Haret ech Cheikh (also Haret-Ech-Cheikh), is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

in the

Matn District Matn ( ar, قضاء المتن, '), sometimes spelled Metn (or preceded by the article El, as in El Matn), is a district ('' qadaa'') in the Mount Lebanon Governorate of Lebanon, east of the Lebanon's capital Beirut. The district capital is ...

in the Mount Lebanon Governorate near Bouchriyeh.

Archaeology

The archaeological site at Haret Ech Cheikh is east of the road between Dekwaneh and

Jdeideh Jdeideh ( ar, جديدة المتن translit. al-Judaydat), also Jdayde, Jdaideh and Jdeidet el-Matn, is a coastal municipality and the administrative capital of the Matn District in the Mount Lebanon Governorate. Jdeideh has an area of approxim ...

, about above sea level, on the top of a wooded hill. It was discovered by

Paul Bovier-Lapierre Reverend Father Paul Bovier-Lapierre (1873–1950) was a French Jesuit archaeologist, notable for his work on prehistory in Egypt and surveys in southern Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Repu ...

and Raoul Describes who suggested it may be a ''

high place "High place", or "high places", (Hebrew במה ''bamah'' and plural במות ''bamot'' or ''bamoth'') in a biblical context always means "place(s) of worship". This rendering has etymological justification, as appears from the poetical use of the ...

''.Tallon, Maurice, Les Monuments Megalithiques de Syrie et du Liban. MUSJ, vol. 35, 1958. The hilltop has several outcrops of sandstone slabs suggested to be megalithic building foundation or enclosure. The suggested foundations have big stones at the corners that were not securely determined to be prehistoric. Materials collected from the site were

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several p ...

Chalcolithic The Copper Age, also called the Chalcolithic (; from grc-gre, χαλκός ''khalkós'', "copper" and ''líthos'', "stone") or (A)eneolithic (from Latin '' aeneus'' "of copper"), is an archaeological period characterized by regular ...

in form and was possibly mixed with that of the adjacent site of Ain Cheikh.

Lorraine Copeland Lorraine Copeland (born Elizabeth Lorraine Adie, 1921April 2013) was a British archaeologist specialising in the Palaeolithic period of the Near East. She was a secret agent with the Special Operations Executive during World War II. Early life ...

and

Peter Wescombe Peter Wescombe (4 January 1932 – 25 November 2014) was a British diplomat, amateur archaeologist, historian and founding member of the Bletchley Park Bletchley Park is an English country house and estate in Bletchley, Milton Keynes ( Bu ...

collected some fresh, unpatinated flint tools from a position west of the hilltop enclosure where a large amount of factory waste was also found. All material is in the

Museum of Lebanese Prehistory The Museum of Lebanese Prehistory (french: Musée de Préhistoire Libanaise, ar, متحف ما قبل التاريخ اللبناني) is a museum of prehistory and archaeology in Beirut, Lebanon. History The museum is the first museum of prehist ...

, marked with the label "Ain Cheikh". A grandiose villa dominates land covering part of the hill.

References

External links

www.geographic.org - entry on Haret ech Cheikh
Populated places in the Matn District Archaeological sites in Lebanon Chalcolithic sites of Asia Neolithic settlements Neolithic sites of Asia {{Lebanon-geo-stub