Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean (16.2004(2005))

JIYEH

LEBANON

DISCOVERY OF THE SITE

Travelers (H. Th. de Luynes) had taken note
of the site already in the 17 th century, but it
was not until the mid-19th century that
Ernest Renan actually put it on an archae-
ological map of Phoenicia.2 He uncovered
a Byzantine chapel with a dated mosaic in-
scription from the 6th century in the sands
of the coastal village of Nebi Younis on the
southern side of the bay (today the village
has been engulfed by the main agglome-
ration of Jiyeh). Work carried out by George
Contenau briefly in 1914 led to the discov-
ery of a large Christian basilica amidst the
ruins ol buildings and a necropolis.3 Pro-
gressing devastation of the area and buil-
ding development resulted in short-lived
excavations carried out in 1975 by Roger
Saidah of the Direction Generale des
Antiquites. He cleared a considerable

section of the residential district from
Byzantine times, situated in the vicinity of
Contenau's basilica.4 Civil war, which began
then in Lebanon, also took its toll on the
site. In 1987/88, the local inhabitants
rediscovered the basilica, which Contenau
had described only summarily. To avoid
destruction, the mosaics were lifted from
the church and transported to the museum
at the Beiteddine Palace, where they have
remained until the present day.
The Polish-Lebanese archaeological
project commenced in 1996 with
explorations in nearby Chhim. The
following year the expedition accomplished
clearing of the district discovered by Saidah
in 1975. However, work could not be
resumed until 2003 due to difficulties in
protecting the site.

SITE HISTORY

Travelers already in the 17th century pro-
posed to identify Nebi Younis (which
cherishes a local tradition connected with
the prophet Jonah in the village mosque)
and Jiyeh with the ancient Porphyreon. The
suggestion was picked up by R. Dussaud,
who referred also to other authors.5 Early
reports contained information on urban
ruins stretching all along the bay and tombs
situated in the hills to the east. Porphyreon,
the name of which must doubtless refer to
the purple pigment commonly produced
on the Phoenician coast, was said to have
been a Hellenistic town, established per-
haps by the Ptolemies in the 3rd century

BC. The first fact of certainty is the sea and
land battle of 218 BC between the armies
of Ptolemy and Antioch III for the isthmus
that blocked the Seleucid armies approach
to Sidon (Polybius, Hist., V, 68-69)- The
town lay on the main road connecting all
the Phoenician cities on the coast. No
further mention of the site is known from
Roman times, until it reappears in the
Itinerarium Burdigalense of AD 333, where
it is described as a pilgrim stop on the
route to the Holy Land (It. Burd. 18, 21).
In Late Antiquity, it seems to have been
little more than a big village. Interestingly,
the place name was transferred in local

2 E. Renan, Mission de Phenicie (Paris 1864), 509-514.
3 G. Contenau, "Mission archeologique a Sidon (1914)", Syria 1 (1920), 295-305.
4 R. Saidah, "Porphyreon du Liban", Archeologia 104 (1977), 38-43.
5 R. Dussaud, Topographie historique de la Syrie antique et medievale (Paris 1927), 43 n. 4, 45.

420