About midway between Tyre and Sidon lies what has been called by Porter and Tristram a kind of Syrian Stonehenge; but neither they nor Vandevelde, who likewise mentions it, really visited the spot.

The remains are not even mentioned in Carl Ritter’s elaborate compilation, the “Erd-Kunde,” nor in Robinson or Thompson; but as I have visited them five times, namely in October 1848, October 1849, September 1855, October 1857, and September 1859, I may as well tell what I know of these monuments, which I believe to be of some importance.

The site on which they stand is a large open cultivated ground, nearly opposite Sarafend, (Sarepta,) between the high-road and the sea, a quarter of an hour south of the vestiges of Adloon, whose broken columns and large pieces of tesselated pavement lie actually upon the highway, so that our horses and mules walk over the household pavements, or the road pavement of hexagonal slabs. Adloon may be at half distance between Soor and Saida. It has been conjectured that the name is an Arabic modification of Adnoun, and that again derived from Ad nonum, meaning the ninth Roman mile from Tyre; but as far as my memory serves me, that does not correspond with the real distance.

There are upright stones standing from four to six feet each above the present level of the ground, but which may not be the original level. There may have been a considerable rise accumulated in process of time. The largest stone still shows six feet by a breadth of two. They anciently formed a parallelogram, (not a circle, which is commonly believed to be an emblem belonging to Baal-worship,) as may be seen in the following plan, which represents their present appearance:—

Ancient construction at Adloon

The twelve stones marked 0 are still erect; the rest, whose places are marked by dots, are either prostrate on the ground, or have entirely disappeared. Between them all are spaces of two or three yards each. The stones appear to have been carefully hewn originally, though now the edges are worn off, or pieces have fallen away from the substances of most of them. They bear, however, no chisel-indications of having been connected by lintels across the tops: they have not been placed as trilithons.

Outside the parallelogram, at the distance of six yards, stand two other stones of the same description, which probably served as a portal of approach.

Within the enclosure is a depression of ground, in an oval shape, almost filled up with weeds, which demands but little effort of imagination to suggest the position of an altar now removed, leaving only the hollow orifice of a channel for carrying away blood or ashes. This may be worth an examination hereafter.

There are tokens of buildings having stood near, but these may have been of later date. I picked up a fragment of tesselated pavement there, but that may have come there by means of any conceivable accident from Adloon.

Such is my simple account of what I cannot but believe to have been a temple of Baal-worship for the old Phoenicians, certainly of earlier period than any Greek or Roman architecture in the country; and vestiges such as these, of antique Syrian monuments, may, on careful examination, furnish us with data, useful in enabling us to understand the Celtic remains still found in Europe.

The nearest village to these remains, though at some distance upon the hills, is Sairi, hence the place is named Sook Sairi, from the circumstance of a “market” of cattle and general goods being held there periodically for the district around. But why should this spot above all others in the long-deserted plain be used for such a market? Is it not a traditional continuance of some remote custom in connexion with the importance conferred by the ancient temple and its now-forgotten worship? Who can tell us through how many ages this rural fair has been held at Sairi or Adloon?

The peasant account of the stones is that they were formerly men, whom God, or a prophet in His name, turned into stones for their wickedness, while they were employed in reaping a harvest; further my informant could not tell. The narrative closely resembled the explanation given me by country people in England respecting some almost similar stones at Long-Compton, on the border between Oxfordshire and Warwickshire; and I think I remember to have read of similar instances in other parts of England.

Vandevelde was told that this miracle was wrought by Nebi Zer, (whose weli is in the neighbourhood,) and that this prophet Zer was nephew to Joshua, the son of Nun,—i.e., if he understood his interpreter aright.

I cannot well leave that vicinity without mentioning the long lines of sepulchres excavated in the cliff-line which runs parallel to the sea, eastwards of the highway, and upon the crest of which line Sarafend and other villages are posted. These sepulchres have been noticed by travellers generally, even while merely passing along without leaving the beaten track, others have taken the trouble to visit them, but without finding any inscriptions. I have seen one inscription, the following in Greek, and apparently unfinished:—

?????
???S??

Although in some respects these resemble the sepulchres near Jerusalem, they are not so elaborately formed into passages and inner chambers as the latter. Many of the excavations high above the ground have been at some era adapted to residences for hermits.

Near Saida I have been shown sepulchres that were entered by steps and passages, and coated with very hard stucco, on which were pictures in fresco of festoons of olive and vine leaves alternated, these leaves being diversified sometimes with tints of autumnal brown, also trees of palm or olive, with birds upon their branches; the birds being all of one kind, with long tails, and coloured bright yellow and red, with brown backs. Inasmuch as these portray living creatures they must be ascribed to some classical, i.e., ante-Islamitic epoch. The designing and colouring of them are excellent, and the work remains in good preservation; they are most likely of Roman art, for their style much resembles the wall pictures of Pompeii.

I have met with no mention of these decorated sepulchres, but in Ritter’s quotation from Mariti, (Saida’s Umgebungen in vol. iv. I, page 410,) and that only lately.

The sepulchre which I entered consisted of one principal chamber, at each side of which were three smaller recesses, besides two such opposite the entrance. These latter have others proceeding further within them. There are no low shelves as in the JudÆan sepulchres, but the dead were laid in shallow trenches sunk in the rocky floor. The stucco has only been employed to the right and left of the principal chamber.

I pass over, as not belonging to this subject, the more recent discovery by others near the town in 1855 of the two sarcophagi, one of them bearing a Phoenician inscription.

Temple of Baal (see p284)