Tale of Two Cities
| Tyre | 33 16 10.45N 35 11 57.60E | The ruins which are visible in the south of the former island and at the landward side of the town are all Roman. Note the characteristic shape of the hippodrome, |
| Sidon | 33 33 58.88N 35 22 07.94E | The most prominent site in Sidon is the Crusader castle which almost blocks the entrance to the port and is linked to the land by a narrow bridge. Note the offshore island, now a popular picnic spot. Note the large square khan or inn, which dates to Crusader times. |
It would be difficult to find two more contrasting sites than those of the Phoenician cities of Tyre and Sidon. A mere twenty-two miles apart as the crow flies, they are linked in the popular imagination so that it is difficult to think of Tyre without Sidon - or, of course, the other way round.
Unlike many other neighbouring cities, it seems that the two were never in conflict but formed peaceful if rival centres of commerce. Their secret lay in the offshore islands which provided protected anchorages on an otherwise harbourless coast. Both rose to prosperity, both shared the Phoenician domination of the Mediterranean, both sent out colonists to extend Phoenician influence as far away as the west coast of Spain and the south-west of England.
Yet despite their similarities, the fates which befell them were very different. Tyre resisted Nebuchadnezzar while Sidon seems to have yielded quietly and got on with the business of making money. Mind you, Sidonian ships almost certainly slipped out to the island on which the population of Tyre had taken refuge from the all-powerful Babylonians, taking food and supplies to their compatriots during the 14 long years of the "siege" while Nebuchadnezzar raged helplessly on the beach. The Sidonians may also have played a part in arranging the face-saving peace deal between Nebuchadnezzar and the people of Tyre which put an end to the siege.
Much the same happened when Alexander the Great came along: Sidon surrendered peacefully and continued to prosper, Tyre shut its gates and then, when the Greek soldiers were on the point of breaking in, retreated once more to the island. No doubt the people expected another 14-year stand-off, but Alexander was not Nebuchadnezzar. After a couple of days staring across the water at the island Alexaner had a plan: he set his men to work tearing down the walls of Tyre and throwing them into the sea. When the walls were gone they started on the houses and finally dug up the foundations and threw them in the sea to form a causeway out to the island.
According to the Roman historian, Quintus Curtius Rufus, when Alexander's men stormed across the causeway and onto the island they slaughtered 6,000 fighting men, though another 15,000 were rescued by the Sidonian sailors who were ostensibly on Alexander's side.
Many, however, found safety with the Sidonians among the Macedonian troops. Although these had entered the city with the conquerors, they remained aware that they were related to the Tyrians ... and so they secretly gave many of them protection and took them to their boats, on which they were hidden and transported to Sidon. Fifteen thousand were rescued from a violent death by such subterfuge.
Anoter 2,000, however, were crucified on the shore and the remaining 30,000 were sold into slavery. Curiously, the king, Azimilik, and a few others who had taken refuge in the main temple of the city were spared.
Another curiosity is that after Alexander's departure his causeway was not destroyed by the sea. Instead coastal currents washed sand onto it, enlarging it to form the peninsula which today juts out into the sea from the coast of the Lebanon. There are no Phoenician ruins in Tyre - they are all at the bottom of the sea!
Sidon, on the other hand, has been built and rebuilt on the same spot for thousands of years - which is incredibly annoying for archaeologists. For many years the only excavations in Sidon took place in the cramped backyards of houses, whose owners required their backyards back again afterwards, so any discoveries had to be mapped, photographed and drawn and then filled in again.
A few years ago, however, modern commerce came to Sidon and some wealthy Lebanese businessman bought up a whole block of the city and set about building a supermarket. As the law required, he gave permission for the archaeologists to investigate the site before construction commenced - an action that he was to regret because the discoveries were so dramatic that, as far as I know, his supermarket has never been built!
Now the team from the British Museum, which has been working there for the last eleven years, has announced another successful season during which they uncovered more ruins than in any previous year. These included a temple 156' long which dates to between 1800 BC and 1500 BC, several smaller shrines, some dating back to 3000 BC, and nine rooms which contained stocks of grain. The large temple contained a hoard of bronze pieces, including knives and rings, as well as statues in stone and pottery which probably represented demons that would repel other evil spirits.
The team also found a burial site dating back to 2000 BC and a broken vase decorated with a lotus flower and some hieoglyphs which led the archaeologists to interpret it as a gift to the king of Sidon from Queen Twosret (1190 BC).
Dramatic as the finds are, however, Dr Claude Serhal is most pleased about the stratigraphy of the site. "The site, unlike any other in Lebanon, showed the clear succession of historic periods in Sidon," he says. "This helped complete the cycle of historic periods discovered in the site."
As a result he is able to claim confidently that Sidon is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world.
no Phoenician ruins On a visit some years ago we found a team of archaeologists at work and quizzed them on what they had found. In answer to our query the team leader admitted that they had not found any Phoenician remains "yet" - but even to our unpracticed eyes, it was clear that the workmen were scraping at bedrock! Return
Sidon, on the other hand The book of Ezekiel, written during the time of Nebuchadnezzar, preserves dramatic prophecies against both cities, but whereas Tyre merits several chapters which predict that the city will be thrown into the sea and never built again, Sidon gets a couple of verses which denounce the city and foretell various disasters, though no specifics such as are given against Tyre.
The odd thing is that even if we assign a late date to Ezekiel (for which there is no evidence) and thus turn the predictions into "postdictions", we still have to explain the fact that Tyre would never be built again - and it has not.
So far as we can tell, ancient Tyre centred around the copious spring of Ras al-Ain, which still provides copious quantities of fresh water to the town. Once the island had been turned into a peninsula it had no attractive defensive qualities to offset the distance from the vital water supply - yet every city since the time of Alexander has been built out on the island, leaving the site of ancient Tyre as nothing more than orchards. Return
© Kendall K. Down 2009
