The year 2018 marks the twenty years of the archaeological mission of the British Museum on the site of the American school of Saïda (Sidon) in Bouwebet el-Fawqa, near the soap factory Audi. Research has shown that the current Lebanese population comes directly from people who lived in Lebanon 4,000 years ago.
·
"The excavations of Sidon are of interest, for more than one reason: the complexity and the archaeological wealth of each stage of the development of the city are finally revealed to us for the first time; milestones that we had only previously suspected existed, "says construction site manager Claude Doumet Serhal.
In 1998, the Directorate General of Antiquities gives permission to the British Museum to undertake archaeological excavations on the former site of the American College, Saïda, located along the medieval wall, on the site of the ditch of the city.
 |
Skeletal Remains |
"The careful stratigraphic excavation, the detailed architectural analysis and the chronological study of ceramics and objects discovered gave us a more accurate picture of the historical continuity of the city's occupation," says Serhal. Indeed, the site has been inhabited by Sidonians since the Chalcolithic period and during the Canaanite and Phoenician periods until the medieval period. The whole history of the city is concentrated in this place where, between the castle of the earth and the castle of the sea, the medieval defensive structures of Sidon have been progressively brought to light. Semicircular towers that once strengthened the fortifications were placed along the wall at a distance of 55 m from each other. So far, without any significant indication of major restoration work, it is believed that these defensive structures were built in a single phase around the time of St. Louis. With the exception of a single tower, discovered this year at the north end of the site near the Audi soap museum. It is newer; it goes back to the Mamluk era. Falling into disuse, its interior space has been transformed into a silo.
The focus, however, is on the site of the American school which, since medieval times until the fourth millennium, has been a high burial place. It represents "an exceptional and major interest", especially with regard to the sacrificial cults and worship practices of the Canaanites and Phoenicians. In those days, scenes of offering and banquets went hand in hand around the 170 burials of children and adults (exhumed to this day), as well as in the three main temples unearthed.
The first is a large 47-meter long Canaanite temple dating back to 1600 BC. It bears witness to ritual ceremonies with the voluntary breaking of dishes after consumption. Thus, in one of the temple chambers, archaeologists unearthed a magnificent portable tabernacle dedicated to the goddess Ishtar, a number of censers, 500 oil lamps and hundreds of deliberately broken plates. As in Ebla and Peldaba'a, in the Nile delta, here too the ritual of eating and breaking the plates was practised. The number of oil lamps found suggests that the temple had no windows or that the ritual took place at night.
The flotation program and analyzes conducted by a specialist at the University College of London have identified residues of lentils, chickpeas and white beans in a number of household outbreaks, as well as a large amount of bone. animals, which prove the predominant role of sacrificial meat consumption. However, a raw brick storage containing a 160 kg deposit of Vicia faba makes it possible to affirm that "foul" is Sidon's favourite legume.
The second Canaanite temple is underground, deep and hidden. It goes back to the 13th century BC. AD and responds to a particular place of worship: 25 stone horns are stuck in the sacred canal, and a real deer horn has been discovered. This canal structure, which collected the blood of sacrificed animals, seems to have been commonly used as a symbolic marker of transition between the living and the dead. It is found in both Phoenician and Canaanite temples, says the archaeologist.
The Hermes god and the currency of Europe
At the same site, the Phoenician has set up a temple, which lasted from the 11th to the 8th century BC. "It has at least 11 superimposed floor levels and is still being excavated," says Serhal. The excavations are financed by the SAL National Cement Factory and the Hariri Foundation. Many cuttlebones have been found on a layer of clay protecting the soil. "The pattern of these cephalopods was used to decorate ceremonial dishes in the Aegean world. The fact that they are also consumed in a Sidonian temple further reinforces the idea that it was a custom spread around the Mediterranean, "says the specialist. Among the small valuables found in this temple, she points to an alabaster vase, the terracotta figurine of a goddess, as well as a polished rectangular bone on which is engraved a man standing, his head turned to the right, his left hand raised and holding a tree in his right hand. "This is a deity worshipping the tree of life, probably because of a Canaanite tradition. Although this motif was originally developed as a symbol of a fertility goddess (Ishtar or Asherah), her relationship with this deity became more and more obscure at the beginning of the Iron Age, "says Dr Serhal. The layers of the Iron Age have delivered beautiful ceramics, including an ancient amphora representing two riders in white tunics carrying spears and going to war. Another declines an intercessor posing in front of the god Hermes with winged sandals. Claude Doumet Serhal is amazed by the quality of these "very well preserved museum pieces".
"College Site" is a large-scale project that has positioned itself from the beginning of the long term, and thus has had enough time for in-depth scientific research of international scope.
 |
| Sacred Scarabs |
To conclude, Claude Doumet Serhal observes that "the data obtained during the excavations of this temple have reinforced the very important question of the interchangeability of the notion of" Canaanite "and" Phoenician "and have given convincing answers that leave no room for discussion. no doubt that the Phoenicians in the Iron Age are descendants of the Canaanites of the second millennium BC. It recalls that in 2017, a collaboration between the Sanger Institute and the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom was undertaken to study the DNA of the skeletons exhumed on the site of the American School of Saïda. "The project was ambitious because it was an attempt to extract and study the DNA of people buried for 4,000 years in Lebanon, in a geographical area of Mediterranean climate, not very favorable to the survival of DNA former. However, the team was able to successfully sequence all the genomes of five individuals who lived during the Middle Bronze Age of Sidon (the Canaanite period). The operation showed for the first time that the inhabitants of Sidon known as Canaanites (and later Phoenicians) descended from a mix between locals and migrants from the east, probably from the Zagros region. (a mountainous region of southwestern Iran) that arrived in the Levant about 5,000 years ago. However, the most surprising results were obtained when scientists compared the genomes of ancient individuals to the genomes of current populations in Lebanon and found that they were almost identical. This means that the many invasions and migrations over 4,000 years have had a little genetic impact on the Lebanese population and, as a result, the current Lebanese population is descended directly from people who lived in Lebanon 4,000 years ago. The expansion of genetic studies in the Eastern Mediterranean will bring many further clarifications in the near future on human occupation in Canaanite times. "
In these temples and around the graves, where banquets were held in honor of the dead, a number of treasures were exhumed, including "the greatest concentration ever found in the Levant of rythas" (kinds of champagne flutes, 13th century BC); "The oldest Minoan cup recorded in the Levant; a cuneiform tablet, the first ever found in Sidon. This is a list of orders of wooden objects. This discovery indicates that cuneiform was used in recent bronze Sidon in commerce and daily life. The fragments of the vase of Queen Tawosret, successor to Ramses II, were also discovered. A number of jars, including one containing nine astragals, foot bone which, archaeologically speaking, has always had, and we do not know why, a ritual and votive connotation. From this archaeological site in permanent evolution since 20 years has also arisen the only Phoenician priest statue discovered in Lebanon since the 1960s. There are only three others preserved in the National Museum of Beirut, from Sidon (Ford collection), Umm el-Amed and Tyre (Sur). On the site was also the bronze sign of the Phoenician goddess Tanit / Astarte. A rare discovery because Lebanon had until then only two: one from the site of Sarepta (north of Sarafand) and the other from the excavations of Tyre (Sur). Likewise, a terracotta head of the Egyptian god Bes, who passed to drive away evil spirits and the evil eye, and who had been adopted by the Phoenicians. Represented from the front, her grinning face is framed by two large ears and a lion's mane. One of the temples delivered a kernos, offering vase composed of several containers connected to each other. A portable tabernacle representing a miniaturized sanctuary, in which was placed a divine effigy. An anthropomorphic vessel in the shape of a bust, bearing feminine attributes with the roundness of two breasts. Its narrow neck offers a "collar" pattern, evoking a necklace. This feminine element, a symbol of the mother, accompanied two children on their journey to the hereafter.
Thousands of other objects and shards were collected: jewellery, scarabs, local terra cotta; cylinder seals, one of which is engraved with a scene depicting a human procession, in the characteristic style of Ebla. Braising or tweezers, the terracotta statuette of a mother carrying her child, etc. Egyptian jars, ceramics imported from ancient Greece, etc.
All these objects will take their place in the future museum of the site designed by the Khatib and Alami box, and whose construction is financed by the Kuwait Fund for Economic Development.
