroy Zumoffen (1848 in France – 1928) was a French Jesuit archaeologist and geologist notable for his work on prehistory in Lebanon. He is known particularly for pioneering Lebanese archaeology, and for discovering severa ...

in 1898, 1900 and 1908 who found material thought to be either

Acheulean Acheulean (; also Acheulian and Mode II), from the French ''acheuléen'' after the type site of Saint-Acheul, is an archaeological industry of stone tool manufacture characterized by the distinctive oval and pear-shaped "hand axes" associated ...

Mousterian The Mousterian (or Mode III) is an archaeological industry of stone tools, associated primarily with the Neanderthals in Europe, and to the earliest anatomically modern humans in North Africa and West Asia. The Mousterian largely defines the latt ...

Dorothy Garrod Dorothy Annie Elizabeth Garrod, CBE, FBA (5 May 1892 – 18 December 1968) was an English archaeologist who specialised in the Palaeolithic period. She held the position of Disney Professor of Archaeology at the University of Cambridge from 193 ...

suggested similarities existed to a final Acheulean (or Yarbrudian) industry of

Tabun E Tabun may refer to: * Tabun (nerve agent), the first nerve-agent chemical weapon to be discovered * "Tabun" (song), a 2020 single by Japanese music duo Yoasobi * Tabun Cave, part of a World Heritage Site related to human evolution at Mount Carme ...

. Along with

Diana Kirkbride Diana Victoria Warcup Kirkbride-Helbæk, (22 October 1915 – 13 August 1997) was a British archaeologist who specialised in the prehistory of south-west Asia. Biography She attended Wycombe Abbey School in High Wycombe and served in the Women' ...

, she re-opened excavations in 1958 with another season in 1963 and found a pre-

Aurignacian The Aurignacian () is an archaeological industry of the Upper Paleolithic associated with European early modern humans (EEMH) lasting from 43,000 to 26,000 years ago. The Upper Paleolithic developed in Europe some time after the Levant, where t ...

(Garrod's

Amudian The Acheulo-Yabrudian complex is a complex of archaeological cultures in the Levant at the end of the Lower Palaeolithic. It follows the Acheulian and precedes the Mousterian. It is also called the Mugharan Tradition or the Acheulo-Yabrudian Cult ...

) blade industry in the deposits. D. A. Hooijer discussed the fauna of the site suggesting it included game animals and

rhino A rhinoceros (; ; ), commonly abbreviated to rhino, is a member of any of the five extant species (or numerous extinct species) of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae. (It can also refer to a member of any of the extinct species o ...

. Materials from the site are now in collections of the

Saint Joseph University Saint Joseph University of Beirut ( French: ''Université Saint-Joseph de Beyrouth'', abbreviated to and commonly known as "USJ") is a private Catholic research university located in Beirut, Lebanon, which was founded in 1875 by French Jesuit mis ...

Beirut Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint o ...

and the

Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge The Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, also known as MAA, at the University of Cambridge houses the university's collections of local antiquities, together with archaeological and ethnographic artefacts from around the world. The museum ...

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

. The site is now owned by the

Directorate General of Antiquities The Directorate General of Antiquities (DGA; french: La Direction Générale des Antiquités et des Musées) is a Lebanese government directorate, technical unit of the Ministry of Culture Ministry of Culture may refer to: *Ministry of Tourism, C ...

but the previous land owner carried out private digging that has spread deposits from the Aadloun II cave site over the area creating a false layer.

Aadloun II

Aadloun II, Bezez Cave or Mugharet el Bzaz is a cave on the east of the road heading to Tyre set into a cliff at an altitude of approximately above sea level. It was first sounded with little result in 1898 by Godefroy Zumoffen. A major excavation was undertaken in 1963 by Diana Kirkbride and Dorothy Garrod who determined a sequence stretching through the Yarbrudian, Levalloiso-Mousterian,

Upper Paleolithic The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...

and on into the

Heavy Neolithic Heavy Neolithic (alternatively, Gigantolithic) is a style of large stone and flint tools (or industry) associated primarily with the Qaraoun culture in the Beqaa Valley, Lebanon, dating to the Epipaleolithic or early Pre-Pottery Neolithic at the ...

. Materials from the excavations were to be held by Saint Joseph University and the

American University of Beirut The American University of Beirut (AUB) ( ar, الجامعة الأميركية في بيروت) is a private, non-sectarian, and independent university chartered in New York with its campus in Beirut, Lebanon. AUB is governed by a private, aut ...

. The site is owned by the Directorate General of Antiquities and a gate was fixed over the mouth of the cave for protection. Three distinct levels were determined. Level C was called Acheuleo-Yarbrudian with materials found that resembled level E at

Tabun Cave The Tabun Cave is an excavated site located at Nahal Me'arot Nature Reserve, Israel and is one of the Human Evolution sites at Mount Carmel, which were proclaimed as having universal value by UNESCO in 2012. History Together with the nearby ...

. Level B was called Levalloiso-Mousterian and compared with level D of Tabun. Level C encompassed the Upper Paleolithic and onwards.

Aadloun III

Aadloun III is a site approximately south of Aadloun with a

Chalcolithic The Copper Age, also called the Chalcolithic (; from grc-gre, χαλκός ''khalkós'', "copper" and ''líthos'', "stone") or (A)eneolithic (from Latin '' aeneus'' "of copper"), is an archaeological period characterized by regular ...

(Enéolithique) industry that was found by P. E. Gigues.

Aadloun IV

Aadloun IV was found by P. E. Gigues on the terraces below the village near the caves that have been damaged by

quarry A quarry is a type of open-pit mine in which dimension stone, rock, construction aggregate, riprap, sand, gravel, or slate is excavated from the ground. The operation of quarries is regulated in some jurisdictions to reduce their envi ...

ing. Local farmers have recovered several fine Neolithic and Chalcolithic tools from this area that are held by Saint Joseph University. Dr. Gigues collection was held in Beirut by a relative who charged a fee for showing it after his retirement to

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to ...

Materials recovered

Lorraine Copeland Lorraine Copeland (born Elizabeth Lorraine Adie, 1921April 2013) was a British archaeologist specialising in the Palaeolithic period of the Near East. She was a secret agent with the Special Operations Executive during World War II. Early life ...

made a collection of mostly

flints from the site in 1966. Amongst the finds were massive trapezoidal

axe An axe ( sometimes ax in American English; see spelling differences) is an implement that has been used for millennia to shape, split and cut wood, to harvest timber, as a weapon, and as a ceremonial or heraldic symbol. The axe has ma ...

s, chisels, a chopper, points, a pick, rough scrapers, blades, cores and hammerstones. The finds led Andrew Moore to suggest that Bezez cave was a factory site for such tools.

Modern era

In 1875

Victor Guérin Victor Guérin (15 September 1821 – 21 Septembe 1890) was a French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included Greece, Asia Mino ...

noted that Aadloun "consists of 350 inhabitants, all

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

Cistern A cistern (Middle English ', from Latin ', from ', "box", from Greek ', "basket") is a waterproof receptacle for holding liquids, usually water. Cisterns are often built to catch and store rainwater. Cisterns are distinguished from wells by t ...

s carved into the rock and many

ashlar Ashlar () is finely dressed (cut, worked) stone, either an individual stone that has been worked until squared, or a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, generally rectangular cuboid, mentioned by Vitruv ...

s of ancient appearance seem to prove that it succeeded an older locality."

Notable people

Mohamed Zein Tahan Mohamad Zein El Abidine Ali Tahan ( ar, محمد زين العابدين علي طحان, ; born 20 April 1988), known as Mohamad Zein Tahan or simply Zein Tahan, is a Lebanese footballer who plays as a full-back for club Safa, whom he captai ...

(born 1990), Lebanese footballer

References

Bibliography

External links

Aadloun
localiban {{Authority control Populated places in Sidon District Sunni Muslim communities in Lebanon Paleolithic sites Neolithic settlements Chalcolithic sites Archaeological sites in Lebanon Heavy Neolithic sites Phoenician sites in Lebanon Phoenician funerary practices