Baalbeck

[tattwa]

In the recent past the tranquillity of the Beqa’a Valley, that runs north-south between the Lebanon and Ante-Lebanon mountain ranges, has been regularly shattered by the screeching noise of Israeli jet fighters. Their targets are usually the Hizbullah training camps, mostly for reconnaissance purposes, but occasionally to drop bombs on the local inhabitants. It is a sign of the times in the troubled Middle East.

Yet the Beqa’a Valley is also famous for quite another reason. Elevated above the lazy town of Baalbek is one of architecture’s greatest achievements. I refer to the almighty Temple of Jupiter, situated besides two smaller temples, one dedicated to Venus, the goddess of love, and the other dedicated to Bacchus, the god of fertility and good cheer (although some argue this temple was dedicated to Mercury, the winged god of communication).

Today these wonders of the classical world remain as impressive ruins scattered across a wide area, but more remarkable still is the gigantic stone podiums within which these structures stand. An outer podium wall, popularly known as the ‘Great Platform’, is seen by scholars as contemporary to the Roman temples. Yet incorporated into one of its courses are the three largest building blocks ever used in a man-made structure. Each one weighs an estimated 1000 tonnes a piece.1 They sit side-by-side on the fifth level of a truly cyclopean wall located beyond the western limits of the Temple of Jupiter.

Even more extraordinary is the fact that in a limestone quarry about one quarter of a mile away from the Baalbek complex is an even larger building block. Known as Hajar el Gouble, the Stone of the South, or the Hajar el Hibla, the Stone of the Pregnant Woman, it weighs an estimated 1200 tonnes.2 It lays at a raised angle — the lowest part of its base still attached to the living rock — cut and ready to be broken free and transported to its presumed destination next to the Trilithon, the name given to the three great stones in ancient times.

The enigma is this — although the high-tech, computer programmed jet fighters that scream through the Beqa’a Valley possess laser-guided missiles that can precision bomb to within three feet of their designated target — there is not a crane today that can even think of lifting a 1000-tonne weight, never mind a 1200-tonne weight like the stone block left in the quarry. Confounding the mystery even further is how the builders of the Trilithon managed to position these stones side by side with such precision that, according to some commentators not even a needle can be inserted between them.3

So who were the supermen behind this breath-taking project? Surely the world is aware of their origins and history. Who were these people?

Unfortunately, however, nobody knows their names. Nowhere in extant Roman records does it mention anything at all about the architects and engineers involved in the construction of the Great Platform. No contemporary Roman historian or scholar commentates on how it was constructed, and there are no tales that preserve the means by which the Roman builders achieved such marvellous feats of engineering.

Why?

Why the silence?

Surely someone, somewhere, must know what happened.

And herein the problems begin, for the local inhabitants of the Beqa’a Valley — who consist in the main of Arab Muslims, Maronite Christians and Orthodox Christians — do preserve legends about the origins of the Great Platform, but they do not involve the Romans.

They say that Baalbek’s first city was built before the Great Flood by Cain, the son of Adam, whom God banished to the ‘land of Nod’ that lay ‘east of Eden’ for murdering his good brother Abel, and he called it after his son Enoch.4 The citadel, they say, fell into ruins at the time of the deluge and was much later re-built by a race of giants under the command of Nimrod, the ‘mighty hunter’ and ‘king of Shinar’ of the Book of Genesis.5

So who do we believe — the academics who are of the opinion that the Great Platform was constructed by the Romans, or the local folktales which ascribe Baalbek’s cyclopean masonry to a much earlier age? And if we are to accept the latter explanation, then who exactly were these ‘giants’, gigantes or Titans of Greek tradition? Furthermore, why accredit Cain, Adam’s outcast son, as the builder of Baalbek’s first city?

In an attempt to answer some of these questions it will be necessary to review the known history of Baalbek and to examine more closely the stones of the Trilithon in relationship to the rest of the ruins we see today. It will also be necessary to look at the mythologies, not only of the earliest peoples of Lebanon, but also the Hellenic Greeks. Only by doing this will a much clearer picture begin to emerge.

Heliopolis of the East

Scholars suggest that Baalbek started its life as a convenient trading post between the Lebanese coast and Damascus. What seems equally as likely, however, is that — situated close at the highest point in the Beqa’a, and set between the headwaters of Lebanon’s two greatest rivers, the Orontes and Leontes — this elevated site became an important religious centre at a very early date indeed.

Excavations in the vicinity of the Great Court of the Temple of Jupiter have revealed the existence of a tell, or occupational mound, dating back to the Early Bronze age (c.2900-2300 BC).6 By the late second millennium BC a raised court, entered through a gateway with twin towers, had been constructed around a vertical shaft that dropped down some fifty yards to a natural crevice in which ‘a small rock cut altar’ was used for sacrificial rites.7

In the hills around the temple complex are literally hundreds of rock-cut tombs which, although plundered long ago, are thought to date to the time of the Phoenicians,8 the great sea-faring nation of Semitic origin who inhabited Lebanon from around 2500 BC onwards and were known in the Bible as the Canaanites, the people of Canaan. They established major sea-ports in Lebanon, northern Palestine and Syria, as well as trading posts across the Mediterranean and the eastern Atlantic seaboard, right through till classical times. Indeed, it is believed that Phoenicia’s mythical history heavily influenced the development of Greek myth and legend.

Following the death of Alexander in 323 BC, Phoenicia was ruled successively by the Ptolemaic kings of Egypt and the Seleucid kings of Syria until the arrival of the Romans under a general named Pompey in 63 BC. The first-century AD Jewish historian Josephus tells of Alexander’s march through the Beqa’a on his way to Damascus, during which he encountered the cities of ‘Heliopolis and Chalcis’.9 Chalcis, modern Majdel Anjar, was then the political centre of the Beqa’a, while Baalbek was its principal religious centre.

Heliopolis was the name given to Baalbek under the Ptolemies of Egypt sometime between 323 and 198 BC. Meaning ‘city of the sun’, it expressed the importance this religious centre held to the Egyptians, particularly since a place of immense antiquity bearing this same name already existed in Lower Egypt.

Following a brief period in which Mark Anthony handed Lebanon and Syria back to Queen Cleopatra, the last Ptolemaic queen of Egypt, Lebanon became a Roman colony around 27 BC, and it was during this phase in its history that construction began on the Baalbek temples.10

The principal deity they chose to preside over Baalbek was Jupiter, the sky god. He was arguably the most important deity of the Romans, taking over the role of Zeus in the Greek pantheon. Jupiter was probably chosen to replace the much earlier worship of the Canaanite god Baal (meaning ‘lord’) who had many characteristics in common with the Greek Zeus. It is, of course, from Baal that Baalbek derives its name, which means, simply, ‘town of Baal’. Yet when, and how, this god of corn, rain, tempest and thunder, was worshipped here is not known, even though legend asserts that Baalbek was the alleged birth-place of Baal.11 In the Bible Baalbek appears under the name Baalath,12 a town re-fortified by Israel’s King Solomon, c.970 BC (1 Kings 9:15 & 2 Chr. 8:6), confirming both its sanctity to Baal at this early date and its apparent strategic importance on the road to Damascus.

Some scholars have suggested that Baal (Assyrian Hadad) was only one of a triad of Phoenician deities that were once venerated at this site — the others being his son Aliyan, who presided over well-springs and fecundity, and his daughter Anat (Assyrian Atargatis), who was Aliyan’s devoted lover. These three correspond very well with the Roman triad of Jupiter, Mercury and Venus, whose veneration is almost certainly preserved in the dedication of the three temples at Baalbek. Many Roman emperors were of Syrian extraction, so it would not have been unusual for them to have promoted the worship of the country’s indigenous deities under their adopted Roman names.13

Whatever the nature of the pre-Roman worship at Baalbek, its veneration of Baal created a hybrid form of the god Jupiter, generally referred to as Jupiter Heliopolitan. One surviving statue of him in bronze shows the beardless god sporting a huge calathos headdress, a symbol of divinity, as well as a bull, a symbol of Baal, on either side of him.14

The Temple of Jupiter

When the Romans began construction of the gigantic Temple of Jupiter — the largest of its kind in the classical world — during the reign of Emperor Augustus in the late first century BC, they utilised an existing podium made up of huge walls of enormous stone blocks.15 This much is known. Academics suggest that this inner podium, or rectangular stone platform filled level with earth, was an unfinished component of an open-air temple constructed by the Seleucid priesthoods on the existing Bronze Age tell sometime between 198 and 63 BC.16 Baalbek’s great sanctity was well-known even before the building of the temple, for it is said to have possessed a renowned oracle which, according to a Latin grammarian and author named Macrobius (fl. AD 420), expressed itself through the movement of a great statue located in the courtyard. It was attended by ‘dignitaries’ with shaven heads who had previously undergone long periods of ritual abstinence.17

As the temple complex expanded throughout Roman times, the existing foundations extended southwards, beyond the inner podium, to where the Temple of Bacchus (or Mercury) was eventually constructed in the middle of the second century BC. It also extended north-eastwards to where a great court, an observation tower, an enclosed hexagonal court and a raised, open-air altar were incorporated into the overall design. To the south, outside the Great Court, rose the much smaller Temple of Venus as well as the lesser known Temple of the Muses.

According to Professor H. Kalayan, whose extensive surveying programme of the Baalbek complex was published in 1969, the Temple of Jupiter and its east facing courtyard were planned simultaneously as one overall design.18 Yet in the age of Augustus this should have meant that the temple be placed at one end of a courtyard that surrounded it on all sides; it was the style of the day. This, however, is not what happened at Baalbek, for its courtyard ceased in line with the temple facade. This Professor Kalayan saw as a deliberate change of policy, even though ‘foundations’ for an extension to this courtyard were already in place on the north side of the temple.19

The Trilithon

Did the Roman architects of Baalbek chop and change their minds so easily? Their next move would appear to suggest as much, for they decided that, instead of extending the courtyard, they would continue the existing pre-Roman temple podium behind the western end of the Temple of Jupiter. This mammoth building project apparently necessitated the cutting, transporting and positioning of the three 1000-tonne limestone blocks making up the Trilithon. Their sizes vary between sixty-three and sixty-five feet in length, while each one shares the same height of fourteen feet six inches and a depth of twelve feet.20 Seeing them strikes a sense of awe unimaginable to the senses, for as a former Curator of Antiquities at Baalbek, Michel M. Alouf, aptly put it: "No description will give an exact idea of the bewildering and stupefying effect of these tremendous blocks on the spectator".21

The course beneath the Trilithon is almost as bewildering. It consists of six mammoth stones thirty to thirty three feet in length, fourteen feet in height and ten feet in depth,22 each an estimated 450 tonnes in weight. This lower course continues on both the northern and southern faces of the podium wall, with nine similarly sized blocks incorporated into either side. Below these are at least three further courses of somewhat smaller blocks of mostly irregular widths which were apparently exposed when the Arabs attempted to incorporate the outer podium wall into their fortifications.23 Indeed, above and around the Trilithon is the remains of an Arab wall that contrasts markedly from the much greater sized cyclopean stones.

There is no good reason why the Roman architects should have needed to use such huge blocks, totally unprecedented in engineering projects of the classical age. Further confounding the picture is that the outer podium wall was left ‘incomplete’. Furthermore, the even larger 1200-tonne cut and dressed Stone of the Pregnant Woman lying in the nearby quarry (which measures an incredible sixty-nine feet by sixteen feet by thirteen feet ten inches24), would imply that something went wrong, forcing the engineers to abandon completion of the Great Platform.

Why?

Scholars can only gloss over the necessity to use such ridiculously large sized blocks. Baalbek scholar Friedrich Ragette, in his 1980 work entitled, simply, Baalbek, suggests that such huge stones were used because "according to Phoenician tradition, (podiums) had to consist of no more than three layers of stone" and since this one was to be twelve metres high, it meant the use of enormous building blocks.25 It is a solution that rings hollow in my ears. He further adds that stones of this size and proportion were also employed "in the interest of appearance".26

In the interest of appearance? But they don’t even look right — the Trilithon looks alien in comparison to the rest of the wall.

Ragette points out that the sheer awe inspired by the Trilithon ensured that Baalbek was remembered by later generations, not for the grandeur of its magnificent temples, but for its three great stones which ignorant folk began to believe were built by superhuman giants of some bygone age.27

Was this the real explanation why giants were accredited with the construction of Baalbek — because naive inhabitants and travellers could not accept that the Romans had the power to achieve such grand feats of engineering?

There is no answer to this question until all the evidence has been presented in respect to the construction of the Great Platform, and it is in this area that we find some very contradictory evidence indeed. For example, when the unfinished upper course of the Great Platform was cleared of loose blocks and rubble, excavators found carved into its horizontal surface a drawing of the pediment (a triangular, gable-like piece of architecture present in the Temple of Jupiter). So exact was this design that it seemed certain the architects and masons had positioned their blocks using this scale plan.28 This meant that the Great Platform must have existed before the construction of the temple.

On the other hand, a stone column drum originally intended for the Temple of Jupiter was apparently found among the foundation rubble placed beneath the podium wall.29 This is convincing evidence to show that the Great Platform was constructed at the same time, perhaps even later, than the temple.

So the Great Platform turns out to be Roman after all, or does it?

It could be argued that the column drum was used as ballast to strengthen the foundations of the much earlier podium wall, and until further knowledge of exactly where this cylindrical block was found then the matter cannot be resolved either way.

The Big Debate

The next problem is whether or not the Romans possessed the engineering capability to cut, transport and position 1000-tonne blocks of this nature. Since the Stone of the Pregnant Woman was presumably intended to extend the Trilithon, it must be assumed that the main three stones came from the same quarry, which lies about one quarter of a mile from the site. Another similar stone quarry lies some two miles away, but there is no obvious evidence that the Trilithon stones came from there.

Having established these facts, we must decide on how the Roman engineers managed to cut and free 1000-tonne stones from the bed-rock and then move them on a steady incline for a distance of several hundred yards.

Ragette suggests that the Trilithon stones were first cut from the bed-rock, using "metal picks" and "some sort of quarrying machine" that left concentric circular blows up to four metres in radius on some blocks (surely an enigma in itself).30 They were then transported to the site by placing them on sleighs that rested on cylindrical wooden rollers. As he points out, similar methods of transportation were successfully employed in Egypt and Mesopotamia, as is witnessed by various stone reliefs.31 This is correct, for there do exist carved images showing the movement of either statues or stone blocks by means of large pulley crews. These are aided by groups of helpers who either mark-time or pick up wooden rollers from the rear end of the train and then place them in the path of the slow-moving procession.

Two major observations can be made in respect to this solution. Firstly, this process requires a flat even surface, which if not present would necessitate the construction of a stone causeway or ramp from the quarry to the point of final destination (as is evidenced at Giza in Egypt). Certainly, there is a road that passes the quarry on the way to the village, but there is still much rugged terrain between here and the final position of the blocks. Secondly, the reliefs depicting the movement of large weights in Egypt and Assyria show individual pieces that are an estimated 100 tonnes in weight — one tenth the size of the Trilithon stones. I feel sure that the movement of 1000-tonne blocks would create insurmountable difficulties for the suggested pulley and roller system. One French scholar calculated that to move a 1000-tonne block, no less than 40,000 men would have been required, making logistics virtually inconceivable on the tiny track up to the village.32

Practically Impossible

The next problem is how the Romans might have manoeuvred the giant blocks into position. Ragette suggests the "bury and re-excavate" method,33 where ramps of compacted earth would be constructed on a slight incline up to the top of the wall — which before the Trilithon was added stood at an estimated twenty-five feet high. The blocks would then be pulled upwards by pulley gangs on the other side until they reached the required height; a similar method is thought to have been employed to erect the horizontal trilithon stones at Stonehenge, for instance. Playing devil’s advocate here, I would ask: how did the pulley gangs manage to bring together these stones so exactly and how were they able to achieve such precision movement when the land beyond the podium slopes gently downwards? Only by creating a raised ramp on the hill-slope itself, and then placing the pulley gangs on the other side of the wall could an operation of this kind even be attempted.

And how were the stone blocks lifted from the rollers to allow final positioning? Ragette proposes the use of scaffoldings, ramps and windlasses (ie. capstans) like those employed by the Renaissance architect Domenico Fontana to erect a 327-tonne Egyptian obelisk in front of St Peter’s Basilica in Rome. To achieve this amount of lift, Fontana used an incredible 40 windlasses, which necessitated a combined force of 800 men and 140 horses.

Based on an estimated weight of 800 tonnes per stone34 (even though he cites each one as 1000-tonnes a piece earlier in the same book35), Ragette proposes that, with a five-tonne lifting capacity per drilled Lewis hole, each block would have required 160 attachments to the upper surface. He goes on: "Four each could be hooked to a pulley of 20 tons capacity which in the case of six rolls needed an operating power of about 3Ѕ tons. The task therefore consisted of the simultaneous handling of forty windlasses of 3Ѕ tons each. The pulleys were most likely attached to timber frames bridging across the stone."36

Such ideas are pure speculation. No evidence of any such transportation has ever come to light at Baalbek, and the surface of the Trilithon has not revealed any tell-tale signs of drilled Lewis holes. Admittedly, the Stone of the Pregnant Woman remaining in the quarry does contain a seemingly random series of round holes in its upper surface, yet their precise purpose remains a mystery.

As evidence that the Romans possessed the knowledge to lift and transport extremely heavy weights, Ragette cites the fact that between AD 60 and 70, ie. the proposed time-frame of construction of the Jupiter temple, a man named Heron of Alexandria compiled an important work outlining this very practice, including the use of levels to raise up and position large stone blocks.37 Curiously, the only surviving example of this treatise is an Arabic translation made by a native of Baalbek named Costa ibn Luka in around 860 AD.38 Did it suggest that knowledge of this engineering manual had been preserved in the town since Roman times, being passed on from generation to generation until it finally reached the hands of Costa ibn Luka? Of course it is possible, but whether or not it was of any practical use when it came to the construction of the Trilithon is quite another matter.

The Archaeologists’ View

No one can rightly say whether or not the Romans really did have the knowledge and expertise to construct the Great Platform; certainly some of the Temple of Jupiter’s tall columns of Aswan granite, at sixty-five feet in height, are among the largest in the world. And even if we presume that they did have the ability, then this cannot definitively date the various building phases at Baalbek. For the moment, it seemed more important to establish whether there existed any independent evidence to suggest that the Great Platform might not have been built by the Romans.

Over the past thirty or so years a number of ancient mysteries writers have seen fit to associate the Great Platform with a much earlier era of mankind, simply because of the sheer uniqueness of the Trilithon. They have suggested that the Romans built upon an existing structure of immense antiquity. Unfortunately, however, their personal observations cannot be taken as independent evidence of the Great Platform’s pre-Roman origin.

There is, however, tantalising evidence to show that some of the earliest archaeologists and European travellers to visit Baalbek came away believing that the Great Platform was much older than the nearby Roman temples. For instance, the French scholar, Louis Felicien de Saulcy, stayed at Baalbek from 16 to 18 March 1851 and became convinced that the podium walls were the "remains of a pre-Roman temple".39

Far more significant, however, were the observations of respected French archaeologist Ernest Renan, who was allowed archaeological exploration of the site by the French army during the mid nineteenth century.40 It is said that when he arrived there it was to satisfy his own conviction that no pre-Roman remains existed on the site.41 Yet following an in-depth study of the ruins, Renan came to the conclusion that the stones of the Trilithon were very possibly "of Phoenician origin",42 in other words they were a great deal older that the Roman temple complex. His reasoning for this assertion was that, in the words of Ragette, he saw "no inherent relation between the Roman temple and this work".43

Archaeologists who have followed in Renan’s footsteps have closed up this gap of uncertainty, firmly asserting that the outer podium wall was constructed at the same time as the Temple of Jupiter, despite the fact that inner podium wall is seen as a pre-Roman construction. Yet the openness of individuals such as de Saulcy and Renan gives us reason to doubt the assertions of their modern-day equivalents.

A similar situation prevails in Egyptology, where in the late nineteenth, early twentieth centuries megalithic structures such the Valley Temple at Giza and the Osireion at Abydos were initially ascribed very early dates of construction by archaeologists before later being cited as contemporary to more modern structures placed in their general proximity. As has now become clear from recent research into the age of the Great Sphinx, there was every reason to have ascribed these cyclopean structures much earlier dates of construction. So what was it that so convinced early archaeologists and travellers that the Trilithon was much older than the rest of the temple complex?

The evidence is self apparent and runs as follows:

a) One has only to look at the positioning of the Trilithon and the various courses of large stone blocks immediately beneath it to realise that they bear very little relationship to the rest of the Temple of Jupiter. Moreover, the visible courses of smaller blocks above and to the right of the Trilithon are markedly different in shape and appearance to the smaller, more regular sized courses in the rest of the obviously Roman structure.

b) The limestone courses that make up the outer podium base — which, of course, includes the Trilithon — are heavily pitted by wind and sand erosion, while the rest of the Temple of Jupiter still possesses comparatively smooth surfaces. The same type of wind and sand erosion can be seen on the huge limestone blocks used in many of the megalithic temple complexes around the northern Mediterranean coast, as well as the cyclopean walls of Mycenean Greece. Since all these structures are between 3000 and 6000 years of age, it could be argued that the lower courses of the outer podium wall at Baalbek antedate the Roman temple complex by at least a thousand years.

c) Other classical temple complexes have been built upon much earlier megalithic structures. This includes the Acropolis in Athens (erected 447-406 BC), where archaeologists have unearthed cyclopean walls dating to the Mycenean or Late Bronze Age period (1600-1100 BC). Similar huge stone walls appear at Delphi, Tiryns and Mycenae.

d) The Phoenicians are known to have employed the use of cyclopean masonry in the construction of their citadels. For instance, an early twentieth-century drawing of the last remaining prehistoric wall at Aradus, an ancient city on the Syrian coast, shows the use of cyclopean blocks estimated to have been between thirty and forty tonnes a piece.

These are important points in favour of the Great Platform, as in the case of the inner podium, being of much greater antiquity than the Roman, or even the Ptolemaic, temple complex. Yet if we were to accept this possibility, then we must also ask ourselves: who constructed it, and why?

Only one account of Lebanon’s mythical origins has been left to posterity, and this is the work of Sanchoniatho, a Phoenician historian born either in Berytus (Beirut) or Tyre on the Lebanese coast just before the Trojan war, c.1200 BC. He wrote in his native language, taking his information mostly from city archives and temple records.

In all he compiled nine books, which were translated into Greek by Philo, a native of Byblos on the Levant coast, who lived during the reign of the emperor Hadrian (reigned AD 117-138). Fragments of his translation were fortunately preserved by an early Christian writer named Eusebius (AD 264-340).44 Some scholars look upon Sanchoniatho’s writings as spurious, but others see them as preserving archaic myths of the earliest Phoenicians.

In his long discourse on the cosmogony of the world and the history of the earliest inhabitants of Lebanon, Sanchoniatho cites Byblos as Lebanon’s first city.45 It was founded, he says, by the god Cronus (or Saturn), the son of Ouranus (Uranus or Coelus, who gave his name to Coele-Syria, ie. Syria), and grandson of Elioun (Canaanite El) and his wife Beruth (who gave her name to the city-port of Berytus or Beirut).

Sanchoniatho goes on to say that the demi-gods of Byblos possessed "light and other more complete ships", implying they were a sea-faring nation. He also states that chief among these people was Taautus, "who invented the writing of the first letters; him the Egyptians called Thoor, the Alexandrians Thoyth, and the Greeks Hermes."46 He was Cronus’ "secretary", from whom the god gained advice and assistance on all matters.

A confusing sequence of events are described for this period, during which time Cronus is constantly at war with his father Ouranus. There are also marriages, intermarriages and incestuous relationships which produce a multitude of characters, many of whom act as symbols for the expansion of this mythical culture around the Levant and into Asia Minor (modern Turkey). For instance, there is Sidon, the daughter of Pontus, who "by the excellence of her singing first invented the hymns of odes or praises".47 Like Byblos, Sidon was a Phoenician city-port on the Lebanese coast, while Pontus was an ancient kingdom situated on the Black Sea in what is today north-eastern Turkey.

Finally, it is said that having visited "the country of the south" Cronus "gave all Egypt to the god Taautus, that it might be his kingdom",48 implying that he was its founder.

Sanchoniatho tells us that knowledge of the age of the demi-gods of Byblos was handed down for generation after generation until it was given into the safe-keeping of "the son of Thabion... the first Hierophant of all among the Phoenicians".49 He in turn delivered them up to the priests and prophets until they came into the possession of one Isiris, "the inventor of the three letters, the brother of Chna who is called the first Phoenician."50

There is much more in Sanchoniatho’s mythical history, but the basic message is that a high culture with sea-faring capabilities established itself at Byblos before gradually expanding into other parts of the eastern Mediterranean. More curious is his assertion that the god Taautus, the Phoenician form of the Egyptian Thoth or Tehuti and the Greek Hermes, was some kind of founder of the Egyptian Pharaonic culture which began c.3100 BC.

Was Sanchoniatho’s work simply fable, based on the Phoenicians’ own maritime achievements, or might it contain clues concerning an actual high culture that existed in the Levant during prehistoric times?

Journey to Byblos

Certainly, the implied link between Egypt and Byblos is real enough. In the legend of Osiris and Isis, as recorded by the Greek biographer Plutarch (AD 50-120), the evil god Set tricks Osiris into a wooden coffin which is sealed before being set adrift on the sea. It is carried by the waves until it finally reaches Byblos, where it comes to rest in the midst of a tamarisk bush, which immediately grows to become a magnificent tree of great size. Inside it the coffin containing the body of Osiris remains encased. The king of that country, on seeing the great tree, has it cut down and made into "a pillar for the roof of his house".51 Isis learns of what has happened to her husband and is able to attain entry into the palace as a handmaiden to one of the king’s sons. Each night she takes on the form of a swallow to fly around the pillar. After a fashion she convinces the queen to give her the pillar, which is then opened to reveal the body of Osiris.52

Byblos is the clear name used in Plutarch’s account, but for some reason noted Egyptologists such as Sir E.A. Wallis-Budge have seen fit to identify this place-name with a location named Byblos in the Nile Delta, even though Plutarch himself adds that wood from the pillar, which was afterwards restored by Isis and given to the queen, "is, to this day, preserved in the temple of Isis, and worshipped by the people of Byblos".53 In my opinion, setting this story in the Nile Delta makes no sense whatever, especially as the coffin was said to have been "carried (to Byblos) by the sea".54

Lucian, the celebrated Greek writer (AD 120-200), spoke of the Isis-Osiris legend and connected it specifically with Byblos in Lebanon, adding that "I will tell you why this story seems credible. Every year a human head floats from Egypt to Byblos". This "head" apparently took seven days to reach its destination. It never went off course and came via a "direct route" to Byblos. Lucian claimed that this once yearly event actually happened when he himself was in Byblos, for as he records "I myself saw the head in this city".55

What exactly Lucian witnessed, and what was really behind this head tradition is utterly unfathomable, particularly as Lucian states that the head he saw was made of "Egyptian papyrus".56 In Christian times a St Kyrillos also apparently witnessed the event, but said that "what was borne towards him by the wind looked like a small boat".57 All that can be said with any certainty is that this peculiar tradition appeared to preserve some kind age-old twinning between Egypt and Byblos, perhaps during the mythical age of the gods, the Zep Tepi, or First Time. As has been ably demonstrated by recent works from Hancock, Bauval et al, this believed mythical age, when gods ruled the earth, appears to have been an actual stage of human development pre-dating Pharaonic Egypt by many thousands of years.58

Yet how might this new-found knowledge of the relationship between Egypt and Byblos relate to Baalbek?

Firstly there appears to have been a strong link between Isis-Osiris legend and the mountains north-west of Baalbek. It was said that Isis took "refuge" (presumably at the point in the story when the king and queen of Byblos discover she is daily incinerating their child on a blazing fire!) in the lake of Apheca, the ancient name for Lake Yammouneh some 32km distance from Baalbek, "and thus lived in Lebanon", or so recorded the Baalbek archaeologist and historian Michel M. Alouf.59

The more obvious answer, however, appears to be an apparent twinning that existed between Heliopolis in Egypt and Heliopolis in Lebanon. The fifth-century Latin grammarian Macrobius wrote specifically on this subject in his curious work entitled Saturnalia. He stated that a "statue" was carried ritually from Heliopolis in Egypt to its Lebanese name-sake by Egyptian priests. He adds that after its arrival it was worshipped with Assyrian rather than Egyptian rites.60

Some authors have suggested that this statue was that of the Egyptian sun-god, presumably Re, while others say it was a representation of Osiris.61 In addition to this statue story, there was also a strong tradition, recounted by Macrobius and others, that the Egyptian priests actually erected a temple at Baalbek dedicated to the worship of the sun.62 If so, then what special place did this ancient location, sacred to Baal, hold to the Heliopolitan priesthood in Egypt? Might this transmission of religious ideas from Egypt to Baalbek have been connected in some way to the once yearly arrival of an Egyptian ‘head’ at Byblos, and to Osiris’ fateful journey inside a sealed coffin?

Titans and Elohim

Aside from the suggested link with the Egyptian culture, the writings of Sanchoniatho throw further light on this apparent pre-Phoenician culture existing in the Levant during prehistoric times. He says that the "auxiliaries" or "allies" of Cronus, presumably in battle, were the "Eloeim" a misspelling of the term Elohim, the sons of whom (the bene ha-elohim) were said to have been a divine race that came unto the Daughters of Man who subsequently gave birth to giant offspring known as the Nephilim, or so records the Book of Genesis and various uncanonical works of Judaic origin.63

Elsewhere I have put forward the hypothesis that the Sons of the Elohim — who are equated with the angelic race known as the Watchers in the apocryphal Book of Enoch, as well as in recently translated Dead Sea literature — were a race of human beings. Evidence indicates they established a colony in the mountains of Kurdistan in south-east Turkey sometime after the cessation of the last Ice Age, before going on to influence the rise of western civilisation. Their progeny, the Nephilim, were half-mortal, half-Watcher, and there is tentative evidence in the writings of Sumer and Akkad to suggest that the accounts of great battles being fought between mythical kings and demons dressed as bird-men might well preserve the distorted memories of actual conflicts between mortal armies and Nephilim-led tribes.64 [See New Dawn nos. 40-42]

Might Cronus — who or whatever he represents — have employed the services of the bene ha-elohim in the wars against his father, Ouranus? In Greek mythology the Nephilim are equated directly with the Titans and gigantes, or ‘giants’, who waged war on the gods of Olympus and, like Cronus, were the offspring of Ouranus. In many ancient writings preserved during the early Christian era, stories concerning the Nephilim, or gibborim, ‘mighty men’, of biblical tradition are confused with the legends surrounding the Titans and gigantes. All blend together as one, and not perhaps without reason. The giants and Titans are said to have helped Nimrod, the ‘mighty hunter’ construct the fabled Tower of Babel which reached towards heaven. On its destruction by God, legends speak of how the giant races were dispersed across the bible lands.65

According to an Arabic manuscript found at Baalbek and quoted by Alouf in his informative History of Baalbek "after the flood, when Nimrod reigned over Lebanon, he sent giants to rebuild the fortress of Baalbek, which was so named in honour of Baal, the god of the Moabites and worshippers of the Sun."66 Local tradition even asserts that the Tower of Babel was actually located at Baalbek.67

The involvement of Nimrod in this legend is almost certainly a misnomer, born out of the belief that only super-humans of myth and fable could ever have built such gigantic stature, in the same way that either named giants or mythical figures, such as Arthur, Merlin or the devil are accredited with the construction or presence of prehistoric monuments in Britain. Moreover, stories of giants exist right across Asia Minor and the Middle East, and these are often cited to explain the presence of either cyclopean ruins (such as the Greek city of Mycenae, the cyclopean walls of which were said to have been built by the one-eyed cyclops — hence the term ‘cyclopean’ masonry) or gigantic natural and man-made features.

On the other hand, the alleged connection between giants, Titans and Baalbek is quite another matter. It is feasible that, if the Watchers and Nephilim (and therefore the Titans and gigantes) are to be seen as a lost race of human beings, any presumed pre-Phoenician culture in Lebanon could not have failed to have encountered their presence in the Near East. If so, were alliances forged with them, wars fought alongside them?

Might the ancient skills and brute strength of these human races of great stature have been employed in grand engineering projects such as the construction of the Great Platform? Remember, the Titans were said to have been born of the same loins as Cronus, and in alliance with their half-brother, they waged war against their father Ouranus. Yet family alliances of this type can go wrong, for according to the various ancient writers on this subject,68 after the fall of the Tower of Babel and the dispersion of the tribes, a war broke out between Cronus and his brother Titan. An early Christian writer named Lactantius (AD 250-325) records that Titan, with the help of the rest of the Titans, imprisoned Cronus and held him safe until his son Jupiter (or Zeus) was old enough to take the throne. Does this imply that the Titans deposed Cronus and took control of the Byblos culture until the coming of Zeus, or Jupiter? What influence might this forgotten race have brought to bear on the development of Lebanon’s pre-Phoenician culture? More importantly, when might any of this have taken place?

Far off in Hell

According to classical mythology, the Titans were eventually defeated by Jupiter and his fellow Olympian gods and goddesses. As punishment, they were banished to Tartarus, a mythical region of hell enclosed by a brazen wall and shrouded perpetually by a cloud of darkness. The gigantes, too, were linked with this terrible place, for they are cited by the first-century Roman writer Caius Julius Hyginus (fl. c.40 BC) as having been the "sons of Tartarus and Terra (ie. the earth)".69

Although Tartarus has always been seen as a purely mythical location, there is reason to link it with a Phoenician city-port and kingdom known as Tartessus (Tarshish in the Bible) that thrived in the Spanish province of Andalucia during ancient times.

The evidence is this — Gyges, or Gyes, was a son or Coelus (ie. Ouranus) and a brother of Cronus; he was also seen both as a gigante and a Titan (demonstrating how they were originally one and the same race).70 He seems to have been one of the main figures in the later wars between his titanic brothers and the Olympian gods under the command of Zeus, and may simply have been Titan under another name.

Classical writers such as Ovid (43 BC-AD 18) wrote that Gyges was punished by being banished to the prison of Tartarus. Yet an account of this same story given by a Chaldean writer named Thallus, states that instead of being banished to Tamrus, Gyges was "smitten, and fled to Tartessus".71 If this is a genuinely separate rendition of the same story then it means that Tartarus was another name for Tartessus.

The immense antiquity of Tartessus is not in question. The Greek geographer named Strabo (60 BC-20 AD) claimed that it possessed "written records" going back a staggering 7000 years. As a sea-port it is believed to have been situated on a delta of the Guadalquivir River, even though no trace of it remains today. It is also synonymous with another ancient sea-port known as Gades, modern Cadiz. E.M. Whishaw in her important 1930 work Atlantis in Andalucia uses excavated evidence of neolithic and possibly even palaeolithic sea-ports, sea-walls, cyclopean ruins and hydraulic works around the towns of Niebla and Huelva on the Andalucian coast to demonstrate the reality not only of Tartessus’s lost kingdom, but also the existence of Plato’s Atlantis.

A Sea-Faring Nation

Knowledge of the apparent links between Tartessus, the gigantes/Titans and the mythical Byblos culture is compelling evidence of an as yet unknown sea-faring nation in the Mediterranean area sometime between 7000-3000 BC, the latter half of this period being the time-frame when many of the megalithic complexes began appearing in places such as Malta and Sardinia. Charles Hapgood in his 1979 book Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings concluded that the various composite portolans, such as the Piri Reis map of 1513, show areas of the globe, including the Mediterranean Sea, as they appeared at least 6000 years ago. He therefore concluded that those who had originally drawn these maps must have belonged to "one culture", who possessed maritime connections all over the globe and flourished during this distant age.72 Was he referring here to the mythical Byblos culture? Might it have been responsible for passing on these ancient maps to civilisations such as Egypt, c.3100 BC, and Phoenicia, c.2500 BC?

The early dynastic boat burials uncovered at Giza and Abydos have revealed seagoing vessels with high prows that were never intended to be sailed on the Nile; this is despite the fact that Egypt had no obvious maritime tradition during this early stage in its development. Where did this knowledge come from? Was it from the remnants of an earlier culture, such as the one spoken of by Sanchoniatho as having existed on the Levant coast in mythical times? Might this sea-faring connection help explain why the wooden coffin containing the body of Osiris was carried by the sea to Byblos, and why the priests of Heliopolis in Egypt took such an interest in Baalbek during Ptolemaic times?

It is a subject that requires much further research before any definite conclusions can be drawn, but the apparent advanced capabilities of the proposed Byblos culture allows us to perceive the antiquity of Baalbek’s Great Platform in a new light. Did the legends suggesting that it was constructed by super-human giants during the age of Nimrod preserve some kind of bastardised memory of its foundation by the Byblos culture under Ouranus, Cronus or his brothers, the Titans? If so, then who were these mythical individuals and what ancient engineering skills might their culture have employed in the construction of cyclopean structures such as the Great Platform?

Stones that Moved

In surviving folklore from both Egypt and Palestine there are tantalising accounts of how sound, used in association with ‘magic words’, was able to lift and move large stone blocks and statues, or open huge stone doors. I was therefore excited to discover that, according to Sanchoniatho, Ouranus was supposed to have "devised Baetulia, contriving stones that moved as having life".73 By "contriving" the nineteenth-century English translator of Philo’s original Greek text seems to have meant ‘designing’, ‘devising’ or ‘inventing’, implying that Ouranus had made stones to move as if they had life of their own. Was this a veiled reference to some kind of sonic technology utilised by the proposed Byblos culture? Could this knowledge help explain the methods behind the cutting, transportation and positioning of the 1000-tonne blocks used in Baalbek’s Great Platform? It is certainly a very real possibility.

Why Baalbek?

If we accept for a moment that Baalbek’s Great Platform, and perhaps even the inner podium that supports the Temple of Jupiter, might well possess a much greater antiquity than has previously been imagined, then what purpose might the Baalbek structure have served?

Zecharia Sitchin in his 1980 book The Stairway to Heaven proposes that the Great Platform was a landing site and launch pad for extra-terrestrial vehicles. Perhaps he is right, but in my opinion its high elevation hints at the fact that it once served as some kind of platform for the observation of celestial and stellar events. It is a subject I am currently investigating for a future article.

And just how old is Baalbek?

The French archaeologist Michel Alouf apparently learnt from the Maronite Patriarch of the Baalbek region, a man named Estfan Doweihi, that: "...the fortress of Baalbek on Mt. Lebanon is the most ancient building in the world. Cain, the son of Adam, built it in the year 133 of the creation, during a fit of raving madness".74 Unfortunately this tells us very little about the site’s real age. Yet if we can accept the existence of a pre-Phoenician culture that not only employed the use of cyclopean masonry in its building construction, but also possessed sea-going vessels and flourished in the Mediterranean somewhere between 7000 BC and 3000 BC, then it opens the door to the possibility that Baalbek’s ‘fortress’ may also date to this early phase of human history.

Yet the question remains as to why this pre-Phoenician, sea-going nation should have wished to construct an almighty edifice on an elevated plain between two enormous mountain ranges. What was the reasoning behind this decision? The site undoubtedly possessed a very ancient sanctity; however, the architects may well have had more pressing reasons for placing it where they did. All the indications are that Sanchoniatho’s Byblos culture eventually experienced a period of fierce wars that waged between Cronus, or Saturn, and his titanic brothers under the leadership of Titan or Gyges, and then finally between Cronus’ son Jupiter and the rest of the Olympian deities. In a strange way the fraternal conflict between Cronus and his brothers parallels the biblical struggle between Cain and Abel, suggesting that the link between Cain and Baalbek might well have some symbolic significance to the site’s early history.75

Is it possible that Baalbek’s first ‘city’ was constructed, not just as a religious centre, but also as an impenetrable fortress against attacks by whatever we see as constituting the gigantes and Titans of mythology? If the Great Platform, and perhaps even the inner podium, really does date to this early period, then might the fortress theory explain why its architects used such gigantic stones in its construction? Were they incorporated into the design through a combination of technological capability and sheer necessity, not through "the interest of appearance" or some ancient wall-building tradition upheld by the neo-Phoenicians of the Roman era? Such ideas may even provide some kind of explanation as to why the mother of all stone blocks, the Stone of the Pregnant Woman, was left cut and ready for transportation in a nearby quarry. Did the whole building project have to be abandoned because the site was over-run, or at least seriously threatened, by invading forces? Scholars have always accredited the Romans with having built the Great Platform, with its stupendous Trilithon stones, simply because they could not conceive of an earlier culture possessing the technological skills needed to have transported and positioned such enormous weights. The Sphinx-building culture of Egypt is evidence that such technological skills may well have been available as early as 10,500 BC, while our current knowledge of the Baalbek platform gives us firm grounds to push back its accepted construction date by at least a thousand years.

Even if the dates suggested for Sanchoniatho’s Byblos culture are open to question, I believe the sacred fortress hypothesis brings us a lot closer to unlocking the mysteries of Baalbek. Both visually and in legend its ruins bear the mark of the Titans, and understanding the site’s true place in history can only help us to discover the reality of this lost cyclopean age of mankind.

[tattwa]

The Beqa'a valley

Baalbek is in the fertile Beqa'a valley in Lebanon, lying between Jabal Lubnan (the Lebanon Mountains) and Al-Jabal Ash-Sharqi (the Anti-Lebanon Range). The valley was part of Syria in Hellenistic times and part of Aram in Abraham’s time. Joshua called Beqa'a the Valley of Lebanon and classical writers referred to it as one of the "Granaries of Rome". The narrow valley runs from north to south and is about 175 kilometres long, generally less than 25 kilometres wide and 900 metres or more above sea level. Baalbek is in the centre of the valley at an elevation of 1,150 metres, where the watershed of the Orontes River flowing north joins the watershed of the Leontes River flowing south. The name Beqa'a is derived from the Arabic word biqa', the plural of buq'ah meaning a place with stagnant water, alluding to the fact that the valley was covered with swampy areas when the first settlers arrived there. Baalbek is a Semitic name that refers to the great Semitic god Baal and signifies "Lord of the Beqa'a". Modern Baalbek is a district capital and has a population of 15,000 or more.

When Alexander the Great invaded western Asia, the importance of Baalbek as a religious centre was emphasised by the Greeks who called it Heliopolis, meaning the city of the sun, adding "in Phoenicia" or "in the Lebanon" to distinguish it from its famous Egyptian namesake. Alexander died in Babylon in 323 BCE and the Beqa'a valley became part of the Ptolemaic Empire. After a lengthy struggle the Seleucid kings annexed Phoenicia and the Beqa'a valley in 198 BCE. When part of the Seleucid Empire the Beqa'a valley was called Coele-Syria meaning "hollow Syria". The Roman general Pompey the Great marched southwards through the Beqa'a valley to Damascus in 64 BCE, thence through Jerash to Jerusalem in 63 BCE. He conquered the Seleucid Empire, when Syria and Palestine became part of the Roman Empire. Except from 611 to 622, when Syria was a Persian satrapy, its allegiance to Rome continued into the Byzantine period that began in 306 under the rule of the Emperor Constantine the Great, who saw the Sign of the Cross in the sky and established Christianity as the religion of the Roman Empire. However, Khalid ibn al-Walid's general Abu Obaida conquered Damascus in 637, when Syria became an Arab state and embraced Islam and Heliolopolis resumed its Semitic name of Baalbek.

Ethnic origins and religious background

Pastoralists of Canaanite origin were the first settlers in the Beqa'a valley who arrived there about 8,000 years ago. They were devotees of the moon, in whose cool light their flocks could graze comfortably during the summer months. The short though rich period of spring growth in the Beqa'a valley is brought on by a rainy winter, when water flows in torrents. The summers are long hot droughts when nothing can survive without the aid of irrigation. During the thousand years or so after their arrival, the pastoralists progressively introduced mixed farming. They constructed a maze of irrigation and drainage channels that converted the swampy terrain into arable land and supported their crops. As these agricultural pursuits were being established, the farmers realised that the sun's warmth was essential for the production of crops and they became devotees of the sun. This natural cycle is reflected in ancient beliefs that a sun god, an earth mother and a goddess of fertility were responsible for the climate cycle and the procreative process. The religion of the Canaanites was based on a theme of birth, life, death and resurrection, reflecting the cycle of nature in their harsh and unforgiving region. Like the Babylonians and Egyptians, they developed a distinct pantheon of deities and a religion that greatly influenced the lives of the people.

The supreme god of the Canaanites was the sun god El, usually represented by a bull, alluding to the agricultural basis of their society. El's wife Ashera, the goddess of the sea, represented the sea-oriented branch of their society later identified with the Phoenicians. It was believed that this supreme couple could only be approached through the mediation of their son Baal, signifying lord, who was the master of rain, thunder and tempest. Although Baal shared the bull with his father he also had his own symbol, which was a thunderbolt terminating in a spear and ears of corn. Baal had a son Aliyan, who was the god of springs and floral growth; also a daughter Anat, who was Aliyan's faithful lover. There also was Astarte, the goddess of love and fertility. The positive attributes of these deities were offset by Mot, signifying death. Mot was the god of summer and drought who brought all fruit to ripeness, but who also killed all vegetation unless sustained by Aliyan's springs. The characteristics that are represented in the father-son-daughter relationship of Baal, Aliyan and Anat are recognizable in Zeus, Hermes and Ahprodite of the Greeks and in Jupiter, Mercury and Venus of the Romans, although not identical with either of those relationships. The Assyrians adopted Baal as Bel, which is the equivalent of the Egyptian Seth, the Phoenician Reshef and the Aramean Haddad.

Clay tablets from Alalakh (now Tell Atchana) that date from about 1800 BCE, also thousands of clay tablets found in what apparently was a library between two great Canaanite temples at Ugarit (now Ras Shamra) that date from about 1500 BCE, give a full description of the Canaanite pantheon and tend to confirm Biblical assertions that early Canaanites' fertility cults and idolatrous worship were immoral and corrupt. The Ugaritic texts mention the sacrifice of cattle, rams, lambs and birds to the gods, but there is no archaeological evidence of any human sacrifice. Despite their apparently corrupt ways, the Canaanites were a very talented people who developed the arts and sciences and excelled in ceramics, music and architecture. When Joshua assumed command of the Israelites in about 1400 BCE, they entered Canaan and defeated the Amorites. Joshua then crossed the River Jordan with his army and destroyed Jericho. He conquered the whole of Canaan during the next six years, removing the threat of Canaanite practices to the monotheistic faith of the Hebrews. Notwithstanding their early paganism, the Canaanites appear to have developed a belief in an after life before the Achaean Greeks overran Palestine soon after 1200 BCE. Later invading Dorian Greeks expelled the Achaean Greeks from the Aegean Islands, after which they occupied the coastal areas of Lebanon and Syria until about 332 BCE, merging with the Canaanites who called them Philistines from which the name Palestine is derived. The Hellenic Greeks called them Phoenicians, from the Greek phoinix meaning purple-red, alluding to the dye industry for which they became famous. The Egyptians called them the "sea people" because they were renowned for their seafaring ability.

Excavations of stoutly walled Canaanite cities prove that their construction was far superior to the later buildings erected by the Israelites, which no doubt was the reason why King Solomon sought the assistance of Hiram King of Tyre when building the temple at Jerusalem, although it may not have been the only reason. Until fairly recently it had been thought that the temple at Jerusalem followed Egyptian patterns, but modern archaeological studies have shown otherwise. Although there is scant reference in the Bible to the prowess of the Canaanites, they had constructed many temples throughout Canaan long before the temple at Jerusalem. Some of their important temple remains are at Alalakh, Ebla, Emar, Moumbaqat and Ugarit in Syria and at Beth-shan, Hazor, Lachish, Megiddo and Shechem in Palestine, many of which have only been discovered or studied in detail during the last fifty years. The temples at Ebla and Moumbaqat were built 800 years before the first temple at Jerusalem and those at Emar are from 200 to 400 years older. Their ground plans and other features clearly show that the temple at Jerusalem was patterned on the Canaanite temples. A religious structure at Baalbek was contemporaneous with those at Emar.

Mythology,religion and pantheism

Myths are stories that express primitive beliefs relating to the origin of a race or a religion, expressed in language comprehensible to ordinary people. The Greek word myth means words, from which is derived the Greek word mythos meaning a fable, although a myth is not the same as a fable or a legend. A myth conveys something of racial or universal significance of greater importance than the moral contained in a fable or legend. Even if a myth has an obvious link with actual events in ancient times, it should not be regarded as history in the accepted sense. Myths develop forms closely related to the type of society that creates them. Pastoral people, like the original settlers of the Beqa'a valley, often adopt a powerful and protective deity associated with the sky. Farming people, which the pastoralists of the Beqa'a valley became, usually emphasise a mother-earth deity and develop rituals concerned with fertility. Legends originally were chronicles of the lives of saints, to be read in religious houses, but although based on actual events their traditional histories were not necessarily authentic in detail.

An appreciation of the relationship between mythology, religion and pantheism is important for an understanding of the significance of the temples at Baalbek. Mythology reflects a people's search for the truth in relation to creation and their place in the universe. Mythology has a real place in religion and indeed is one of the foundations of all religions, both ancient and modern. Religion is a belief in and recognition of a higher unseen controlling power or powers, coupled with the associated emotions, morality and related rites and ceremonials of worship. The concept of a life after death seems to have developed in the Middle East by about 3000 BCE. Within the compass of religion, pantheism is the doctrine that identifies the universe with God, conceiving Him as wholly and in some cases exclusively immanent in all things. The Canaanites were pantheists who considered God to be omnipresent, the driving force of the universe and identical with the universe and all of nature, although apparently they were not animists who visualised objects as having spirits, nor did they deify humans.

Greek mythology derived directly from the Minoan mythology of Crete, dating from some time before 3000 BCE and passed down through the later Mycenaean civilisation. The people of Crete appear to have come from the Middle East and their ancient religion reflected Middle Eastern and Egyptian influences. Religion in Crete probably began with a superstitious reverence for natural phenomena and was centred on an earth goddess. With the decline of the Minoan civilisation and the rise of the more warlike and mobile Mycenaeans, the sky god Zeus supplanted the earth goddess. The Greek religion was tolerant, practical and closely related to everyday life, not demanding too much of the individual. Greek gods were believed to be superhuman, but they had human personalities and were seen to behave like ordinary people, not being regarded as creators of the world. Nor did mystical prophets claim to represent the word of God. The persecution and punishment of people on the grounds of their religion was completely alien to the Greeks. Their Eleusinian Mysteries, which originated in about 1800 BCE, culminated in a symbolic restoration from death to eternal life.

As the Roman gods originally did not have human personalities, but were as illusory as the supernatural forces that animists associate with natural phenomena, they had no myths attached to them. Roman gods had clearly defined functions, but having no families attached to them they had none of the usual attributes of the Greek gods. The chief Roman god was Jupiter, believed in from a time before the use of metals. Like Zeus, Jupiter was a sky god or god of light, primarily associated with the weather and especially with thunderstorms. However, by the time the Romans constructed the temples at Baalbek, they had developed a mythology that primarily was an assimilation of Greek mythology with some fragmentary elements of Latin and Etruscan myths. In contrast to the Greek religion, the Roman religion placed great emphasis on devotion to the state, in a much more complex way than is required in patriotism. Stoicism was essential and the individual was always subservient to the social group of which he was a member. The Romans put great value in the order and permanence of things, with stability and security of the state as their primary concern, which is reflected in the differences between Greek and Roman architecture.

Greek and Roman architecture

The Greeks are renowned for their several orders of architecture, of which the Ionic, Doric and Corinthian probably are the best known. Although ancient Greek structures are outstandingly extrovert, their external magnificence is seldom matched by their interior decoration, which often seems lifeless. The structures on the Acropolis in Athens incorporate many of the orders of architecture and include some of the best examples of the Greek style, with the Parthenon taking pride of place. The Parthenon was about 115 metres long, with massive Doric columns that formed a colonnade completely surrounding the structure, decorated externally with a continuous series of sculptures. The Parthenon typified the monolithic unity of a Greek temple and was the ultimate expression of the Greek city-state. The Propylaea, or stepped gateway providing the main access at the western end of the Acropolis, had pitched roofs supported by massive Doric columns at the lower entrance level and slender Ionic columns at the higher level. The Erechtheum, a relatively small though highly adorned temple, had Ionic columns and also a series of sculptured figures as columns. These two buildings cast aside the monolithic unity of the Greek temple that had prevailed for centuries. All of these and the various smaller temples, sanctuaries and monuments on the Acropolis were constructed in less than fifty years and completed in 432 BCE, reflecting the ultimate in Greek architecture.

Although Roman architecture owes much to Greek architecture, it is not simply an extension of it. Perhaps the two most significant differences are the magnitude of Roman buildings and the adornment of their interiors. All of the great buildings of the Roman Empire were larger than their Greek predecessors and were more elaborately decorated within. By comparison with the Greeks, the Romans aimed above all to create and adorn magnificent structures with interiors that would match their exteriors, reflecting their imperial pride and growing awareness of themselves. Although their great buildings were also very large buildings, they were designed with such finesse that their magnitude did not seem out of place, but blended into their surroundings even though they often overshadowed them. The Greeks knew the principles of the arch and vault, but they used neither, whereas the Romans used them to superb advantage. The value of the arch and vault was clearly demonstrated in the buildings housing the Roman baths, whose magnitude and interior grandeur was outstanding. They were centres for every kind of entertainment and incorporated halls to stage boxing and wrestling matches, theatres, libraries and galleries of shops that would compete with the best of the modern shopping complexes.

Many of the open-air amphitheatres constructed in the Middle East and around the Mediterranean were enormous. They were usually located on a hill to provide a wonderful vista of the city. A notable exception with regard to location was the huge Colosseum in Rome, which was constructed between 72 CE and 80 CE. It was as an ellipse 200 metres by 166 metres in plan and was almost 50 metres high. The exterior facade is in four tiers ornamented by columns graduated from heavy Doric at the bottom to the lighter and more decorative foliated orders at the top, with arched entrances between each pair of columns in the lower three tiers. The Pantheon of Rome, where Raphael was buried, is another remarkable example of Roman architecture. Its interior, with a superbly coffered dome and seven deep wall recesses each fronted with pairs of Corinthian columns, contrasts starkly with a less imposing exterior. Entrance to the Pantheon was gained through a gabled portico supported by sixteen Corinthian columns. Constructed between 120 CE and 124 CE, the Pantheon reflected not only the monolithic structure of the Roman Empire and its monarchy, but also what ultimately would become its monotheistic religious doctrine. Nevertheless, it also was an early example of the Roman tendency to become progressively more introverted.

The earliest religious structure at Baalbek

The earliest forms of worship usually reflected ancient animistic beliefs and developed around distinctive natural features like unusual rock outcrops, crevices in rocks and springs. High places also developed special significance as the dwelling place of God, which in Mesopotamia crystallised in the form of a ziggurat with a sanctuary on top. These influences are evident in the earliest religious structure at Baalbek, where the place of veneration was located on a tel on the hill that defined the western boundary of the town. The sacred site itself was situated in a natural crevice about 50 metres deep, which was difficult of access and reserved for high priests only. It is not known when this site was first used, but it was very ancient. In about 1200 BCE the need for greater public participation apparently was felt, because a raised stone court about 230 metres square was built with a surrounding stone wall to create a sanctuary, which had a sacrificial altar in the centre, connected to the natural crevice by a vertical shaft. Access to the sanctuary was gained by a stairway at the eastern end, flanked by two massive stone towers. The arrangement of the sanctuary was typical of the cult terraces associated with many temples in Syria and Palestine, which had stone tables of offering near the sacrificial altar. The inner court, or court of the priests that was in front of King Solomon's temple, which was constructed about 250 years after the sanctuary at Baalbek, served the same purpose although its brazen altar, brazen sea and brazen lavers were much more elaborate.

When the Beqa'a valley became part of the Egyptian Empire, the Ptolemies decided to construct a temple at Baalbek. It was intended to be an embellished monument, towering in the west behind the sacrificial altar, clearly visible from all directions. Building of the temple was delayed by disputes between the Ptolemies and the Seleucids, as a result of which it only began when the Seleucids won the Beqa'a valley under Antiochus the Great in 198 BCE. Because the sanctuary was at the edge of the hill, it was necessary to enlarge the tel to accommodate the temple. An artificial podium was constructed to extend the ancient sanctuary towards the west. When the Roman general Pompey occupied Phoenicia in 64 CE, almost four hundred years after the Ptolemies first proposed the temple, the podium was nearing completion, but the Temple of Jupiter had only been under construction for about four years.

The Roman town of Baalbek

As their first priority the Romans secured and fortified the town and developed all their usual civic facilities, including public administration buildings, a town hall, theatre, forum and necropolis. A solid defensive wall of stone enclosed the town in a lozenge shaped area about one and a half kilometres from east to west and a kilometre from north to south. The wall, in nine sections of various lengths from 150 to 750 metres, was about 3 metres thick and 10 metres high, with massive square defensive towers at about 30 metre intervals. There were only four fortified and elaborately decorated gates, one each in the north-east, south-east, south-west and north-west, so that the main axial roads between them intersected almost at right angles. The streets and roads were buried under 4 metres or more of dirt and debris over the centuries. The Romans constructed four temples on the tel and later, some time before 250 CE, another stately temple on the crest of the Sheikh Abdallah hill about a kilometre south of the town centre, called the Temple of Mercury. The Temple of Mercury, which had a single row of surrounding columns and was surmounted by a caduceus, was accessed by a monumental flight of stairs 10 to 12 metres wide cut into the rocky hillside.

The temples

The Romans constructed four temples of various sizes on the tel, of which three were typical rectangular colonnaded structures and the fourth, though not the smallest, was circular and of a distinctly different character. The largest was the Temple of Jupiter, often referred to as the Acropolis of Baalbek. It had pride of place and retained the orientation of the sanctuary established in pre-Roman times, facing 14° north of east. The rising sun shone directly into the temple in mid-summer, from about the middle of May until the middle of June, as well as at the autumnal equinox from the end of August to the end of September, echoing the influence of El the Canaanite sun god. The Temple of Jupiter stood 48 metres high and was surrounded by a colonnade of 54 columns. It was erected on a podium 12 metres high in a separate precinct that was only accessible from the Great Court. Construction of the Temple of Jupiter had begun by about 60 CE and was finished in about 70 CE, but embellishing work continued for many more years. The Temple of Jupiter had been in use for several generations when Emperor Hadrian visited Baalbek in 130 CE, but the embellishments were still incomplete. The temple stood in a compound that was 340 metres long and covered an area of 27,000 square metres, of which 10,000 square metres were open courtyards and stairways.

The Great Court and its surrounding walls and colonnades were not constructed until after the Temple of Jupiter had been completed. To maintain the local tradition of a High Place, a dominating monument was erected in the centre of the Great Court, a cubical tower 17 metres high and adorned with richly carved ceilings. There were separate flights of stairs for ascent to and descent from the observation deck, which provided a superb view of the god's statue in the rear part of the temple. Access to the Great Court was gained after passing through an elaborately colonnaded hexagonal Forecourt. The Forecourt could only be reached by ascending a long flight of stairs 50 metres wide, then entering through the colonnaded portico of the highly decorated Propylaea that was flanked by two square towers like the Babylonian city gates. The access stairway began in a ceremonial plaza that was semi-circular at the eastern end and 70 metres long, which was surrounded by a low stone wall and a continuous row of peripheral seating. It contained much statuary and seems to have been completed during the time of Philip the Arab (244-249), or very soon after.

The Temple of Bacchus, with 50 columns in the entrance and surrounding colonnade, was oriented parallel to the Temple of Jupiter. It was larger than the Parthenon of Athens, with a clear interior span of 19 metres and a monumental gateway that was 6.5 metres wide and 13 metres high. The Temple of Bacchus had an area of 2,800 square metres, raised on a podium that was 5.2 metres high and 10,000 square metres in area. The Temple of Bacchus, which was begun in about 150 CE and completed in about 200 CE, is the best-preserved Roman temple of its size anywhere in the world. Its incredible beauty is captured in the words of Dr Friedrich Ragette, once the Professor of Architecture at the American University of Beirut, who said in his book entitled Baalbek:

"The features that strike our eyes first are forms, colours and textures. . . . with its glowing, warm walls and generously bulging columns, its flamboyant Corinthian capitals and boldly projecting cornice, its superb contrast of plain and fluted column shafts and the infinite variety of carving, delicate when seen at close range and vigorous when looming high above us, a rich symphony of colour, texture and form. Here is an architecture to be experienced by the senses rather than the intellect."

The Temple of the Muses was the smallest of the three typical colonnaded Roman temples at Baalbek. It had an area of about 340 square metres and was the first to be completed at the beginning of the first century of the Common Era. Nearby the uniquely shaped Temple of Venus was slightly larger, occupying an area of about 520 square metres. The Temple of Venus faced north-west and overlooked a common space in front of the three main temples. Its circular cella incorporated a domed roof and was fronted by a small rectangular portico supported by four Corinthian columns and accessed by a broad stairway. The circular wall of the cella was indented externally between its six surrounding Corinthian columns. The Temple of Venus probably was completed in about 150 CE. Its podium was raised 2 metres, partially superimposing that of the Temple of the Muses. These two temples shared a colonnaded courtyard some 10,000 square metres in area.

Construction aspects

The Romans were well aware that sound foundations are vital for stable and durable buildings and therefore excavated down to solid rock, in many places as deep as 17 metres. They did not use mortar joints, but relied on perfectly cut stones locked together with iron or bronze clamps and dowels embedded in lead. Weak stones were reinforced with clamps if necessary. These methods provided an elastic structure better able to withstand earthquakes, although earthquakes contributed greatly to the destruction of the temples after the serious ravages of man. The final dressing of surfaces was accomplished by marginally draft chiselling towards the centre, followed by adzing in lines parallel to the edges of the stone. This technique was usual in Syria, Lebanon and Palestine where sandstone was common, contrasting with the chisel and mallet methods of the Greeks who frequently worked with granite and marble. The foundation stones used in the column bases were up to 20 metres long and were 4 metres square in cross-section, weighing up to 800 tonnes, the largest ever used in masonry construction. Except in the small temples, the smallest stones used in the buildings were the ceiling slabs over the external colonnade in the Temple of Bacchus. They were 5 metres long, 3 metres wide, 1.2 metres thick and weighed 45 tonnes each. Rough dressed stones were moved on rollers from the quarry sites, which were up to a kilometre away, then finished on site. Ramps were used to elevate some stones, all of which were hoisted into their final positions using multiple pulleys attached to Lewis cramps, with each cramp supporting up to 5 tonnes.

The columns in the Temples of Jupiter and Bacchus were pink granite brought from Aswan in Egypt. Rough-hewn square sections were transported from the quarry in Egypt down the Nile River, then by sea and land to the temple site in Lebanon. The columns were then rough dressed to shape up to 10 centimetres oversize before erection, then finished and polished after erection. The columns of the Temple of Jupiter had shafts 16.6 metres high, 2 metres in diameter and each weighed 135 tonnes. They were set on bases 1 metre high and were surmounted by capitals 2 metres high. Except for some of the columns in the Hypostyle Hall of the Temple of Amon at Karnak, which are a few centimetres taller but comprise many sections, the columns at Baalbek are the tallest columns existing from antiquity. All of the corner columns had monolithic shafts, but the others were in three sections, the bottom section weighing 62 tonnes, the middle section 40 tonnes and the top section 33 tonnes. The shaft sections were joined together and connected to the bases and the capitals by inserting three bronze dowels set in lead, on a circle 1 metre in diameter concentric with the column at each joint. The columns of the Temple of Bacchus were 2 metres shorter.

Later events

The Emperor Constantine I “the Great” declared Christianity the official religion of the Roman state in 313 and a Christian church was built in the township of Baalbek. When Emperor Julian "the Apostate" succeeded Constantine in 361 he destroyed the church and reverted to paganism. Pagan worship seems to have continued at Baalbek until Emperor Theodosius I “the Great” (379-395) destroyed the altar of sacrifice and the observation tower in the Great Court and constructed a Christian basilica immediately in front of the Temple of Jupiter. The basilica, dedicated to St Peter, was 63 metres long by 36 metres wide, raised 2 metres above the level of the court. When Syria became an Arab state in 637, the basilica was used as a palace and the Temples of Jupiter and Bacchus were converted into a huge walled fortress. The Sultan Barquq (1382-1392) demolished the stairway to the Propylaea and used the stone to fill in between the portico columns, as well as constructing a surrounding moat. The fortress was abandoned when Baalbek became a part of the Ottoman Empire in 1517, but the precinct is still called the Kala'a by the Arabs, meaning a fortress.