Archaeology in Lebanon
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Archaeology of Lebanon reveals thousands of years of history ranging from the
Lower Palaeolithic The Lower Paleolithic (or Lower Palaeolithic) is the earliest subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. It spans the time from around 3 million years ago when the first evidence for stone tool production and use by hominins appears ...
,
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 ...
n,
Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
,
Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...
, Muslim, Christian, Ottoman, and
Crusades The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were ...
history.


Notable findings and sites

Lebanon features several important Paleolithic sites associated with Neanderthals. These include Adloun, Chekka Jdidé, El-Masloukh,
Ksar Akil Ksar Akil (also Ksar 'Akil or Ksar Aqil) is an archeological site northeast of Beirut in Lebanon. It is located about west of Antelias spring on the north bank of the northern tributary of the Wadi Antelias. It is a large rock shelter below ...
, Nahr Ibrahim and Naame.Kipfer, 2000, pp. 623, 632, 637, 647, 655.
Byblos Byblos ( ; gr, Βύβλος), also known as Jbeil or Jubayl ( ar, جُبَيْل, Jubayl, locally ; phn, 𐤂𐤁𐤋, , probably ), is a city in the Keserwan-Jbeil Governorate of Lebanon. It is believed to have been first occupied between 8 ...
is a well-known archaeological site, a Phoenician
seaport A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as H ...
, where the tomb of
Ahiram The Ahiram sarcophagus (also spelled Ahirom, in Phoenician) was the sarcophagus of a Phoenician Kings of Byblos, King of Byblos (c. 850 BC), discovered in 1923 by the French excavator Pierre Montet in tomb V of the royal necropolis of Byblos. Th ...
and the other
Byblian royal inscriptions The Byblian royal inscriptions are five inscriptions from Byblos written in an early type of Phoenician script, all of which were discovered in the early 20th century. They constitute the largest corpus of lengthy Phoenician inscriptions from the ...
were found. An ancient Phoenician inscription on the tomb dates to between the 13th and 10th centuries BCE.Wedgeworth, 1993, p. 453. Byblos, as well as archaeological sites in Baalbek, Tyre,
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. ...
, and
Tripoli Tripoli or Tripolis may refer to: Cities and other geographic units Greece *Tripoli, Greece, the capital of Arcadia, Greece * Tripolis (region of Arcadia), a district in ancient Arcadia, Greece * Tripolis (Larisaia), an ancient Greek city in ...
, contain artifacts indicating the presence of
libraries A library is a collection of Document, materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or electronic media, digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a ...
dating back to the period of
Classical antiquity Classical antiquity (also the classical era, classical period or classical age) is the period of cultural history between the 8th century BC and the 5th century AD centred on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ...
.


Industry names

Lower paleolithic industries of Lebanon have shown similarities to Chelleo-Acheulean,
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 ...
,
Tayacian The Tayacian is a Palaeolithic stone tool industry that is a variant of the Mousterian. It was first identified as distinct by Abbé Breuil from the site of La Micoque in Les-Eyzies-de-Tayac although since then the cave at Fontéchevade has become ...
(the Tabunian of
Francis Clark Howell Francis Clark Howell (November 27, 1925 – March 10, 2007), generally known as F. Clark Howell, was an American anthropologist. Born in Kansas City, Missouri, F. Clark Howell grew up in Kansas, where he became interested in natural history. H ...
), Tayacio-Levalloisian and Early Levalloisian with some caution suggested to be observed with the use of some early Levalloisian and
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 ...
labels that may be confused with 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 t ...
of 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 ...
. Middle paleolithic industries suggested include
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 ...
(Pre-Aurignacian), early
Yabrudian 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 Cultur ...
, (Acheulio-Yabrudian), Yarbrudian, Micro-Levalloisian or Micro-Mousterian, Levalloisian,
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 l ...
and Levalloiso-Mousterian.
Radio-carbon dating Radiocarbon dating (also referred to as carbon dating or carbon-14 dating) is a method for determining the age of an object containing organic material by using the properties of radiocarbon, a radioactive isotope of carbon. The method was dev ...
exists for
Ksar Akil Ksar Akil (also Ksar 'Akil or Ksar Aqil) is an archeological site northeast of Beirut in Lebanon. It is located about west of Antelias spring on the north bank of the northern tributary of the Wadi Antelias. It is a large rock shelter below ...
and
Ras El Kelb Ras El Kelb is a truncated seaside cave and Paleolithic settlement located on the low-lying () coast of Lebanon, north of Beirut. It is one of the oldest habitations found in the country. Rescue excavations were carried out in 1959 by Dorothy Gar ...
. Various other industries have been judged to be typologically similar to these along with one described by
Henri Fleisch Reverend Father Henri Fleisch (1 January 1904 – 10 February 1985) was a French archaeologist, missionary and Orientalist, known for his work on classical Arabic language and Lebanese dialect and prehistory in Lebanon. Fleisch spent years rec ...
in 1962 particular to "mountain sites" for which the Mayroubian culture has been defined after its
type site In archaeology, a type site is the site used to define a particular archaeological culture or other typological unit, which is often named after it. For example, discoveries at La Tène and Hallstatt led scholars to divide the European Iron A ...
, Mayrouba. R. Neuville and
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 1 ...
divided the
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 ...
of Lebanon into six stages based on stratified sites in the surrounding area. Stage one has Emirian and transitional varieties, stage two was possibly evidenced at
Ksar Akil Ksar Akil (also Ksar 'Akil or Ksar Aqil) is an archeological site northeast of Beirut in Lebanon. It is located about west of Antelias spring on the north bank of the northern tributary of the Wadi Antelias. It is a large rock shelter below ...
. Stages three and four have been termed Lower and Upper
Antelian The Levantine Aurignacian (35,000-29,000 BP, calibrated, 32,000-26,000 BP, non-calibrated) is an Upper Paleolithic culture of the Near-Eastern Levant that evolved from the Emiran culture. It was named so because of the similarity of stone tools ...
after the
Antelias cave Antelias Cave was a large cave located east of Antelias, northeast of Beirut close to the wadi of Ksar Akil. It was discovered by Heidenborg in 1833. Godefroy Zumoffen made an excavation in 1893, finding an Aurignacian industry amongst large qua ...
. Stage five is Atlitian, possibly developed from stage four. Stage six is identified as
Kebaran The Kebaran culture, also known as the Early Near East Epipalaeolithic, was an archaeological culture in the Eastern Mediterranean area (c. 23,000 to 15,000 BP), named after its type site, Kebara Cave south of Haifa. The Kebaran were a highly ...
, of which there are many varieties of assemblage based on locality. Several 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 ...
(similar to Neolithic Ancien of
Byblos Byblos ( ; gr, Βύβλος), also known as Jbeil or Jubayl ( ar, جُبَيْل, Jubayl, locally ; phn, 𐤂𐤁𐤋, , probably ), is a city in the Keserwan-Jbeil Governorate of Lebanon. It is believed to have been first occupied between 8 ...
or
Amuq The Amik Valley ( tr, Amik Ovası; ar, ٱلْأَعْمَاق, al-ʾAʿmāq) is located in the Hatay Province, close to the city of Antakya (Antioch on the Orontes River) in the southern part of Turkey. Along with Dabiq in northwestern Syria ...
A) sites were found by
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 Wome ...
in the Beqaa Valley in 1964 and mentioned by
James Mellaart James Mellaart FBA (14 November 1925 – 29 July 2012) was an English archaeologist and author who is noted for his discovery of the Neolithic settlement of Çatalhöyük in Turkey. He was expelled from Turkey when he was suspected of involvem ...
in 1965.Mellaart, James., Earliest Civilizations in the Near East, Thames and Hudson, London, 1965. The Neolithic of Lebanon was divided up into three stages by
Maurice Dunand Maurice Dunand (4 March 1898 – 23 March 1987) was a prominent French archaeologist specializing in the ancient Near East, who served as director of the Mission Archéologique Française in Lebanon. Dunand excavated Byblos from 1924 to 1975, and ...
based on the stratified levels of
Byblos Byblos ( ; gr, Βύβλος), also known as Jbeil or Jubayl ( ar, جُبَيْل, Jubayl, locally ; phn, 𐤂𐤁𐤋, , probably ), is a city in the Keserwan-Jbeil Governorate of Lebanon. It is believed to have been first occupied between 8 ...
. The first two stages, "Néolithique Ancien" and "Néolithique Moyen", were characterized by an economy based on a mixture of hunting and farming whereas "Néolithique Récent" displayed a shift to agriculture evidenced by fewer
arrowheads An arrowhead or point is the usually sharpened and hardened tip of an arrow, which contributes a majority of the projectile mass and is responsible for impacting and penetrating a target, as well as to fulfill some special purposes such as s ...
and more grinding tools and
sickle A sickle, bagging hook, reaping-hook or grasshook is a single-handed agricultural tool designed with variously curved blades and typically used for harvesting, or reaping, grain crops or cutting Succulent plant, succulent forage chiefly for feed ...
blades. Various other Neolithic industries have been found in Lebanon such as
Trihedral Neolithic Trihedral Neolithic is a name given by archaeologists to a style (or industry) of striking spheroid and trihedral flint tools from the archaeological site of Joub Jannine II in the Beqaa Valley, Lebanon.Fleisch, Henri., Les industries lithiques ...
and
Shepherd Neolithic Shepherd Neolithic is a name given by archaeologists to a style (or industry) of small flint tools from the Hermel plains in the north Beqaa Valley, Lebanon.Fleisch, Henri., Les industries lithiques récentes de la Békaa, République Liba ...
.
Henri Fleisch Reverend Father Henri Fleisch (1 January 1904 – 10 February 1985) was a French archaeologist, missionary and Orientalist, known for his work on classical Arabic language and Lebanese dialect and prehistory in Lebanon. Fleisch spent years rec ...
discovered and termed the
Shepherd Neolithic Shepherd Neolithic is a name given by archaeologists to a style (or industry) of small flint tools from the Hermel plains in the north Beqaa Valley, Lebanon.Fleisch, Henri., Les industries lithiques récentes de la Békaa, République Liba ...
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 ...
industry from the
Bekaa Valley The Beqaa Valley ( ar, links=no, وادي البقاع, ', Lebanese ), also transliterated as Bekaa, Biqâ, and Becaa and known in classical antiquity as Coele-Syria, is a fertile valley in eastern Lebanon. It is Lebanon's most importan ...
in Lebanon and suggested that it could have been used by the earliest
nomad A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the po ...
ic shepherds. He dated this industry to the Epipaleolithic or
Pre-Pottery Neolithic The Pre-Pottery Neolithic (PPN) represents the early Neolithic in the Levantine and upper Mesopotamian region of the Fertile Crescent, dating to  years ago, (10000 – 6500 BCE).Richard, Suzanne ''Near Eastern archaeology'' Eisenbrauns; il ...
as it is evidently not Paleolithic, Mesolithic or even
Pottery Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other ceramic materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. Major types include earthenware, stoneware and ...
Neolithic. One particularly vigorous culture identified at over forty sites by Jesuit archaeologists in Lebanon is called 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 ...
. This culture existed at the dawn of
agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people t ...
without pottery and produced
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 ...
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 such as
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 and picks to work with lumber, such as the
Cedars of Lebanon ''Cedrus libani'', the cedar of Lebanon or Lebanese cedar (), is a species of tree in the genus cedrus, a part of the pine family, native to the mountains of the Eastern Mediterranean basin. It is a large evergreen conifer that has great rel ...
. Their
type site In archaeology, a type site is the site used to define a particular archaeological culture or other typological unit, which is often named after it. For example, discoveries at La Tène and Hallstatt led scholars to divide the European Iron A ...
is Qaraoun II, located close to the El Wauroun Dam,
Mount Hermon Mount Hermon ( ar, جبل الشيخ or جبل حرمون / ALA-LC: ''Jabal al-Shaykh'' ("Mountain of the Sheikh") or ''Jabal Haramun''; he, הַר חֶרְמוֹן, ''Har Hermon'') is a mountain cluster constituting the southern end of th ...
and
Aaiha Aaiha (or Aiha) ( ar, عيحا) is a village, plain, lake, and temporary wetland situated in the Rashaya District and south of the Beqaa Governorate in Lebanon. It is located in an intermontane basin near Mount Hermon and the Syrian border, app ...
. The
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 ...
was divided into two periods by
Jacques Cauvin Professor Jacques Cauvin (1930 – 26 December 2001) was a French archaeologist who specialised in the prehistory of the Levant and Near East. Biography Cauvin started his work in France at Oullins Caves and Chazelles Caves (near Saint-André- ...
based on stratified levels at Byblos; "Énéolithique Ancien" and "Énéolithique Récent". The division is marked largely by differences in pottery more than flints with a few notable exceptions such as fan-scrapers. There are a large number of tells in the Beqaa Valley and Akkar Plain which have Early
Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...
or earlier deposits including one under the Grand Court in front of the Temple of Jupiter in Baalbek.


Surveys and dating of prehistoric sites

Descriptions of some of the tells in the Beqaa Valley were published by A. Jirku in 1933, L. Burkhalter in 1948 and A. Kuschke in 1954, along with a map of the Beqaa valley by Bernard Geze in 1956 that marked 50 tells.Kuschke, A., Beiträge zur Siedlungsgeschichte der Bika'. Zeitschrift der Deutschen Palastina-Vereins, vol. 70, pp. 104-129, 1954 (continued in vol. 71, pp. 97-110, 1955-56). Another major survey of Lebanese tells was carried out between 1965 and 1966 with 88 tells recorded along with numerous surface sites by
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 ...
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 ...
. Materials collected were presented for comment and identification to a 'panel of experts' that included
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 Wome ...
,
Jacques Cauvin Professor Jacques Cauvin (1930 – 26 December 2001) was a French archaeologist who specialised in the prehistory of the Levant and Near East. Biography Cauvin started his work in France at Oullins Caves and Chazelles Caves (near Saint-André- ...
,
Henri de Contenson 250px, Henri de Contenson Henri de Contenson (4 March 1926 – 8 September 2019) was a French archaeologist and was the Research Director at the CNRS, The Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (National Center for Scientific Research), a ...
,
Maurice Dunand Maurice Dunand (4 March 1898 – 23 March 1987) was a prominent French archaeologist specializing in the ancient Near East, who served as director of the Mission Archéologique Française in Lebanon. Dunand excavated Byblos from 1924 to 1975, and ...
,
Francis Hours Reverend Father Francis Hours, born 1921 in France and died 1987, was a French Jesuit archaeologist known for his work on prehistory in the Levant. He gave the Lebanese a real scientific framework for prehistoric research and worked excavating v ...
,
Henri Fleisch Reverend Father Henri Fleisch (1 January 1904 – 10 February 1985) was a French archaeologist, missionary and Orientalist, known for his work on classical Arabic language and Lebanese dialect and prehistory in Lebanon. Fleisch spent years rec ...
,
Robert John Braidwood Robert John Braidwood (29 July 1907 – 15 January 2003) was an American archaeologist and anthropologist, one of the founders of scientific archaeology, and a leader in the field of Near Eastern Prehistory. Life Braidwood was born July 29 ...
,
Ralph Solecki Ralph Stefan Solecki (October 15, 1917 – March 20, 2019) was an American archaeologist. Solecki was born in Brooklyn, New York in October 1917, the son of Polish immigrants – Mary (nee Tarnowska), a homemaker, and Casimir, an insurance salesm ...
, W.J. van Liere, G.L. Harding, H. Balfet,
Olga Tufnell Olga Tufnell (26 January 1905 – 11 April 1985) was a British archaeologist who assisted on the excavation of the ancient city of Lachish in the 1930s. She had no formal training in archaeology, but had worked as a secretary for Flinders Petri ...
, Brian Gregor and Ziyad Beydoun.


Temples of Lebanon

Lebanon contains a diverse range of ruins and remains of
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic p ...
and
Roman temple Ancient Roman temples were among the most important buildings in Roman culture, and some of the richest buildings in Roman architecture, though only a few survive in any sort of complete state. Today they remain "the most obvious symbol of ...
s. The premier attraction being the complex at Baalbek, including the enormous temple of
Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousandth t ...
and outstandingly well preserved temple of
Bacchus In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, myth, Dionysus (; grc, wikt:Διόνυσος, Διόνυσος ) is the god of the grape-harvest, winemaking, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstas ...
. It is thought that local villages attempted to create similar temples to a diverse range of Gods, leaving ancient shrines and vestiges to be found all around the country-side. This has led to the country itself being described an ''"open-air
museum A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make thes ...
"''. George F. Taylor divided the temples of Lebanon into three groups, one group referred to the Temples of the Lebanese coastal plain to Mount Lebanon, another group as
Temples of the Beqaa Valley The Temples of the Beqaa Valley are a number of shrines and Roman temples that are dispersed around the Beqaa Valley in Lebanon. The most important and famous are those in Roman Heliopolis. A few temples are built on former buildings of the Phoen ...
and another area with a particularly heavy concentration was defined as the
Temples of Mount Hermon The Temples of Mount Hermon are around thirty Roman shrines and Roman temples that are dispersed around the slopes of Mount Hermon in Lebanon, Israel and Syria. A few temples are built on former buildings of the Phoenician & Hellenistic er ...
.


Damage to archaeological sites

During the 2006 Lebanon war, a number of archaeological sites, including world heritage sites, were damaged as a result of Israeli aerial bombardments in Lebanon. A survey of the damage to sites in Lebanon was launched by UNESCO after the international archaeological community, including the director of the
British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
,
Neil MacGregor Robert Neil MacGregor (born 16 June 1946) is a British art historian and former museum director. He was editor of the ''Burlington Magazine'' from 1981 to 1987, then Director of the National Gallery, London, from 1987 to 2002, Director of th ...
, urged an investigation into the effects of bombing on "one of the planet's most heritage-rich countries." UNESCO's team of experts found that the most serious damage resulting from the conflict was at the world heritage site of Byblos, where an oil spill resulting from the targeting of fuel tanks at the Jiyeh power plant had stained the stones at the base of the port's two Medieval towers, among other archaeological remains on the seashore. Mounir Bouchenaki, Director-General of the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM) estimated that it would take twenty-five people eight to ten weeks to manually hand-clean the affected areas, placing the cost of the operation at some 100,000 USD. The mission also found that the main features of the world heritage site of Tyre, such as the Ancient Roman hippodrome and
triumphal arch A triumphal arch is a free-standing monumental structure in the shape of an archway with one or more arched passageways, often designed to span a road. In its simplest form a triumphal arch consists of two massive piers connected by an arch, cro ...
had escaped damage, but that
frescoes Fresco (plural ''frescos'' or ''frescoes'') is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaster ...
in a Roman
tomb A tomb ( grc-gre, τύμβος ''tumbos'') is a repository for the remains of the dead. It is generally any structurally enclosed interment space or burial chamber, of varying sizes. Placing a corpse into a tomb can be called ''immureme ...
at the site had come loose, likely because of vibrations caused by
bombs A bomb is an explosive weapon that uses the exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. Detonations inflict damage principally through ground- and atmosphere-transmitted mechanic ...
. It was also reported that the world heritage site of Baalbek was not damaged by bombs, with the exception of the fall of one block of stone and the widening of
fissure A fissure is a long, narrow crack opening along the surface of Earth. The term is derived from the Latin word , which means 'cleft' or 'crack'. Fissures emerge in Earth's crust, on ice sheets and glaciers, and on volcanoes. Ground fissure ...
s on the lintels in the
temple A temple (from the Latin ) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called churches), Hinduism (whose temples ...
s of
Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousandth t ...
and
Bacchus In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, myth, Dionysus (; grc, wikt:Διόνυσος, Διόνυσος ) is the god of the grape-harvest, winemaking, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstas ...
, likely due to vibrations from nearby bombings. Also damaged by bombs, as noted by the mission, were the souk and some old houses in the Old City of Baalbek that were not part of the property inscribed on the World Heritage List. At a
press conference A press conference or news conference is a media event in which notable individuals or organizations invite journalists to hear them speak and ask questions. Press conferences are often held by politicians, corporations, non-governmental organ ...
revealing the results of the survey, Françoise Rivière, UNESCO's Assistant Director-General for Culture, reported on UNESCO's efforts during and after the fighting to draw the attention of both parties to their obligations to spare cultural heritage, as protected by the
Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict The Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict is the first international treaty that focuses exclusively on the protection of cultural property in armed conflict. It was signed at The Hague, Nethe ...
, to which both Lebanon and Israel are States Parties. The recent increase in pace of
urbanization Urbanization (or urbanisation) refers to the population shift from rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. It is predominantly t ...
in Lebanon has raised notable issues in the news regarding the
Beirut Hippodrome Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, is home to two hippodromes, a historic one from the Roman era and a modern one that was built in the late 19th century. Roman Hippodrome of Beirut The Roman Hippodrome, which occupies 3500 m² near the Maghen Abr ...
and a suggested Phoenician port of Beirut. Non-governmental organizations such as the Association for the Protection of Lebanese Heritage have organized public demonstrations and co-operate with cultural activist groups such as Save Beirut Heritage to increase awareness of heritage conservation in the country.


See also

*
Levantine archaeology Levantine archaeology is the archaeological study of the Levant. It is also known as Syro-Palestinian archaeology or Palestinian archaeologyDavis, 2004, p. 146.Dever, 2001, p. 61. (particularly when the area of inquiry centers on ancient Palesti ...
*
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 ...
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Archaeological Museum of the American University of Beirut The Archaeology Museum of the American University of Beirut in Beirut, Lebanon is the third oldest museum in the Near East after Cairo and Constantinople. History The Archaeological Museum of the American University of Beirut (AUB Archaeological M ...
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National Museum of Beirut The National Museum of Beirut ( ar, متحف بيروت الوطنيّ, ''Matḥaf Bayrūt al-waṭanī'' or French: Musée national de Beyrouth) is the principal museum of archaeology in Lebanon. The collection begun after World War I, and the m ...
* list of tells in lebanon *
Culture of Lebanon The culture of Lebanon and the Lebanese people emerged from various civilizations over thousands of years. It was home to the Phoenicians and was subsequently conquered and occupied by the Assyrians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Persians, t ...
* BAAL Journal


References


Notes


Bibliography

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External links


Lebanon's Archeological Heritage
{{Asia topic, Archaeology in