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chapter 4
The Seabord: Harbours and Ports North to South
[Coast of Phoenicia:] Qu’y a-t-il encore? des tours antiques le long du
rivage, sur les rochers; tours aux trois quarts écroulées, dont la base sert
de muraille à quelque masure; des entassements de pierre taillées dans les
champs et sur le rivage, mêlées avec des colonnes enterrées ou brisées.[1]
[1866]
From the European perspective, it was the Syrian seabord and ports which
were the key both to access and to trade, and Shaw’s was the general opinion,
that the ancients had put up magnificent harbours, but that later rulers “out
of avarice, or want of public Spirit, have suffered them to become either alto-
gether useless, or else of very little service to the trade and navigation of this
rich and plentiful country.”[2]
The Middle East was an entrepôt between East and West and, before the
circumnavigation of Africa, Venice and Genoa grew prosperous from that
trade. Enormous camel trains brought goods westward, most finishing in Asia
Minor (at Smyrna and Bursa) and some in Syria, at Aleppo. Syrian ports were
therefore important for mediaeval trade and military incursions,[3] but in sub-
sequent centuries these had mixed fortunes, either lacking the maintenance
necessary to keep them working, or being deliberately blocked off to prevent
naval surprises, even before the Crusades.1 Natural harbours down the coast of
Syria were rare, so artificial ones had to be built, many of the surviving remains
in various locations being Roman, others marking attempts down the centu-
ries to open up the coast for trade. Such harbour works, together with the nec-
essary fortresses, took a large toll on the ancient monuments. Since there were
so few natural harbours, Herod’s great constructions at Caesarea were essen-
tial. In later centuries, the virtual abandonment of once-working ports meant
that only small ships (and hence small trade) could be welcomed. In any case,
the majority were too small for large 19th century sailing ships, not to men-
tion steamers,[4] which were offering regular services by the 1850s.[5] As we saw
in Chapter Two, affairs inland were little better during the same centuries: a
declining population, abandonment of country towns and villages, desertifica-
tion, marauding Bedouin, neglect of agriculture, and a European trade through
Aleppo that was on its last legs by 1800.
1 Richard 1998 for the key importance of the ports for both sides.
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This chapter examines seabord towns one by one, both to underline the
problems with which they presented Syria up to the 20th century, and to reflect
the lack of development inland, but also because before the Middle Ages they
had been thriving towns with important monuments, and were visited for this
reason, and also because of biblical connections, by later European travellers.
Inland were hills or mountains so, if robbers were discounted, the coast road
could be used. It was flat, and there were always a few settlers along its length.
The towns are examined north to south, almost as if the reader were a middle-
sized ship looking for a place to anchor or to dock: Alexandretta/Iskenderun,
Seleucia, Lattakia, Tripoli, Byblos, Beirut, Sidon, Tyre, Acre, Caesarea, Haifa,
Athlit, Tortosa, Jaffa, Ascalon, and Gaza. There were some landing-places
available by the mid-19th century, especially Beirut and Jaffa; earlier travellers
either braved Lattakia (the port for Aleppo), or travelled overland from the
north or south – from Asia Minor or Egypt. Many travellers’ accounts parcel
Syria together with Asia Minor or Egypt, and the latter grouping becomes the
more popular as Egypt develops as a winter travel destination, and pilgrimage
to the Holy Land develops in part into a group concern, commercially man-
aged. Many of the following towns formed part of the Crusader Kingdom of
Jerusalem, and their antiquities were usually re-used in their building of town
walls, in eleven towns on the coast, and three inland.2
In many of the ports discussed below we shall come across large numbers of
columns thrown into the sea for use as breakwaters, and it will become clear
that their numbers diminished over the years, because it was evidently not
over-difficult to dredge them up into boats, dry them off, and re-use them else-
where. Casola, travelling in 1494, relates that Saladin was said to have re-used
columns from Jaffa, some on land, some lifted from the water:
Our magnificent captain assured me that this was true, because a few
years ago he was obliged with his boats to help to raise certain columns
which were in the water there at Jaffa, and which were afterwards dried
and taken to Jerusalem to be used in the building of the new Mosque.[6]
Iskenderun
D’ailleurs personne ne regrettera Alexandrette, avec son port dangereux,
son climat malsain et la traversée de l’Amanus, difficile en tous temps et
périlleuse en hiver.[7] [1889]
2 Pringle 1995.
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In the knee-bend between Cilicia and Syria sits Alexandretta, or Iskenderun.
This is the northern port for Antioch a few kilometres to the south, the other
being Seleucia Pieria (see below). The name indicates its founder. Nearly
deserted at the Ottoman Conquest,3 in 1669 traces of luxurious churches still
survived there: “di tre ò quattro Chiese, e dalle colonne, capitelli, basi, cornici,
e pietre, marmi bellissimi, s’argomenta fossero fabriche di considerazione.”[8]
Ruins of a temple and a city were to be seen on the road hence to Aleppo.[9]
Traces of its ancient harbour at Arsous (“the foundations of strong edifices,
from which two keys have run out, so as to form a pretty little mole or harbour”)
were visible in 1754.[10] This part of the coast was marshy, certainly by 1738,[11]
and a breeding-ground for malaria; this affected Drummond who, when he
recovered, went “in quest of such antiquities as had escaped the blind fury of
those wretches who are now in possession of Asia.”[12] The Aleppo merchants
in the 1770s suggested to the Pasha of Tripoli that they would pay to refurbish
the harbour if duties on their goods were forgiven for ten years, and otherwise
would carry their trade to Lattakia. But he refused:
“But what signifies it to me,” replied the Pasha, what may happen in time?
I was yesterday at Marash; to-morrow, perhaps, I shall be at Djeddah.
“Why should I deprive myself of present advantages which are certain,
for future benefits I cannot hope to partake of?”[13]
This might have been a common argument, for the Aga of Gaza advanced
it when Volney suggested to him in 1792 that he should repair his palace at
Ramleh: “Pourquoi, disois-je un jour à un de ses sous-Agas, ne répare-t-il pas
au moins la chambre? Et s’il est supplanté l’année prochaine, répondit-il, qui
lui rendra sa dépense?”[14] Porter’s explanation in 1868 was that Syrians were
concerned only about their own house, selfishness reigning supreme:
The consequence is, that there is not a road in the whole country except
the one recently made by a French company . . . It sometimes hap-
pens that a roué pasha takes a pious fit, and spends a tithe of his ill-got
gains in building a bridge or adorning a mosque; but the moment the
work is finished the process of dilapidation begins, and nobody thinks
of repairs.
3 Nour 1982, 298–299: Antioche et la renaissance d’Alexandrette.
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The result was a country that looked as if it had been hit by a continuing
earthquake:
There are so many broken bridges, ruinous mosques, and roofless cara-
vansaries. It is emphatically a land of ruins, and ruins are increasing in
number every year.[15]
One area of the marshes was drained about 1830, and an opinion in 1836 was
that “for less than 1000l all the land might be efficiently drained, cleared,
and rendered fit for cultivation.”[16] This is but one of several examples of
Europeans seeing just how easily and cheaply improvements could be made
to the land of Syria. Squire in 1820 indicted the Turkish government with igno-
rance and imbecility, for not draining the marshes, cultivating the land, and
introducing commerce to this, “one of the finest bays in the world.”[17] In 1832
Aucher-Éloy stated the obvious: this was the best port for Aleppo, and suit-
able for the Sultan’s navy.[18] In fact, Ibrahim Pasha [ruler of Syria 1831–40] cut
a canal to channel a spring, which “finding no adequate outlet, have created
those baneful marshes which surround the town, extending over nearly the
whole plain.”[19] But in 1840 there were still no harbour services: ships had
to unload using their own boats, and there was no accommodation to be
had.[20] What is more, in 1854 Laorty-Hadji suggested that it was not only diffi-
cult docking that caused the problem, claiming that visiting sailors were dying
because of its climate: “Des fièvres du plus fâcheux caractère, accompagnées
d’obstructions au foie et compliquées d’hydropisie, enlèvent le tiers des équi-
pages qui viennent y charger pendant l’été.”[21]
According to Neale in 1851 the government was paranoid about spending
on harbour works, sending “some soi-disant engineers to form an estimate of
what the cost would be.” Hence work was stopped short of completion because
it was thought the Franks “when the work was completed, would probably lay
claim to the recovered land. This was the Turkish dog in the manger, at the
same time that they were perishing from fevers, and never dreamt of turning
the marshes to any account themselves.”[22] As a result in 1855 “it requires a
strong act of faith to believe that wealth and luxury have once been in all their
pomp and pride where now not even a bat or an owl resides,”[23] while in 1856
the town was still “dirty, miserable, marshy, and unhealthy” yet also potentially
(as several travellers remarked) “the best harbour on the coast of Syria.”[24] The
town had been devastated by the 1822 earthquake, and not yet rebuilt, for in
1859 “quelques cabanes éparses au milieu de roseaux et de palmiers compo-
sent le village de Scanderoun.”[25] In 1844 the British consul here got acclima-
tised, but only after fifty attacks of fever.[26] Things were looking up by 1918,
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but fever was still a problem.[27] The import/export trade had grown, perhaps
because efforts had been made to fill in and drain the marshes.[28] The spoils
reverted to the new Turkey, to the detriment of Aleppo.4
Seleucia Pieria
To the north of Lattakia were Iskenderun, sitting in its own bay; and Seleucia
Pieria (or Suweida), just north of the River Orontes. Both are now in Turkey.
Seleucia was founded by Seleucus I Nicator, who gave it important ancient har-
bour works, including a 1350m tunnel intended to divert the river and keep the
harbour from silting. This was one of the ports for Antioch. In the early 19th
century, Iskenderun was the winter port for Aleppo, and Lattakia for the sum-
mer, but neither was in good condition:
Le port d’Alexandrète n’est pas tenable dans l’une de ces saisons, à cause
de son insalubrité, et celui de Laodicée ne l’est pas dans l’autre, parce que
la jetée en est rompue et qu’il ne peut recevoir que de petits bâtiments.
Il faudrait réparer le port de Laodicée et assaillir celui d’Alexandrète, en
donnant un écoulement aux eaux.[29]
This site, modern Al-Sweidiyeh,[30] a town near the Mediterranean coast serving
Antioch, is not to be confused with the Suweida in the Hauran. Our travellers
call it some variation of Suedia. Griffiths visited the area in 1805, determined to
find the remains of Seleucus’ famous port, but could see only “the remains of
two moles indicated where this famous port had once received the innumer-
able but diminutive vessels of the eastern monarchs.”[31] The following account
will explain why viewing the ancient harbour works was so difficult.
Seleucia was already in bad condition in 1754, the large blocks of its quays
tumbled down:
One of them is perfectly intire for above thirty feet, and is forty-five feet
in breadth; the basin may be about eight hundred feet wide; but how
large the entrance was, or how far from the land, I could not pretend to
judge.[32]
The town walls were still traceable at this date, but within them “no intelli-
gible ruins could I find.”[33] By 1772ff, when Parsons was travelling, silting (pre-
4 Fedden 1955, 213: after WWI “the arbitrary seizure of Alexandretta fatally compromised the
already reduced possibilities of Aleppo.”
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sumably) meant that he only saw corn fields on the site. However, its former
greatness was remembered by the locals: “pointing to the old port, they said
their fore-fathers had left it on record, that that was the port of Antioch when
it was a great city.”[34] The port works (including a tunnel and canals) were
still visitable in 1838, when Robinson noted the iron cramps uniting the large
blocks of the jetty projecting into the sea;[35] but there was nobody there except
himself.[36] In 1839 Layard marvelled at the “great tunnel and water-course,
cut with extraordinary labour and skill through the solid rock, to carry off
the waters of a torrent which threatened to fill up the port with the mud and
stones that it brought down from the mountains, and which were thus diverted
to the sea.”[37] The dimensions of this cutting were extraordinary. It was broad
enough for seven or eight horses abreast,[38] and demonstrated an ancient
attempt to keep the port free of the effects of winter rains.[39] By the 1870s, the
port which Pococke had described over a century beforehand
n’est plus qu’un marécage, la mer s’étant retirée à une distance de près
de cent cinquante mètres. Son énorme môle existe en partie, montrant
encore la terrasse qu’il supportait, et, dans le bas, de spacieuses cavités qui
probablement étaient des magasins pour les besoins du commerce.[40]
Nevertheless, there survived some ancient remains, perhaps of a temple, plus
a statue of the seated Neptune.[41] In 1860 Bourquenoud described the topog-
raphy of the harbour and of the town, plus the walls of the upper town (with
a tower “revêtue de belles pierres de taille”); he saw marble débris in the town,
and noted the recent discovery of a marble statue.[42]
Here as at other erstwhile harbours, the port was a swamp in 1851, yet still
with lions surviving at its entrance.[43] In 1825 Buckingham found in the area
“the remains of a curious edifice, apparently once encompassed by a square
of twenty columns, five on each face. There are still ten of these columns
standing,”[44] and went on to inspect a Roman tomb, with bas-reliefs of hel-
mets, shields and armour.[45] Both were still there in 1838, visited by Lindsay,
who walked down the ancient pavement, “but the street is in many places
choked up with rubbish, and we then clambered over the roofs, and through
the apartments of the old houses; fig-trees grow wild among them.”[46] In 1834
Madox found another colonnade near Suweida, this one oval, near the Druze
village of Garnavate:
The ruins here are beautiful. Magnificent temples or palaces, with col-
umns, all of great strength and beautiful workmanship, greet the eye.
Round one door the vine in clusters was sculptured; and floral ornaments
appeared on others. All is in a state of ruin: part of the ground is paved:
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water gushes down in all directions, forming cascades amongst these
once well-built houses.[47]
For European visitors in the earlier 19th century, the must-see in the valley
of Suedia was the garden of John Barker, long-time British consul at Aleppo,
where “les arbres et les plantes d’Europe y sont mêlés aux arbres et aux plan-
tes d’Orient,”[48] and where he built himself a villa,[49] which included marble
basins and flowing water.[50] He also promoted local industry, namely silk pro-
duction and cotton weaving.[51] There appears to have been a spurt of cottage-
building by English merchants, but these were untenanted by 1861, perhaps
as a result of the decline of the Aleppo trade including, as Skene writes, “the
dilapidated villa of a late British consul, where we had taken up our quarters.”
He returned to the sea, and admired “a fine colossal statue, representing the
river Orontes, lately dug up, and a curious tunnel constructed in the rock to
prevent a winter torrent from flowing into the basin, with a great many sepul-
chral caves of considerable interest.”[52]
The ancients had done so much work on the complex that it should be
restored, thought Captain William Allen R.N. in 1855. A Fellow of both the
Royal Society and the Royal Geographical Society, Allen described the setup
thoroughly, making a survey “in the hope of finding that this port is capable
of being restored to its original purpose.”[53] His sketch appears in the 1898
Baedeker, but everywhere was still in ruin, without any active port.[54] Thus it
remained in 1919, with little hope of being cleared: “The ancient dock or port
which was excavated from the rock is now partially silted up, and considerable
rock excavation would be required to convert it into a modern harbour, as the
limestone in the old basin is only 12.5 feet below sea level.”[55] In other words,
either the sea floor had risen, or the land had sunk.
Lattakia
Surrounded by the sea on three sides . . . Its buildings are very ancient . . .
The port of Al Lâdhikiyyah is a most wonderful harbour, and one of the
most spacious, so that it never ceases to lie full of large ships. There is at
its mouth a great chain which protects the ships that are inside from the
enemies’ ships without.[56] [later 13thC]
During the Middle Ages, some of Syria’s Mediterranean ports were evi-
dently kept in good condition. Lattakia/Laodicea is a few kilometres north
of Byblos and, in the 13th century, Dimashqi notes the marble quarries in
the area, and the port, as in the above quote, and “on y voyait des marbres
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de toute espèce.”[57] Although some of its buildings were dismantled during
the Crusades,[58] Ibn Battuta (d.1368) describes Lattakia as closed with a chain
(as it was in Dimashqi’s day), it being “un des plus beaux ports de mer de la
Syrie.”[59] In the later 17th century Lattakia was refurbished, “being cherished,
and put in a way of trade by Coplan Aga, a man of great wealth, and author-
ity in these parts, and much addicted to merchandise,”[60] and a man whose
name was still known and revered in the area in the mid-18th century.[61] Such
accounts refer to the inland town, and it is not clear what alterations he made to
the port.
In the 18th century the town of Lattakia was still rich in ancient remains. In
1714 Lucas saw a splendid church said to have been built by S. Helena, with a
fallen vault, and the environs used for animals:
L’on voit encore ces belles colonnes qui soutenoient le comble. Au dessous
de l’Eglise sont de grandes voûtes fort longues, qui servent aujourd’huy à
retirer des bœufs, des chèvres & des moutons.[62]
There were “hundreds” of columns along the shore.[63] Outside the town to
the north, Shaw saw several decorated sarcophagi,[64] and in 1743 Perry noted
a triumphal arch as “tolerably perfect (abating for the Abuses and Alterations,
which those barbarous People the Tuks have made.)”[65] Drummond teased out
some columns (“from a number of broken fusts which are buried in the walls
of mean houses”), thinking them part of a grand building,[66] but they were
actually part of a colonnade, with grey granite shafts, like those of the arch.[67]
Buckingham realised this, what he saw surmised to be “remaining portions
of colonnades to some public edifices which still remained standing after the
general destruction of the buildings to which they belonged; and advantage
might thus have been taken to build the walls of the modern dwellings in a line
with them.”[68] As Robinson neatly put it in 1838, “Les restes de l’ancienne ville
offrent des matériaux tout prêts pour construire des habitations modernes.”[69]
Colonnades were not uncommon in Syria, and travellers to Jerusalem would
have come across the eighty columns of a long road surviving at Samaria.[70] In
1874 Beaufort noted that
there is still enough to show that a double row of granite columns once
made an approach the whole way from the quay on the harbour up to
the Corinthian Temple, whose remains are now quite at the back of the
town, and at the distance of 1500 yards from the harbour. Numbers of
these columns still remain, but the greater part have been broken off and
rolled down to the sea, to be built into the foundations and walls of the
castle in the harbour.[71]
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Capper, travelling in 1778, noted that the town “doit avoir été un ouvrage aussi
magnifique que dispendieux; il n’en reste aujourd’hui que des débris.”[72] The
arch (there were comparable structures elsewhere in Greater Syria5) was then
part of a mosque.[73] To the south of the town, Parsons saw still better antiq-
uities, “consisting of pieces of granite pillars, capitals, broken pedestals, and
among them many larger fragments of columns than are to be met with at pres-
ent in any part of Syria.”[74] Such survivals were difficult to examine, because
they were built into later structures,[75] Buckingham writing of “ranges of gran-
ite columns still erect, and incorporated with the modern buildings.”[76] In 1840
La Salle wrote of the fort protecting the port, which “a des fondements tout
feutrés de colonnes, rouges, noires, blanches, en basalte, en granit, en marbre,
posées droites, horizontales, obliques, sortant du mur comme des canons.”[77]
In 1846, Stanhope wrote extended descriptions both of the arch,[78] and of the
other antiquities he saw in and around the town.[79] There were still plenty
to be seen in 1874,[80] and in 1877 Guérin reported on the arch, the remains of
a temple with four surviving columns, and on other shafts to be seen in the
mosques as well as the harbour walls.[81] Digging for materials was already in
train in 1835, when Michaud & Poujoulat noted the ruined monuments above
ground, pointing out that “les fouilleurs ne creuseraient point en vain dans
l’enceinte de la cité rivale d’Apamée et d’Antioche.”[82]
In 1851 Walpole got news of “the opening of a sepulchre of extraordinary
beauty, and covered with inscriptions,” with nearby a later drain or aqueduct,
where more inscriptions were to be found: “rest by some barbarian from their
original holy use: they had thus, perhaps, been preserved, where their fellows
in their proper places had perished.”[83] He also admired the ruined house of
the governor: “The bath, fitted with marble, is small, but very handsome.”[84]
There might have been plenty of splendid sarcophagi in the area, for Corancez
reported one in 1816, “chargé au dehors d’ornemens encore bien conservés. Il
y a quelques années qu’on déterra aussi dans les environs un beau groupe de
la même matière, représentant un homme de haute stature qui tient un lion
enchaîné.”[85]
By the end of the 19th century few antiquities were visible above ground,
but “en creusant des fondations ou même en cultivant les jardins, des
5 Kader 1996 sets the tetrapylon at Lattakia in context of the Temple of Jupiter at Jerash, plus
the arches at Petra and Bosra, plus east gate of market at Damascus. Author then discusses
city gate monuments at Gadara, Tiberias, Tyre and Petra. Lattakia tetrapylon now freed from
later accretions. All stonework is friable, and damaged. 108–114: early knowledge of the arch
at Petra, but no digging until 20thC.
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statues de marbre mutilées de l’époque grecque” were found. What is more
“une ancienne église byzantine, convertie en mosquée, garde encore des traces
de peintures murales où l’on reconnaît des figures de saints. A l’extérieur,
ses murs sont ornés de sculptures représentant des casques et des boucliers
romains, faisant présumer que cet édifice était, lors de sa fondation, un monu-
ment triomphal.”[86] With so much decoration, this was evidently a different
arch from that recorded by Perry in 1743, and mentioned above.
Travellers could no doubt consider themselves experts on Mediterranean
harbours, and perhaps studied their fittings with a nervous eye or, in the case
of Lattakia, with a jaundiced one. For they would have sailed or steamed in
and out of several on their way to Syria, and would know the dangers. By 1738
the harbour complex (“capacious enough to receive the whole British navy”)
was in ruins, recognisable as “a work and structure of great labour and design,
though at present it is so much filled up with sand and pebbles, that half a
dozen small vessels can only be admitted.”[87] Pococke visited Lattakia in 1745,
when the harbour basin was already badly silted. He examined the canal,
which he thought once had gates to control the water flow, and saw signs of
abandoned habitation:
Near a mile to the west of this bason there are ruins of several houses
along the river, which do not seem to be of any very great antiquity, but
probably were houses of merchants, and warehouses, when Antioch
flourished in the middle ages, at which time it was called the port of
St. Simon.[88]
Ferrières-Sauveboeuf first entered the harbour in 1783, noting the protecting
tower which, crumbling, made entry more and more difficult.[89] Once in,
the harbour was choked with sand, so that, still shamefully neglected, in 1808
“none but barks and small ships can get so far into it as to lye secure from hard
gales of wind.”[90] What is more, by this date it was known to be unhealthy, and
Europeans avoided it for that reason:
Ce n’est pas que l’air de cette ville ne soit en lui-même très-sain, mais
depuis que les Mahométans en ont fait disparaître la majeure partie des
habitans, les terres se trouvent en quelques endroits abandonnées et cou-
vertes d’eau une partie de l’année.[91]
Size requirements had changed by 1823, when two naval officers noted that
“The port . . . is very small, but it is better sheltered than any we have seen on
this coast.”[92]
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If the surrounding land was badly maintained, and a breeding-ground for
mosquitoes, nor was the port cared for. The crumbling tower and its walls
were to be recognised as mediaeval constructions, with through-columns to
strengthen them, looking like “une rangée de gros canons;”[93] capitals and
other antique débris were also built into them.[94] Dilapidated walls were still
causing difficulties in 1816, as were the large blocks of stone from the old quay
which littered the basin.[95] Magazines were built for the port sometime before
1850, and Walpole remarks on a large khan, where “a few columns and a few
handsome marble pillars attest its antiquity.”[96] Allen reported in 1855 that it
was still silted, but “could be cleared out so easily, and with such incalculable
advantages for the maritime population as well as to the government.”[97] And
by 1860, one of the would-be improvers who wished to update the whole of
Syria’s commerce, thought it “could, with a little expense, be made an excel-
lent harbour for both steamers and sailing vessels, as the holding-ground is
trustworthy, the entrance favourably situated, and it is well sheltered by closely
surrounding hills.”[98] Earthquakes had struck in 1799 and 1822, and accord-
ing to Eyriès writing in 1859 further damaging the port; he also reported that
through-commerce had gone down, not up, in the previous half-century.[99]
Trade recovered somewhat by the 1860s, when the aromatic Lattakia tobacco,
smoked in peasant huts (where the dwarf oak was burned), was exported to
Egypt.[100] The trade was still “considerable” in 1918.[101]
Banias6
In Dimashqi’s day in the 1330s, Banias had plenty of springs, but “son sol et
son air sont insalubres,”[102] presumably because the water supply was no lon
ger managed. She also had ancient monuments, the fortress on the above
hill with “des substructions de beaux blocs taillés en bossage; les Romains,
ces maçons acharnés, ont passé par là.”[103] Van De Velde agreed, thought the
foundations even older, and was amazed “at a sight of these gigantic stones,
gates, vaults, tanks, and so on.”[104] By 1714 when Lucas passed by, the bridge
was in ruins, and the fortress as well.[105] Seetzen in 1809 found twenty poor
huts there, and the line of the town walls was clear, but no traces of Herod’s
temple to Augustus survived.[106] By mid-century the bridge appears to have
been rebuilt, and “in every direction there were broken shafts and capitals of
marble pillars scattered upon the ground.”[107] Ibrahim Pasha had repaired the
6 Wilson 2004, 38–55: Roman Banias; ibid. 162–176: European “rediscovery” of Banias. Pl 1 for
plan of ancient city.
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fortress, and so perhaps the bridge as well as the small port.[108] De Saulcy in
1853 concluded that the harbour works were not antique, because
Les belles pierres de taille qui en constituent les parements, ont été
empruntées a tous les monuments antiques d’alentour, et au-dessus de
l’archivolte est encastré un véritable tarikh [inscription] arabe, que je n’ai
pas le temps de déchiffrer, mais dont je lis assez pour me convaincre que
je suis devant l’oeuvre d’un soulthan mamlouk Baharite.[109]
Tortosa/Tartus & Ruad
Tortosa became a stronghold for the Crusaders from 1099 and, although not
held continuously, they survived there until 1291, building a fortress and a
cathedral. To the north, at the artificial port, granite columns had been used
in the breakwater, which Walpole saw in 1851,[110] while to the south a decade
later the locals were at work digging down seven or eight metres “à extraire de
belles pierres; entremêlées à des colonnes de granit gris de dimensions moy-
ennes.”[111] The blocks in the fortress were too heavy to move, Rey marvelling in
1866 at what he thought was their great age:
J’ai tout lieu de croire que les ruines phéniciennes de Rouad, d’Amrit et
de Carné durent être mises à contribution pour élever ces gigantesques
murailles, composées d’énormes blocs taillés à bossages.[112]
Just offshore was the island of Ruad, surrounded by double walls containing
some huge blocks of stone (“in size and appearance are Cyclopean, resem-
bling those in the foundations of the temple at Ba’albek”[113]), and a jetty
likewise.[114] There was a temple platform, on which were to be seen column
shafts, and also the remains of decorated sarcophagi.[115] Just like Tortosa,
Ruad was also punctuated by defensive towers, but these were destroyed and
replaced by “les petites forteresses ridicules” to meet the threat of the Greek
War of Independence.[116]
Tripoli
First it was overwhelmed with water; Secondly, it was sacked with
Cursares, and Pirates; Thirdly, it is like now to be overthrowne with new
made mountains of sand.[117] [1632]
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Lithgow in the above quote does not predict a prosperous future for Tripoli, and
indeed its future would mirror its past. The peninsula of Tripoli was protected
by strong stone walls.[118] Little survived above ground in Tripoli and its port
of Al-Mina was older than Crusader times. Captured early by the Crusaders,
it was one of the last fortresses to be relinquished. Projecting into the sea and
lacking maintenance, it silted easily. Goujon still recognised port installations
in 1670, “quoy que un peu ruiné.”[119] The name the locals gave to the town in
1835 was El-Karah, the Ruins, because stone was removed in order to build up
the harbour.[120] Its great walls survived in parts in 1745, when Pococke saw
“several pieces of large pillars of grey granite” near it.[121] Robinson saw large
numbers of granite columns near the defending towers and in the sea,[122] but
it is unclear whether these were part of a breakwater, or placed as obstructions
to prevent ships from docking. Both these uses will be found further down the
coast. The towers themselves were also “fortified with fragments of grey granite
columns, placed horizontally in the building.”[123] Seetzen, in 1805, thought the
towers Crusader, not Saracen.[124]
By the early 18th century, the town was not completely inhabited,[125] and
its most noticeable features were the series of very large stones built into its
walls.[126] In 1743 the “many Fragments of Granite and Porphyry Pillars” between
town and port,[127] and the Crusader sculptures to be seen on the façades of
some houses.[128] Burckhardt reported in 1812 that the plain between town and
port had in part been drained, and converted into gardens.[129] Still in 1854 that
same area was “plein de débris d’habitations et de colonnes ensablées,” and
we might wonder whether any of the houses were indeed ancient;[130] Spoll
thought the same in 1861.[131] The mosque was formerly a church, and adorned
with marble columns and Corinthian capitals.[132] Antiquities also survived in
the surrounding countryside, such as the eight-metre-high tower near the vil-
lage of Cir.[133] Its population increased, rising to some 35,000 by 1917, accord-
ing to Roederer.
Volney in 1792 noticed that south of Tripoli the plain was “plein de vestiges
d’habitations & de colonnes brisées & enfoncées dans la terre ou ensablées
dans la mer,” and that “Les Francs en employèrent beaucoup dans la construc-
tion de leurs murs, où on les voit encore posées sur le travers.”[134] Indeeed,
close by was the village of Arca, site of another ancient town, with a temple
dedicated to Alexander, and plenty of ruins surviving into the 1880s. Thomson
in 1886 thought the columns had been brought down by earthquake, “or they
have been thrown down by the equally destructive Saracen and Turk. I counted
sixty-four lying on the bank of the river, one-third of which are of red Syenite,
the rest of gray granite.”[135] Hence this was once a prestigious site, for these
were imported, not Syrian stones. Not far away was a temple at Harf es Sphiry,
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but this time of hard white limestone, with walls still standing, but only two or
three columns amongst its ruins.[136]
Byblos
Malgré ses grandeurs éteintes, Djébaïl n’a guère que six mille habitants;
mais sa baie gracieuse, son pont élégant sur sa jolie rivière, les colonnes
de marbre doré qui restent de son ancien théâtre . . . toutes ces ruines pit-
toresques.[137] [1848]
Byblos (Jebilee, Galaba, Giblet, Djebail, Jubayl), with only six thousand inhab-
itants in 1848, had been an important Phoenician city, its early treasures first
unearthed by Ernest Renan in 1860–61,7 but with as yet nothing coherent to
inspect. But in this book we shall deal only with the Hellenistic and Roman city
visited by travellers. Already in 1697 Maundrell wrote that the town had noth-
ing remarkable, but had noted the “many heaps of ruins, and the fine pillars
that are scattered up and down in the gardens near the town.”[138] Laroque in 1723
saw substantial remains of what he called a palace, built by the Genoese.[139]
Pococke in 1745 (who claimed that “there are very little signs of the antient
harbour”[140]) remarked on some huge stones in the foundations of the
[Crusader] castle.[141] Of course these (rivalled only by a few blocks at Baalbek)
are still there, since the locals concentrated on plundering smaller blocks. The
only other item of note seems to have been a fountain, set up with marble
entablature and other elements, one apparently Egyptian,[142] so perhaps
taken from the Royal Necropolis. Renan in 1864 thought the fortress “paraît,
quand on l’examine pour la première fois, l’oeuvre des géants de la primitive
antiquité.”[143] Modern giants, the British, had battered it when it was in the
hands of Ibrahim Pasha.[144]
Maundrell also visited the theatre, where the Turks were using gunpowder
to blow it up so as to re-use the stones.[145] The interior was then cluttered with
houses, yet “on the west side the seats of the spectators remain still entire, as
do likewise the caves or vaults which run under the subsellia all round the
theatre.”[146] He dubbed this the best of the antiquities at the town, also men-
tioning “great many pillars of granite, some by the water-side, others tumbled
into the water.”[147] Some time after his visit the theatre was evidently part-
destroyed to build modern structures. Egmont & Heyman in 1759 called it an
7 Salibi 1988, 167–181: Phoenicia Resurrected. 171–172: Renan and his Mission en Phénicie.
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amphitheatre, but gave it the same dimensions as Maundrell, so surely the
same building:
the whole exhibits but a wretched appearance, and has been greatly
abused; all that remains now consists of a semi-circle, in the inside of
which are some small houses built of the ruins, a great part of it having
been blown up designedly by gun-powder; and the great quantity of mar-
ble, of which it consisted, converted to build a mosque and a bath.[148]
The destruction had perhaps been bad enough to confuse visitors: Salmon
wrote in 1738 that
le Muraglie non sono in oggi più alte di venti piedi, avendo li Turchi fatto
volare in aria il piano per servirsi de’ Marmi nella fabbrica della Moschea,
e del Bagno, che vi hanno fatti.[149]
Robbing continued, for Michaud & Poujoulat in 1835 found only half the the-
atre surviving, including the seats, and wished:
quel bonheur pour l’histoire des arts si nos chroniqueurs pèlerins se fus-
sent donné la peine de tracer une description complète du théâtre! mais,
vous le savez, les croisés traversaient l’Orient, s’inquiétant peu des chefs-
d’œuvre de l’architecture antique.[150]
Robinson in 1838 found “les restes d’un beau théâtre romain,”[151] yet in 1850
Neale claimed he could find no trace of it (although it part-survives today as a
re-build), and that
probably its stones have been used for the Construction of more modern
buildings; for Gibili is now a town of considerable size, and is much fre-
quented by small vessels, owing to the excellent shelter its little harbour
affords.[152]
Walpole had no difficulty finding the structure the previous year, when
“Between the arches are now a colony of Arabs, whose flocks are driven into the
town at night.”[153] So was cannot always trust supposed eye-witness reports.
As at Tyre and elsewhere, at the port of Byblos Maudrell identified an exten-
sive mole, Madox noted that “a great many broken columns lay about in the
water,”[154] and Porter not only some large blocks in its construction (which he
thought Phoenician), but counted over 40 columns in the water.[155] By 1855
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it was “now nearly filled with ruins and sand. Many grey granite columns are
lying on the shore and in the water. It now has shelter for boats only.”[156] Renan
in 1860–1 observed that few old buildings survived, and said the town had been
used as a quarry to build elsewhere;[157] but described column shafts set sym-
metrically in the town’s north walls, and “de toutes parts se voient de beaux
fûts brisés de colonnes de granit d’Egypte, apportées à l’époque romaine.”[158]
In 1881–2 the town was still half-deserted, its streets “lined with great shafts of
grey syenite from Egypt, some supporting verandas and trellises for creeping
vines.”[159] Much remained at the end of the century: “On voit encore à Djébaïl
le port que les Romains y avaient construit, et on rencontre au bazar beaucoup
de débris de colonnes et de fragments d’antiquités d’époques diverses.”[160]
Some visitors were confused by the stones of which the fortress was built,
because they tried to date them by size, bevelling and apparent masonry tools.
In 1876 De Vogüé called it a “construction arabe entée sur de belles assises de
grandes pierres à refends qu’on a longtemps appelées cyclopéennes ou phé-
niciennes, mais qui, d’après les derniers arrêts de l’archéologie contempo-
raine, paraissent devoir être restituées simplement aux Romains.”[161] Other
antiquities were to be seen around the town. To the south, where red granite
columns were plentiful, was “un vieux château, de construction rustique, et
dont les pierres sont d’une grosseur énorme,” and a Maronite convent the walls
of which “sont ornés de sculptures adaptées dont quelques unes portent des
inscriptions grecques.”[162] To the east, the chapel at Mar Seman had at its cen-
tre “une énorme colonne de marbre de quatre mètres cinquante centimètres
de circonférence. Le tronçon a cinq mètres de haut, et il s’enfonce profondé-
ment dans le sol.”[163] The Convent of Deir-el-Kullah, not far from Beirut, was
“built over the ruins of a very large temple, of which some huge columns and
stones are still standing. A great many Greek and Latin inscriptions have been
fixed in the modern walls (most of them upside down).”[164]
Beirut
The only habitable place in Syria for an Englishman.[165] [1838]
The Persian traveller Nasir-i-Khosrau visited Beirut8 in 1047, and noted the
survival of only one ancient building, of large blocks, which he was told was
the gate of Pharaoh’s garden, though “all the plain around this spot is covered
with marble columns, with their capitals and shafts.”[166] If the building was the
8 Dentzer-Feydy 2007; Hall 2004: Beirut in Late Antiquity.
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baths, then it seems it was thoroughly dismantled in the earlier Middle Ages,
just like those at Carthage. Columns were still scattered around in 1670.[167]
These remains and other ruins discovered underground convinced Volney that
Beirut had once been much larger.[168] No doubt some ancient materials were
re-used by Emir Faccadine (Fakhr ed-Din, 1584–1635) to build himself a palace,
but this had been stripped of its marble by the time Pococke visited in 1745,[169]
“now running to decay, or else were never finished by their first Master”[170] by
1767, and in ruins by the 19th century.[171] Brocchi in 1823–1824 was sniffy about
these remains, but described others within the town.[172] A later emir, Bashir
(1788–1840), built himself a palace at Beiteddine and, according to Brocchi, not
only used marbles from the nearby mountains, and from near Damascus, but
also from the ruins of Beirut.[173]
Just what survived into the late 17th century is difficult to determine. In 1697
Maundrell reckoned he visited the ruins of Faccadine’s “palace,” but it seems
just possible that what he actually saw were the remains of the Roman baths,
because he also saw there “several pedestals for statues, from whence it may
be inferred that this emir was no very zealous Mohammedan,”[174] drawing an
incorrect conclusion. A few antiquities still to be seen around the town in 1825
included a sarcophagus near a public fountain, “and remains of ancient build-
ings are constantly found wherever excavations are made.”[175] In 1803 Olivier
saw three standing granite columns in the town, and a fallen one nearby,[176]
perhaps part of a temple, and still there in mid-century.[177] To the north of the
town, Light noticed “a range of buildings” which by 1818 were converted into
a rope-walk, and “said to be that part of the amphitheatre of Augustus allot-
ted for the reception of wild beasts.”[178] In 1829 Fuller found the town “a dirty
disagreeable place,” its palaces and gardens “now totally gone to decay.”[179]
Thompson walked outside the south walls (built from spolia) in 1767, and came
across what might have been baths: “some Remains of Mosaic Pavements, sev-
eral Pillars of Granite, Pieces of polish’d Marble, and other Tokens of the for-
mer Magnificence of the City.”[180] But these did not last long. In 1835 Michaud
and Poujoulat still discerned what they thought were the remains of baths, and
of a theatre, and believed many other structures were hidden under the sands
to the south-west of the town.[181] But by 1844, these were but “a faint trace,”
yet mosaic pavements were also discovered, and the columns at the harbour
(see below) championed: “Though these remains are of little value in the eyes
of the antiquary, they may, as old Sandys has it, ‘instruct the pensive beholder
with their exemplary frailtie.’ ”[182]
For Blondel in 1840, ruins were everywhere, including the amphitheatre,
bridges and aqueducts, and “on découvre à chaque instant des fragments de
colonnes de granit, des tombeaux, des médailles, des mosaïques superbes.”[183]
Columns and sarcophagi were in evidence in 1856,[184] and mosaic pavements
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were still visible in 1872, but by then any traces of baths and theatre had
vanished.[185] To discover anything else, one would have to dig,[186] encouraged
by the plentiful fragments of pottery, rich marbles and mosaic tesserae (“which
are always signs of occupation by wealthy people”[187]). In 1842 Hunter tried to
follow Buckingham’s “interesting remains . . . but which, I believe, are now no
longer to be found.”[188]
Reflections of the ancient town’s splendour were the remains of the port,
which was claimed in 1835 to be safe even for warships,[189] but presumably
only for small ones. In winter, ships used to anchor in the bay to the north, but
in summer they lay off the town in the open sea.[190] The wharf included many
grey granite shafts, which were used for mooring small craft.[191] There were
also columns scattered along the shore, visible at low tide,[192] and perhaps
the relicts of attempts to export them for re-use elsewhere. In mid-century the
port received a make-over[193] which was to seal Beirut’s ascendancy over other
more precarious harbours up and down the coast. This seems to have been a
slow process, however: in 1861 only small boats anchored in the port, larger
ones in the roads, and passengers were carried ashore piggy-back from ships’
boats.[194] Hence even the quay, described by Paxton in 1839 as consisting of
“an immense number of old, broken pillars . . . Most of them are more or less
broken,”[195] was no longer of use for larger ships. The British bombardment of
1841 largely demolished the once-prominent fortress-towers by the shore.[196]
New installations were evidently needed, for traffic was increasing, and so
was the population. In 1851 Walpole reckoned the town had doubled in size
since his previous visit eight years ago, and “each Christian merchant has now
his villa.”[197] Darboy in 1852 put the current figure at 30,000, up from 12,000,
and noted that it was the poverty of other towns that brought fortune to Beirut,
“qui pourrait, avec l’industrie de ses habitants, ressusciter les splendeurs dont
elle fut environnée sous les Romains.”[198] Beirut was fast becoming a modern
city.[199] Baedeker reckoned the population at 20,000 in 1850, then 80,000 in
1876, and finally 150,000 with a 2,000-man garrison in 1910, rising to 180,000 in
1917, according to Roederer. By 1862, indeed, there was part of a proper road to
Damascus, as well as an electric telegraph between the two towns,[200] plus a
distinct “Western quarter,”[201] so that Guérin in 1877 claimed not to recognise
the town he had seen fifteen years earlier.[202] By 1910 one author could write
nostalgically of “Old Beirut” on his frontispiece showing a photograph of the
town “in 1856, before the historic castle was removed to make way for the rail-
way and the port.”[203] Later conflicts have promoted the modern concept of
memorycide, which can apply to monuments as well as politics.9
9 Naccache 1998.
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Sidon
Le bassin a été malheureusement en partie comblé, et ne pourrait être
réellement utile que si l’on y exécutait des travaux sérieux pour enlever
tous les débris qui ont facilité l’ensablement. Que de richesses
archéologiques ce curage mettra au jour lorsqu’il sera entrepris au grand
avantage des laborieuses et intelligentes populations de cette côte![204]
[1881]
Sidon was designed with a port sheltered by a mole and protected by a sea
castle. Underwater exploration here and at Tyre by Poidebard was to pro-
vide to the 20th century much information on the ancient harbours.10 Emir
Faccadine, who had been to Florence, returned at an appropriate period,
because “the state of the empire then enabled an ambitious and resolute man
to extend his power: and this governor encroached on that of the governors of
Damascus.”[205] Maundrell in 1697 noted the pillars lying around, but no other
antiquities, for “they are now all perfectly obscured and buried by the Turkish
buildings,”[206] so the town evidently was prosperous at that date. In 1767, “some
Latin inscriptions are to be found in the neighbouring Fields and Gardens.”[207]
Certainly, Faccadine built himself a splendid palace here, but this was ruinous
by the end of the 18th century,[208] and was perhaps “the ruinous and neglected
remains of a palace” with a courtyard paved in marble where Madox stayed in
1834.[209] Faccadine had plenty of local antiquities to choose from: for there
were large numbers of columns scattered around above ground even later in
the 17th century.[210]
The French manoeuvred to gain trade access,[211] but Faccadine, fearing a
Turkish invasion by sea to unseat him, filled in the harbour, just as he did at
Acre, and he probably included rock-hard antiquities. (In earlier centuries, it
had been Christian pirates, harassing Muslim shipping, that were dangerous
along this coast.[212]) This was done, writes Maundrell, “to prevent the Turkish
gallies from making their unwelcome visits to this place.” Hence the harbour
remained in ruins: in 1745 Pococke noted “great ruins of a fine port . . . now
choaked up,” and it was still current knowledge that Faccadine had done this,
so that “they might not be harbours for the Grand Signor’s galleys to land
forces against him.”[213] Such fill-ins were much older, and “the fear of renewed
10 Viret 2004: Poidebard at Tyre and Sidon. Poidebard 2004, 190–191: Les fonds pho-
tographiques de la Bibliothèque Orientale de l’Université Saint-Joseph; according to their
website, nothing digitised. Ibid., 292–319: Actualité de sites archéologiques découverts
par Antoine Poidebard. Poidebard 1939: aerial and underwater archaeology at Tyre.
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crusader attacks was the rationale behind the destruction of the coastal cities
of Palestine.”11 The Tyrians had indeed tumbled large blocks into their harbour
to prevent Alexander the Great attacking from the sea.[214]
In 1702, Naud saw on the site only “quelques colomnes abbatuës,” and “plu-
sieurs petits morceau d’ouvrages travaillez à la Mosaïque” in the gardens and
along the roads.[215] Paradoxically, the 16th to 18th centuries were prosperous
here, with an inn for strangers and some paved streets,[216] until a decline in
the later 18th century.12 Some of the gardens were surely outside the walls, and
in the surroundings Leandro reported finding not only coins but also “alcune
colonne, statue, ed iscrizioni spezzate da quei barbari. Se potrò dare alla luce la
collezione delle monete, e degl’Idoli, da me fatta nello spazio di più anni.”[217]
By the early 19th century, the harbour was completely sanded up, and trade
went to Beirut.[218] At that period, repeating Maundrell, “whatever antiquities
may at any time have been here about, they are now all perfectly obscured and
buried by the Turkish buildings.”[219] Although the port was already in a bad
condition in 1670,[220] the earthquake of 1688 caused ruination and fire,[221] and
this probably affected Baalbek, because Sidon was its entrepôt. In 1798 Djezzar
expelled the French merchants from the town, and Marcellus reported in 1820
that in the previous seven years the French consul had seen but one French
ship, and that thrown into the harbour by a storm;[222] the English had a similar
experience.[223] And yet Sidon was capable of containing over twenty small
vessels,[224] and could easily have become the main port for Damascus, because
there was a better road between them than that from Beirut. In 1840 Suleyman
Pasha was persuaded to clear out Faccadine’s large stones; he had got rid of 200
“when he was dissuaded from the undertaking by the janizary Aga, and other
Turks who had houses on the sea-side, which they feared would be carried
away by the water.”[225] Coasting vessels could anchor behind a ridge of rocks,
but even approaching the area was dangerous.[226]
Sidon declined, as already noted, in favour of Beirut. She was described in
1829 as “l’entrepôt de la vallée de Balbek et de celle de Damas.”[227] And as an
optimist wrote quite correctly a decade later, “avec très-peu de frais, on débar-
rasserait l’ancrage de Saïda des sables qui l’ont comblé, et on obtiendrait un
port bien préférable à la rade de Beyrout.”[228] But it was not to be, and Ward in
1864 was still lamenting “its present fallen condition” due entirely to the near-
blocked harbour.[229] Because the state of the harbour prevented large cargoes
of exports, manufacturing declined at Sidon, and commerce consequently
11 Petersen 2007, 506–7.
12 Weber 2010: “This was a boom period, with buildings charted on several maps; followed by
late 18th century decline, linked to the waning stars of its leading families.”
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