Tabarja () is an ancient coastal

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

Lebanon Lebanon, officially the Republic of Lebanon, is a country in the Levant region of West Asia. Situated at the crossroads of the Mediterranean Basin and the Arabian Peninsula, it is bordered by Syria to the north and east, Israel to the south ...

, situated in

Kesrouan Keserwan District (, transliteration: ''Qaḍā' Kisrawān'') is a district (''qadaa'') in Keserwan-Jbeil Governorate, Lebanon, to the northeast of Lebanon's capital Beirut. The capital, Jounieh, is overwhelmingly Maronite Christian. The area is ...

Etymology

Tabarja has been known by various names throughout its history. It is identified with the coastal town of Trieres in

Polybius Polybius (; , ; ) was a Greek historian of the middle Hellenistic period. He is noted for his work , a universal history documenting the rise of Rome in the Mediterranean in the third and second centuries BC. It covered the period of 264–146 ...

' ''

Histories Histories or, in Latin, Historiae may refer to: * the plural of history * ''Histories'' (Herodotus), by Herodotus * ''The Histories'', by Timaeus * ''The Histories'' (Polybius), by Polybius * ''Histories'' by Gaius Sallustius Crispus (Sallust) ...

.'' The historian places the

Lycus river Lycus (Lykos, Lycos, ) may refer to: Mythology * Lycus (mythology), the name of numerous people in Greek mythology, including ** Lycus (brother of Nycteus), a ruler of the ancient city of Ancient Thebes ** Lycus (descendant of Lycus), son of Lyc ...

, Calamus, and Trieres between

Beirut Beirut ( ; ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, just under half of Lebanon's population, which makes it the List of largest cities in the Levant region by populatio ...

and

Batrun Batroun ( ';, ancient Botrys (), is a coastal city in northern Lebanon and one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. It is the capital city of Batroun District. The main Political Party of this city is the Free patriotic mo ...

. In the 6th-century AD pilgrimage guide '' Antonini Placentini Itinerarium,''Trieri ''(Trierim civitatem)'' is mentioned and placed between Beirut and

Byblos Byblos ( ; ), also known as Jebeil, Jbeil or Jubayl (, Lebanese Arabic, locally ), is an ancient city in the Keserwan-Jbeil Governorate of Lebanon. The area is believed to have been first settled between 8800 and 7000BC and continuously inhabited ...

. ''Trieres'' was a

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

exonym An endonym (also known as autonym ) is a common, name for a group of people, individual person, geographical place, language, or dialect, meaning that it is used inside a particular group or linguistic community to identify or designate them ...

meaning "

trireme A trireme ( ; ; cf. ) was an ancient navies and vessels, ancient vessel and a type of galley that was used by the ancient maritime civilizations of the Mediterranean Sea, especially the Phoenicians, ancient Greece, ancient Greeks and ancient R ...

" which implies the location of the settlement next to a harbor. According to Lipiński, the name ''Tabarja'' (Tabarga) stems from ''Tiberias'' through an Arabic dialectal change of -iyya in "Tabariyya" into "Tabarigg", or a Frankish process of

palatalization Palatalization may refer to: *Palatalization (phonetics), the phonetic feature of palatal secondary articulation *Palatalization (sound change) Palatalization ( ) is a historical-linguistic sound change that results in a palatalized articulati ...

to "Tabarge". The settlement was so-called after emperor

Tiberius Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus ( ; 16 November 42 BC – 16 March AD 37) was Roman emperor from AD 14 until 37. He succeeded his stepfather Augustus, the first Roman emperor. Tiberius was born in Rome in 42 BC to Roman politician Tiberius Cl ...

, like the town built in the first century AD on the western shore of the

Sea of Galilee The Sea of Galilee (, Judeo-Aramaic languages, Judeo-Aramaic: יַמּא דטבריא, גִּנֵּיסַר, ), also called Lake Tiberias, Genezareth Lake or Kinneret, is a freshwater lake in Israel. It is the lowest freshwater lake on Earth ...

. This is corroborated by 13th-century AD Arab geographer

Yaqut al-Hamawi Yāqūt Shihāb al-Dīn ibn-ʿAbdullāh al-Rūmī al-Ḥamawī (1179–1229) () was a Muslim scholar of Byzantine ancestry active during the late Abbasid period (12th–13th centuries). He is known for his , an influential work on geography con ...

, who lists a ''Tabarayya'' in as-Sham besides the one in Palestine. As for the Semitic root of the Greek exonym ''Trieres,'' Lipiński suggests "traʿ- ʾarʿā" which means in Aramaic "the gate of the country"; a hypothesis that is corroborated by the Latin name of "Passus Pagani" (the Pass of the Countrymen" mentioned by

William William is a masculine given name of Germanic languages, Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman Conquest, Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle ...

, a 12th-century chronicler and

archbishop of Tyre The See of Tyre was one of the most ancient dioceses in Christianity. The existence of a Christian community there in the time of Saint Paul is mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles. Seated at Tyre (Lebanon), Tyre, which was the capital of the Roma ...

. The Aramaic name dates to the

Persian period The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire, also known as the Persian Empire or First Persian Empire (; , , ), was an Iranian peoples, Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid dynasty in 550 BC. Based in modern-day Iran, i ...

, when it indicated the geographical frontier between the lands of the kingdoms of

Sidon Sidon ( ) or better known as Saida ( ; ) is the third-largest city in Lebanon. It is located on the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean coast in the South Governorate, Lebanon, South Governorate, of which it is the capital. Tyre, Lebanon, Tyre, t ...

and Byblos.

Local lore

Local tradition reports that a rich king called Bargis lived in this town in the ancient times. This story could date to when Tabarja was still "Tiberias" (see

Etymology Etymology ( ) is the study of the origin and evolution of words—including their constituent units of sound and meaning—across time. In the 21st century a subfield within linguistics, etymology has become a more rigorously scientific study. ...

Modern History

On 18 December 1996 a minibus carrying Syrian workers was ambushed by gunmen in Tabarja. The driver was killed and seven passengers wounded. At the time it was estimated there were around one million Syrian workers in Lebanon.

Middle East International ''Middle East International'' was a bimonthly magazine published in London from 1971 until 2005, reaching a total of 761 issues. It was established by Christopher Mayhew and a group of senior British politicians and diplomats. The original publish ...

No 541, 10 January 1996 (misprint - actual date 1997); Publishers Lord Mayhew, Dennis Walters MP; Michael Jansen pp.7-8; Giles Trendle p.8 estimate of number of Syrian workers

Notes

References

Citations

Bibliography

* * * *

External links

Tabarja - Kfar Yassine
Localiban {{Keserwan District Populated places in Keserwan District