Ras Ash-Shaq'a
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Ras Ash-Shaq'a
Ras ash-Shaq'a (alternative spelling Râs ach-Chaq’a’) is a promontory in north Lebanon, known in antiquity as Theoprosopon and Lithoprosopon. The promontory is situated between the ancient cities of Batroun and Tripoli; it creates a massive barrier that cuts through the coast of Lebanon, making it historically difficult for travelers to circumvent. Today's modern, coastal highway runs through the mass via two tunnels. History During Antiquity, a road that ran parallel to the sea existed, which made it possible to circumvent Cape Lithoprosopon and to connect Batroun to Tripoli. Historians report that the earthquake of 551 A.D. caused a landslide, causing the road to sink into the sea permanently, and thus isolating Tripoli from Batroun and Byblos. The name of the cape changed throughout history. The oldest mention of the promontory appears in the writings of the Greek historian, Polybius who named it “Theou Prosopon” or “Face of God.” The Greek geographers, Ptolemy an ...
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Ramsar Convention
The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance Especially as Waterfowl Habitat is an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable use of Ramsar site, Ramsar sites (wetlands). It is also known as the Convention on Wetlands. It is named after the city of Ramsar, Mazandaran, Ramsar in Iran, where the convention was signed in 1971. Every three years, representatives of the contracting parties meet as the Ramsar Convention#Conference of the Contracting Parties, Conference of the Contracting Parties (COP), the policy-making organ of the wetland conservation, convention which adopts decisions (site designations, resolutions and recommendations) to administer the work of the convention and improve the way in which the parties are able to implement its objectives. In 2022, COP15 was held in Montreal, Canada. List of wetlands of international importance The list of wetlands of international importance included 2,531 Ramsar site, Ramsar sites in Februa ...
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Mamluks
Mamluk or Mamaluk (; (singular), , ''mamālīk'' (plural); translated as "one who is owned", meaning "slave") were non-Arab, ethnically diverse (mostly Turkic, Caucasian, Eastern and Southeastern European) enslaved mercenaries, slave-soldiers, and freed slaves who were assigned high-ranking military and administrative duties, serving the ruling Arab and Ottoman dynasties in the Muslim world. The most enduring Mamluk realm was the knightly military class in medieval Egypt, which developed from the ranks of slave-soldiers. Originally the Mamluks were slaves of Turkic origins from the Eurasian Steppe, but the institution of military slavery spread to include Circassians, Abkhazians, Georgians, Armenians, Russians, and Hungarians, as well as peoples from the Balkans such as Albanians, Greeks, and South Slavs (''see'' Saqaliba). They also recruited from the Egyptians. The "Mamluk/Ghulam Phenomenon", as David Ayalon dubbed the creation of the specific warrior class, was of ...
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Landforms Of Lebanon
A landform is a land feature on the solid surface of the Earth or other planetary body. They may be natural or may be anthropogenic (caused or influenced by human activity). Landforms together make up a given terrain, and their arrangement in the landscape is known as topography. Landforms include hills, mountains, canyons, and valleys, as well as shoreline features such as bays, peninsulas, and seas, including submerged features such as mid-ocean ridges, volcanoes, and the great oceanic basins. Physical characteristics Landforms are categorized by characteristic physical attributes such as elevation, slope, orientation, structure stratification, rock exposure, and soil type. Gross physical features or landforms include intuitive elements such as berms, cliffs, hills, mounds, peninsulas, ridges, rivers, valleys, volcanoes, and numerous other structural and size-scaled (e.g. ponds vs. lakes, hills vs. mountains) elements including various kinds of inland and oceanic waterbodi ...
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List Of Wetlands Of International Importance
Ramsar sites are protected under by the Ramsar Convention, an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable use of wetlands, recognizing the fundamental ecological functions of wetlands and their economic, cultural, scientific, and recreational value. The convention establishes that "wetlands should be selected for the list on account of their international significance in terms of ecology, botany, zoology, limnology or hydrology." Over the years, the Conference of the Contracting Parties has adopted more specific criteria interpreting the convention text. The Ramsar List organizes the Ramsar sites according to the contracting party that designated each to the list. Contracting parties are grouped into six "regions": Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin American and the Caribbean, North America, and Oceania. , 171 states have acceded to the convention and designated 2,531 sites to the list, covering ; one other state has acceded to the convention but has yet to designate any si ...
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Wetlands
A wetland is a distinct semi-aquatic ecosystem whose groundcovers are flooded or saturated in water, either permanently, for years or decades, or only seasonally. Flooding results in oxygen-poor ( anoxic) processes taking place, especially in the soils. Wetlands form a transitional zone between waterbodies and dry lands, and are different from other terrestrial or aquatic ecosystems due to their vegetation's roots having adapted to oxygen-poor waterlogged soils. They are considered among the most biologically diverse of all ecosystems, serving as habitats to a wide range of aquatic and semi-aquatic plants and animals, with often improved water quality due to plant removal of excess nutrients such as nitrates and phosphorus. Wetlands exist on every continent, except Antarctica. The water in wetlands is either freshwater, brackish or saltwater. The main types of wetland are defined based on the dominant plants and the source of the water. For example, ''marshes'' are ...
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Hamat
Hamat () is a village in Lebanon. It is located 287 meters high on the historic Ras ash-Shaq'a. It is home to the historic shrine and monastery of Our Lady of Nourieh. The village is also home to Saint Elias Church, which overlooks the Jawz River, or the River of Walnuts and the coastal town of Batroun, only of the oldest continuously-inhabited cities in the world. Other historic sites are St. Simeon Monastery and Hamat Old Tunnel. The Ras ash-Shaq'a, known in antiquity as the Theoprosopon, is large coastal cape between the ancient cities of Batroun and Tripoli, Lebanon that forms a significant barrier along the Lebanese coast. Demographics In 2014 Christians made up 99.37% of registered voters in Hamat. 88.65% of the voters were Greek Orthodox. Historical Military Use During the Lebanese Civil War, a runway called Pierre Gemayel International Airport was built in Hamat in 1976 by the Kataeb party The Kataeb Party (), officially the Kataeb Party – Lebanese Soc ...
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Our Lady Of Nourieh
Our Lady of Nourieh (''Saydet el Nourieh'' in Arabic) is a Shrines to the Virgin Mary, Marian shrine in Hamat, Lebanon. ''Nourieh'' is a derivative of the Arabic word, ''nour'', meaning light. Thus, in English, the Marian shrine can be called, Our Lady of Light. The story of Our Lady of Light shrine and monastery is celebrated throughout Lebanon, a country where Christianity has existed since Jesus first evangelized in Tyre, Lebanon, Tyre and Sidon, and therefore, Lebanon is often considered part of the “Holy Land.” Some of the first Christian communities were set up in Lebanon during the time of the apostles. It is believed that two sailors built the shrine in the 4th century. One winter night, on a very stormy sea, the two sailors found themselves in peril. They began praying, and the Virgin appeared to them as a light and guided them gently to the shore of Theoprosopon near modern-day Chekka in North Governorate, North Lebanon. The grateful sailors carved a cave in the c ...
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Greek Orthodox
Greek Orthodox Church (, , ) is a term that can refer to any one of three classes of Christian Churches, each associated in some way with Greek Christianity, Levantine Arabic-speaking Christians or more broadly the rite used in the Eastern Roman Empire. * The broader meaning refers to "the entire body of Orthodox (Chalcedonian) Christianity, sometimes also called 'Eastern Orthodox', 'Greek Catholic', or generally 'the Greek Church. * A second, narrower meaning refers to "any of several independent churches within the worldwide communion of (Eastern) Orthodox Christianity that retain the use of the Greek language in formal ecclesiastical settings". In this sense, the Greek Orthodox Churches are the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople and its dependencies, the Patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, the Church of Greece and the Church of Cyprus. * The third meaning refers to the Church of Greece, an Eastern Orthodox Church operating within the modern bor ...
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Lebanese Arabic
Lebanese Arabic ( ; autonym: ), or simply Lebanese ( ; autonym: ), is a Varieties of Arabic, variety of Levantine Arabic, indigenous to and primarily Languages of Lebanon, spoken in Lebanon, with significant linguistic influences borrowed from other Middle Eastern and European languages. Due to multilingualism and pervasive diglossia among Lebanese people (a majority of the Lebanese people are bilingual or trilingual), it is not uncommon for Lebanese people to code-switch between or mix Lebanese Arabic, French language, French, and English language, English in their daily speech. It is also spoken among the Lebanese diaspora. Lebanese Arabic is a descendant of the Old Arabic, Arabic dialects introduced to the Levant and other Arabic dialects that were already spoken in other parts of the Levant in the 7th century AD, which gradually supplanted various indigenous Northwest Semitic languages to become the regional lingua franca. As a result of this prolonged process of language s ...
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Laurent D'Arvieux
Laurent d'Arvieux (2 June 1635 – 30 October 1702) was a French traveller and diplomat born in Marseille.Le Consulat de France à Alep au XVIIe siecle2009, p.29-38 Arvieux is known for his travels in the Middle East, which began in 1654 as a merchant in the Ottoman port of Smyrna. From 1658 he travelled throughout the Levant (Lebanon, Syria and Palestine) and in 1666 visited Tunis. Later he returned to France, and in 1674–75 was assigned as consul to Algiers, then later served as consul to Aleppo from 1679 to 1686. During Arvieux's travels he was witness to 17th-century Arab and Turkish societies, and gained important insight involving all facets of their culture and customs. He also familiarized himself with the languages of the region, and learned to speak Arabic, Turkish, Persian, Hebrew and Syriac languages. Because of his knowledge of Turkish manners and dress he collaborated with Molière on the development of '' Le Bourgeois gentilhomme''. At the time of Arvieux' ...
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Ottoman Turks
The Ottoman Turks () were a Turkic peoples, Turkic ethnic group in Anatolia. Originally from Central Asia, they migrated to Anatolia in the 13th century and founded the Ottoman Empire, in which they remained socio-politically dominant for the entirety of the six centuries that it existed. Their descendants are the present-day Turkish people, who comprise the majority of the population in the Turkey, Republic of Turkey, which was established shortly after the end of World War I. Reliable information about the early history of the Ottoman Turks remains scarce, but they take their Turkish name from Osman I, who founded the Ottoman dynasty, House of Osman alongside the Ottoman Empire; the name "Osman (name), Osman" was altered to "Ottoman" when it was transliterated into some Languages of Europe, European languages over time. The Ottoman principality, expanding from Söğüt, gradually began incorporating other Turkish-speaking Muslims and non-Turkish Christians into their realm. B ...
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Crusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and at times directed by the Papacy during the Middle Ages. The most prominent of these were the campaigns to the Holy Land aimed at reclaiming Jerusalem and its surrounding territories from Muslim rule. Beginning with the First Crusade, which culminated in the Siege of Jerusalem (1099), capture of Jerusalem in 1099, these expeditions spanned centuries and became a central aspect of European political, religious, and military history. In 1095, after a Byzantine request for aid,Helen J. Nicholson, ''The Crusades'', (Greenwood Publishing, 2004), 6. Pope Urban II proclaimed the first expedition at the Council of Clermont. He encouraged military support for List of Byzantine emperors, Byzantine emperor Alexios I Komnenos, AlexiosI Komnenos and called for an armed pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Across all social strata in Western Europe, there was an enthusiastic response. Participants came from all over Europe and had a ...
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