Random Ruin IV: The Temples of Niha

Phil and Charbel, admiring the main temple at Niha.

After a week in Beirut, Wade recruited a friend and colleague, Phil to go exploring in the Bekaa Valley. Charbel, the best guide to historical sights in Lebanon, was nice enough to join Wade and Phil.

The destination: The Temples of Niha.

Niha is just a few kilometers north of Zahle, the largest town in the Bekaa Valley. It's also on the road to the famous ruins of Baalbek. Niha is probably Lebanon's third largest Roman temple, yet according to Charbel 90% of the Lebanese have never heard of it. Rarely, Charbel explained, does he take a group of tourists to Niha; maybe every few years.

It was a crowded day in Niha because we had to share the temples with three other people!

Phil, on the left, talking to Charbel.

Charbel does a particularly good job of explaining what archeologists know and how they know it. In the picture above, Charbel explains how the smaller temple was probably built by locals in the first century AD -- Roman temples typically face east so that the sun hits the statue of the god/godess; this temple faces south like some earlier pre-Roman temples in Lebanon.

From the first through fifth centuries, Niha, Baalbek, and the temples of Faqra on the other side of the mountains, made up a network of pilgrimage sights. Pilgrims would land in Byblos, hike up the Adonis Valley, over the mountains, ending in Baalbek but stopping at various temples along the way.

This relief, just outside the main temple, is of a local priest during Tiberius' reign. Historians guess that he's local because he's wearing what looks like a traditionally Phoenician hat.

Wade, underneath the temple altar in a pitch-black cellar once used for storing sacrifices and offerings. Now it's just creepy.

Phil, photographing the massive side of the temple, with the village of Niha in the background.

After exhausting the two main temples of Niha, Charbel had a special surprise for Wade and Phil. We hopped in Charbel's car and drove five kilometers further up the mountain to find an even more remote temple, one that is unnamed and most likely unfinished.

The view looking back down on the Niha Temples on our way up to the even more remote temple. Off in the distance, across the valley, you can see Syria and the Anti-Lebanon range.

Mysteriously, on our way up the mountain, we all received text messages welcoming us to Syria. We don't think that Bashar al Assad would approve of welcoming us into Syria at the moment.

We saw fewer and fewer buildings the further up the mountainside that we drove, until it was just us, a few migrant workers, and lots of vineyard grapes. We hit gravel and then the road narrowed to where we had to park the car and walk.

And then there it was, the remnants of another Roman temple. Charbel said that nobody knows when it was built or how long it was in use. He doesn't think it was ever finished due to the lack of ornamentation on the columns. He also speculated that it was used as a fort or lookout tower later in its history -- there are a series of walls surrounding the temple that appear to have been built with different levels of skills and with different resources.

Wade and Phil enjoyed a long lunch with Charbel at one of the vineyards, discussing Lebanese history and politics until we exhausted both topics. After lunch, we hopped into a bus and made it back home by 5:30 pm, completing a short, eight hour excursion that satiated Wade's appetite for seeing something old.