10 The Forest of the Ancients. 



some parts, as Mount Lebaaon and Syria, generalization 

 in this respect is dangerous. 



We know, however, that by the 11th century before 

 Christ in Palestine, Asia Minor and Greece, especially 

 in the neighborliood of thriving cities, the forest cover 

 had vanished to a large extent and building timber for 

 the temples at Tyre and Sidon had to be brought long 

 distances from Mount Lebanon, whose wealth of cedar 

 was also freely drawn upon for ship timber and other 

 structures. The exploitation of this mountain forest, 

 although about 465 B. C. Artaxerxes I, having reeog- 

 , nized the pending exhaustion, had attempted to regulate 

 the cutting of timber, had by 333 B. C. progressed to 

 such an extent that Alexander the Great found at least 

 the south slope exhausted and almost woodless. 



The destruction by axe and fire of the celebrated for- 

 ests of Sharon, Carmel and Bashan is the theme of the 

 prophet Isaiah about 590 B. C. ; and the widespread 

 devastation of large forest areas during the Jewish wars 

 is depicted by Josephus. In Greece the Persian wars 

 are on record as causes of widspread forest destruction. 

 Yet in other parts, as on the island of Cyprus, which, 

 originally densely wooded, had rapidly lost its forest 

 wealth during Cleopatra's time through the develop- 

 ment of mining and metallurgical works, ship building 

 and clearing for farms, the kings seemed to have been 

 able to protect the remnants for a long time, so that 

 respectable forest cover exists even to date. 



The Eomans seem to have had still a surplus of, ship 

 timber at their command in the third and second cen- 

 turies before Christ, when they did not hesitate to bum 

 the warships of the CarthaginiaiiB (304 B. C.) and of 



