Chambers's encyclopaedia; a dictionary of universal knowledge for the people . -, and under Augustus it was occupied by a Roman had an oracle held in such high esteem, that hi the 3de. , 438 BABA—EABEH. it was consulted by the Emperor Trajan prior to his entrance onhis second Parthian campaign. To test the prescience of tlie ora-cle, Trajan sent to it a blank piece of paper, which was returnedto him blank. This gave him a high oiiinion of its powers, andhe consulted it iu all seriousness a second time. Tlie response wassome dead twigs from a vine, wrapped up in cloth. Trajansde
Chambers's encyclopaedia; a dictionary of universal knowledge for the people . -, and under Augustus it was occupied by a Roman had an oracle held in such high esteem, that hi the 3de. , 438 BABA—EABEH. it was consulted by the Emperor Trajan prior to his entrance onhis second Parthian campaign. To test the prescience of tlie ora-cle, Trajan sent to it a blank piece of paper, which was returnedto him blank. This gave him a high oiiinion of its powers, andhe consulted it iu all seriousness a second time. Tlie response wassome dead twigs from a vine, wrapped up in cloth. Trajansdecease some two years afterwards, and tlie transmission of liisbones to Rome, was deemed a sufficient interpretation of thesymbolical utterance, and confirmed the celebritry of tlie Pius (138—101 ) built tlie great temple, wliicli tlielegend current among tlie modern inliabitants counts a work ofSolomon. This temple is said to Iiave contained a golden statueof Apollo, or of Zeus, which on certain annual festivals the cliief. Ruins of Baalbek. citizens of Heliopolis bore about on their shoulders. WhenChristianity, under Constantine, became the dominant religion,the temple became a Cliristian church. In the wars tliat followedthe taking of tiie city by the Arabs, who sacked it in 748 , thetemple was turned into a fortress, the battlements of wliicli areyet visible. The city was completely pillaged by Tiinur Bey, orBeg, in 1400 Both city and temple continued to fall moreand more into decay under the misery and misrule to whicli Syriahas been subject ever since. Many of the magnificent pillars wereoverturned by the pachas of Damascus merely for the sake of theiron with which the stones were bound together. What the Arabs,Tatars, and Turks had spared, was destroyed by a terrific eartli-quake in 1759. B. is now an insignificant village, witli a popula-tion of some few liundreds. See Wood and Dawkins Ruins ofBaalhec (1757); Cassas, Voyage Pittoresgue d
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