Dekwaneh ( ar, دكوانة
translit. Dikwene) (also Dekweneh) is a suburb north of
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 ...
in the
Matn District
Matn ( ar, قضاء المتن, '), sometimes spelled Metn (or preceded by the article El, as in El Matn), is a district ('' qadaa'') in the Mount Lebanon Governorate of Lebanon, east of the Lebanon's capital Beirut. The district capital is ...
of the
Mount Lebanon Governorate,
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 Lebanon–Syria border, the north and east and Israel to Blue ...
. The population is predominantly
Maronite Christian
Lebanese Maronite Christians ( ar, المسيحية المارونية في لبنان; syc, ܡܫܝܚܝ̈ܐ ܡܪ̈ܘܢܝܐ ܕܠܒܢܢ) are adherents of the Maronite Church in Lebanon, which is the largest Christian denomination in the country ...
.
Tel al-Zaatar, an
UNRWA
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is a UN agency that supports the relief and human development of Palestinian refugees. UNRWA's mandate encompasses Palestinians displaced by the 1948 ...
administered
Palestinian
Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...
refugee camp housing approximately 50,000-60,000 refugees, and the site of the
Tel al-Zaatar massacre
The Siege of Tel al-Zaatar ( ar, حصار تل الزعتر, French: Siège de Tel al-Zaatar), alternatively known as the Massacre of Tel al-Zaatar, was an armed siege of Tel al-Zaatar (meaning ''Hill of Thyme'' in Arabic), a fortified, UNRWA-adm ...
were located on the outskirts of the town.
Archaeology
Dekwaneh I is about northwest of Mar Roucos monastery, in the gullies of (now deforested) pinewood slopes on the west side of a ridge. Material was found by
Raoul Describes, who mentioned rock-shelters in the area that were destroyed by quarrying for
quicklime.
[Describes, Raoul., Quelques ateliers paléolithiques des environs de Beyrouth, Mélanges de l'Université Saint-Joseph: Volume VII, 1921.] Further collections were found by
Auguste Bergy Reverend Father Auguste Bergy (12 May 1873 – 31 August 1955) was a French Jesuit archaeologist known for his work on prehistory in Lebanon
Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or ...
and
Peter Wescombe
Peter Wescombe (4 January 1932 – 25 November 2014) was a British diplomat, amateur archaeologist, historian and founding member of the Bletchley Park
Bletchley Park is an English country house and estate in Bletchley, Milton Keynes ( Bu ...
. Some of the
flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and sta ...
tools recovered were determined to be
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 ...
as well as a large amount of waste and bifaces from the
Middle Paleolithic that suggested it was a factory site at that time.
Dekwaneh II material comes from various locations around the area, most notably the ravine below the monastery. Flint tools were also found here by Bergy and Describes which included the
Qaraoun culture
The Qaraoun culture is a culture of the Lebanese Stone Age around Qaraoun in the Beqaa Valley. The Gigantolithic or Heavy Neolithic flint tool industry of this culture was recognized as a particular Neolithic variant of the Lebanese highlands ...
's
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 t ...
forms such as massive
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, picks, scrapers and
rabots. Other early
Neolithic
The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several p ...
tools were found along with some Middle Paleolithic material including an
Emireh point
Emiran culture was a culture that existed in the Levant (Lebanon, Palestine , Syria, Jordan, Israel , and Arabia between the Middle Paleolithic and the Upper Paleolithic periods. It is the oldest known of the Upper Paleolithic cultures and rem ...
and tortoise cores. Along with material from Dekwaneh I, finds from the locations are stored in the
Museum of Lebanese Prehistory
The Museum of Lebanese Prehistory (french: Musée de Préhistoire Libanaise, ar, متحف ما قبل التاريخ اللبناني) is a museum of prehistory and archaeology in Beirut, Lebanon.
History
The museum is the first museum of prehist ...
.
LGBT rights
Rights affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender ( LGBT) people vary greatly by country or jurisdiction—encompassing everything from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the death penalty for homosexuality.
Notably, ...
Dekwaneh gained notoriety in the press and social media when, on Monday 22 April 2013, the mayor,
Antoine Chakhtoura, ordered
Lebanese security forces to raid and shut down a gay-friendly nightclub called Ghost. A number of Syrian gay men and a Lebanese
transgender
A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through ...
woman were arrested during the raid and taken to municipal headquarters where it is reported that they were harassed and forced to undress. According to reports, the transgender woman was also photographed naked.
Image gallery
File:General Wessin Street, Dekwaneh, Lebanon.jpg, General Elias Wessin (Wazen) Street in Dekwaneh, Lebanon.
File:Dekouané chapelle Saint-Joseph 01.jpg, St. Joseph chapel
File:Dekouané chapelle Saint-Joseph 02.jpg, Statue of the Immaculate Conception
The Immaculate Conception is the belief that the Virgin Mary was free of original sin from the moment of her conception.
It is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church, meaning that it is held to be a divinely revealed truth w ...
Airfield
Remains of a former airfield can be found in
Tal El Zaatar. Only a small section of runway exist with Northern section along Mar Roukoz has been reused for commercial warehouses.
References
External links
Dekwaneh - Deir Mar Roukoz - Dahr El Hossein Localiban
{{Archaeological sites in Lebanon
Populated places in the Matn District
Maronite Christian communities in Lebanon
Archaeological sites in Lebanon
Paleolithic
Heavy Neolithic sites