DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.45581#0063
Subhiyeh
III
to have been in its present ruined state for a very long time, and it has probably
been deserted for centuries. There are several large heaps of ruins which show a large
proportion of dressed blocks of stone, and there are two large reservoirs faced up with
large blocks. The chief building is rectangular; at its western end the crowns of eight
or ten arches are to be seen amid the confused mass of fallen building material. These
arches are not large, but they are well built, and resemble arcosolia. This building
may have been a large mausoleum, like that at Khirbit Sar 1 in Ammonitis, described
in Part i, Sect. A.
31. SUBHIYEH.
This town was only a suburb of the large town of Sabhah, about ten minutes to
the east. From a distance, the ruins of Subhiyeh present an imposing appearance,
owing to the presence of a high tower that dominates the ruins, and gives it the ap-
pearance of a huge convent. On entering the deserted town, the tower is found to
be at one end of a large two-story house, the rest of which has fallen down, and
there is no sign of the former existence of a convent or a church. The town was
composed of a number of well built and handsomely finished houses, or villas, the
homes, presumably, of wealthy land
owners whose revenues were drawn from
farming. Every house has large stables
and store houses connected with it. It
is one of these stables that I have chosen
for publication here. The plan (Ill. 88)
is made up of a large, square, arched
apartment, entered by a door in the
middle of the front wall, flanked on either
side by long narrow rooms, and with
another long room extending across the
rear of the building and terminating in
a square room at one end. The large
arched room corresponds to two stories
of the rooms about it. The long apart¬
ments served as stables, and the walls
between them and the square room are carried on rows of thin oblong piers between
which are mangers (Ill. 88, Sect. A-B). The cattle or horses standing at their
mangers in the long narrow stables on three sides, faced the large arched room, and
could be observed from any point in it. Two of the stables had doorways opening
directly out of doors, and each was connected with the middle room by a doorway
which occupied the space of one manger. The small square room in the northwest
angle was not a stable; it probably contained stairs ascending to the upper story.
The upper story, above the stables, was probably devoted to the storing of provender,
for there are doors, opening out upon the main room, that could be reached only by
ladders. The whole structure is built in the best manner possible; the stonework of
the exterior is smooth quadrated work; but the interior arch and its supports, the
1 Sect. A, Pt. 1, p. 33.
Publications of the Princeton University Archaeological Expedition to Syria, Div. II, Sec. A, Pt. 2.
15
III
to have been in its present ruined state for a very long time, and it has probably
been deserted for centuries. There are several large heaps of ruins which show a large
proportion of dressed blocks of stone, and there are two large reservoirs faced up with
large blocks. The chief building is rectangular; at its western end the crowns of eight
or ten arches are to be seen amid the confused mass of fallen building material. These
arches are not large, but they are well built, and resemble arcosolia. This building
may have been a large mausoleum, like that at Khirbit Sar 1 in Ammonitis, described
in Part i, Sect. A.
31. SUBHIYEH.
This town was only a suburb of the large town of Sabhah, about ten minutes to
the east. From a distance, the ruins of Subhiyeh present an imposing appearance,
owing to the presence of a high tower that dominates the ruins, and gives it the ap-
pearance of a huge convent. On entering the deserted town, the tower is found to
be at one end of a large two-story house, the rest of which has fallen down, and
there is no sign of the former existence of a convent or a church. The town was
composed of a number of well built and handsomely finished houses, or villas, the
homes, presumably, of wealthy land
owners whose revenues were drawn from
farming. Every house has large stables
and store houses connected with it. It
is one of these stables that I have chosen
for publication here. The plan (Ill. 88)
is made up of a large, square, arched
apartment, entered by a door in the
middle of the front wall, flanked on either
side by long narrow rooms, and with
another long room extending across the
rear of the building and terminating in
a square room at one end. The large
arched room corresponds to two stories
of the rooms about it. The long apart¬
ments served as stables, and the walls
between them and the square room are carried on rows of thin oblong piers between
which are mangers (Ill. 88, Sect. A-B). The cattle or horses standing at their
mangers in the long narrow stables on three sides, faced the large arched room, and
could be observed from any point in it. Two of the stables had doorways opening
directly out of doors, and each was connected with the middle room by a doorway
which occupied the space of one manger. The small square room in the northwest
angle was not a stable; it probably contained stairs ascending to the upper story.
The upper story, above the stables, was probably devoted to the storing of provender,
for there are doors, opening out upon the main room, that could be reached only by
ladders. The whole structure is built in the best manner possible; the stonework of
the exterior is smooth quadrated work; but the interior arch and its supports, the
1 Sect. A, Pt. 1, p. 33.
Publications of the Princeton University Archaeological Expedition to Syria, Div. II, Sec. A, Pt. 2.
15