BAALBEK, 1)51'bisk. The name of a ruined city in ancient. aple-Syria, signifying the 'city of Baal,' the sun-god. The name was converted by the Greeks, during the Seleueidan dynasty, into its Greek equivalent, Heliopolis. It is situated in latitude 34° 1' N., longitude 36° II' E., in the plain of BuktVa, "at. the northern ex tremity of a low range of bleak hills, about one mile from the base of Antilibanon," in a well-watered and delightful locality, rather more than 40 miles northwest of Damascus. It wa• once the most magnificent of Syrian cities, full of palaces, fountains, and beautiful monuments. It is now- fatuous only for the splendor of its ruins. The most imposing is that of the great Temple of the Sun, which was a rectangular building 290 feet by 160, having its roof sup ported by a peristyle of 54 Corinthian columns, "19 at each side and 10 at each end." Of these, 6 are yet standing. The circumference of these columns is about 22 feet, and the length of the shaft 5S; with pedestal, capital, and entabla ture, they measure about SO feet in height. The temple occupies a platform on the Acropolis, about 1000 feet by 450 feet, approached on the east by a broad flight of steps, which lead to a portico. Beyond this is a hexagonal court, through which a large gateway opens into the great square, at the west end of which is the temple, on a lofty stylobate. Except the col umns mentioned, little of the great temple, or of the buildings in front of it, is left standing. but the ground is covered with their ruins. The vast size of the stones used in the substructures of the great platform is remarkable, some of them being over 60 feet long and 12 thick. South from the great temple is a smaller one, known as the Temple of Jupiter. It is similar in form, having its peristyle and the walls of its cella still mostly standing. Its dimensions are 227 feet in length by 117 feet. in breadth, with 15 columns at the sides and 8 at each end. Both temples, as well as the surrounding structures, were built of limestone, in a richly decorated, somewhat fantastic Corinthian style. Besides these, there stands at the distance of 300 yards from the others a circular building, supported on G granite columns; style, mixed Ionic and Corinthian. It was once used as a Christian
church.
The early history of Baalbek is involved in darkness but it is certain that from the most distant times it had been a chief seat of sun worship. as its name implies. Augustus made it a Roman colony and placed there a garrison. Baalbek had an oracle held in such high esteem that in the Second Century A.D. it was consulted by the Emperor 'Trojan prior to his entrance on his second Parthian campaign. Antoninus Pius (A.D. 138-161) built the great temple which the legend current among the modern in habitants counts a work of Solomon. The plat form and substructures are, however, of a much earlier date. This temple is said to have con tained a golden statue of Apollo. or of Zeus, which on certain annual festivals the chief citi zens of Heliopolis bore about on their shoulders. When Christianity, under Constantine, became the dominant religion, the temple became a Christian church. In the wars that followed the taking of the city by the Arabs, who sacked it in A.D. 748. the temple was turned into a fort ress, the battlements of which are vet visible. The city was completely pillaged by Timur in A.D. 1400. Both city and temple continued to fall more and more into decay under the misery and misrule to which Syria has been subject ever since. INIany of the magnificent pillars were overturned by the pashas of Da mascus, merely for the sake of the iron with which the stones were bound together. What the Arabs, Tartars, and Turks had spared was destroyed by a terrible earthquake in 1759. Baalbek is now an insignificant village, with a population of some 2000, of whom more than half are Christians. The Prussian Government conducted, in 1902, quite extensive excavations on the Acropolis.
Consult: Wood and Dawkins, Ruins of Baal bee (London, 1757) ; Cassas, Voyage pittorcsque de la Syrie (Paris, 1799) ; :\lurray, Handbook, for Trarelers in Syria and Palestine (London, 1892) ; Frauberger, Die Akropolis can Baalbek (Frankfort, 1592) ; 2\1. Thompson, The Land and the Book. Vol. III. (New York, 1886) ; Baedeker, Syria and Palestine (Leipzig, 1894) ; Puehstein, in Jahrbuch des deutsehen .Irchdo logisrhen Institnts (Berlin, 1902).