History edit
Wall and moat were built atop the Phoenician cemetery, and cut across the ruins of the Phoenico-Persian, Hellenistic and Roman residences. The wall was built around the 9th century and dismantled at the beginning of the 20th century. Souk Al-Jamil was built over the backfilled moat. In the late 19th century, the city wall and its moat lost their strategic significance.
Moat edit
Located outside the city wall, the moat played an important defensive role in times of war. It kept invaders at a distance, and prevented them from getting close to the wall with mobile wooden towers. Attackers had to construct bridges to reach the top of the wall, thus exposing themselves to the city defenders.
See also edit
References edit
Sources edit
- Curvers, Hans H. and Stuart, Barbara (1996) “Bey 008, The 1994 Results”, Bulletin d’Archéologie et d’Architecture Libanaises 1: 228-234.
- El-Masri, Sami (1999) Beirut: The City and its Crafts in the Medieval Period. Ph.D. Dissertation, Freie Universität, Berlin.
- Mongne, Pascal (1996) « Bey 008 bis, Zone des Souks, Dégagement du fossé médiéval », Bulletin d’Archéologie et d’Architecture Libanaises 1 :270-293.