110 



stands at the uorthern extremity of the fertile valley of Ccelo- 

 Syria, the modern Buka^ seems to have been a favourite 

 camping-place of the invaders of Syria^ as both Necho 

 (2 Kings xxiii. 33) and Nebuchadnezzar (2 Kings xxv. 6) 

 held courts there. The Babylonian king had just commenced, 

 or was preparing, to enter upon his long siege of Tyre, which 

 lasted some thirteen years (B.C. 586-573). There have 

 recently been discovered in the rocky gorges of the Lebanon 

 two valuable inscriptions, which prove the presence of 

 Nebuchadnezzar in Syria at this time. The first of these was 

 found by Dr. Looitved, the Danish Consul at Beirut, in 

 August, 1880, on the rocks near the mouth of the Nahr-el- 

 Kelb, or Dog River (the classical Lycus), a short distance 

 north of Beirut. I published a translation of the best pre- 

 served portion of this inscription in the Athencewn (Oct. 29, 

 1880, p. 563). The inscription is evidently not historical, but 

 relates to some of the great works carried out by the king in 

 Babylonia. The inscription was probably cut by some of the 

 soldiers of the Great King who formed the garrison placed at 

 this important post during the siege of Tyre. 



A few months ago> as described by M. Ganneau in the 

 Times, M. Pognon, the chief Interpreter of the French 

 Consulate at Beirut, discovered a long inscription engraved 

 upon the rocks of the Wady Birsa, a short distance from 

 Hermul in the Lebanon. The inscription was much injured, 

 and the figure of Nebuchadnezzar, which would have been a 

 valuable addition to our gallery of Assyrian and Babylonian 

 portraits, was too mutilated to be recognised. This insci'iption, 

 like the one at the mouth of the Nahr-el-Kelb, is not historical, 

 but contains a long account of the kiug^s works in Babylon, 

 and the ofierings he made to the temples. 



Unsatisfactory as these records are in not affording us 

 historical information from a Babylonian point of view respect- 

 ing the wars in Syria, they are valuable as showing the pre- 

 sence of the royal armies of Babylon in the Lebanon and the 

 regions of Coelo- Syria. The inscriptions near Hermul are 

 only a few miles from the village of Rabli, — the ancient 

 Hibla, — and must have been cut under the personal superin- 

 tendence of the great king. It is most probable, as suggested 

 by M. Pognon, that the Wady-Birsa was an emporium where 

 the wood- cutters of the Babylonian king brought the beams 

 of cedar which they had cut in forests of Lebanon to be 

 trimmed and prepared for transport to Babylon. In the 

 India House inscription Nebuchadnezzar speaks of the temples 

 being decorated with beams and planks of cedar which he 

 brought " from the verdant Lebanon.^^ 



