The ancient city of Baalbek bewitches with its grandeur. And this is not an exaggeration of the author. Indeed, even what remains of Heliopolis is impressive. There is an opinion that the six columns of the Temple of Jupiter were installed by aliens, according to another version - by giants. Sounds unlikely? But the cosmonaut Grechko made a sensational statement in this regard.
The buildings of the ancient city of Baalbek amazed many generations of Arabs with their grandeur, who were accustomed to seeing them on Lebanese banknotes painted by the Russian emigrant artist Pavel Korolev. Some seriously believe that the six columns of the Temple of Jupiter were not erected by people, while others say that this is just a myth. Nevertheless, you will be curious to know what the professor of the Physics and Mathematics Faculty, Soviet astronaut Georgy Mikhailovich Grechko (1931 - 2017), who spent more than 134 days in space, thought about this.
At a conference in Beirut in March 2011, Grechko stated unequivocally that Baalbek helped build extraterrestrial civilizations.
He said: “There may be no direct evidence that aliens are visiting our planet, but there is plenty of circumstantial evidence. I came to Lebanon to visit the Temple of Jupiter, which rises on a grand stone platform. Then there were no modern cranes that could lift giant stones weighing thousands of tons and put them on top of each other so tightly that it was impossible to insert the blade of the thinnest knife between them. I used to think it was just a figurative expression, but then I saw everything with my own eyes. There is no technology yet that can handle and install stone blocks of this size."
There used to be nine columns
Many attribute the popularization of Baalbek to the Irish architect Robert Williams Wood (1717-1771) and his colleague James Dawkins (1722-1757), who visited the city's majestic structures in 1751, and then published the book The Ruins of Baalbek or Heliopolis in region of Syria in 1757.
Wood writes: "The ruins of Baalbek, when compared to the ancient cities we have visited in Italy, Greece, Egypt and Asian countries, seem to be the most daring architectural project implemented to date."
This book became a true bestseller and has prompted many adventurers to make the trip to Baalbek. By the way, it should be noted that the authors added stunning illustrations to the book, including architectural drawings of the nine-column temple complex. However, two years after the publication of the book "The Ruins of Baalbek or Heliopolis in the Syrian Region", an earthquake began in the Bekaa Valley, which destroyed three columns of the temple. Isa Iskander al-Maaluf wrote about this earthquake in The History of the Bekaa and the Syrian Region, which also includes studies by Zuheir Khawari, Ibraghim Mahdi and Fawaz Tarablus). According to researchers, the strength of the earthquake was more than seven points on the Richter scale, so it caused enormous damage - it destroyed ancient structures and columns.
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Grigorovich-Barsky: the first travel diary
About a quarter of a century before Wood and Dawkins arrived in Baalbek, the Kiev pilgrim and traveler Vasily Grigorovich Grigorovich-Barsky (1701-1747) made a trip to the Middle East. He visited Jerusalem and all the cities along the Levantine coast, as well as most of the temple complexes of Mount Lebanon. In addition, Grigorovich-Barsky lived for a long time in Tripoli and Damascus. He published the details of his journey in a book entitled Wanderings to the Holy Places of the East.
Professor Igor Ostash in the book “Ukraine and Lebanon”, which I had the honor to translate from Ukrainian into Arabic, writes: “Today it is difficult to imagine that Grigorovich-Barsky traveled on foot for 24 years (from 1723 until his death) in Western Europe and the Middle East. He left travel notes and about 150 ink drawings. This was a tremendous achievement in that era, because this kind of travel was risky. Nevertheless, he was able to leave behind a legacy thanks to the education he received in the best academic circles in Kiev and Lvov."
Ostash's book describes in detail the journey of Grigorovich-Barsky to the Levant, which included observing travelers and his meetings with local residents, as well as a description of the places he visited.
Grigorovich-Barsky described the road from Al-Arz to Baalbek: “I arrived in Heliopolis on September 2, 1728 and stayed for 10 days in an Orthodox Christian house. Heliopolis is the Greek name for the city, and the Arabs living in it call it Baalbek - a city created by powerful giants. Once upon a time, many people lived in it, but today it is not at all like that. The city turned into an abandoned place and lost its former beauty and grandeur."
The Russian traveler told about what he had heard from local contemporaries about the giants: “The Temple of Jupiter is still standing, which undoubtedly deserves attention, because during my long journey I had not seen anything like it. The ancient Greeks built a temple together with a great people - giants. Agree that if we have never seen them, then hearing about the creations is all the more strange. Giants are people who are as tall as mountains, but they have done things that require a lot of effort. The Temple of Jupiter was built from large stones carved from white and yellow rock. Its walls are very high and thick, and there is a secret passage at the top of the temple. And stones of different sizes … people today cannot, regardless of their strength, move such stones."
Nevertheless, among scientists, there is still a debate about Baalbek, which is the largest historical complex in the Mediterranean region. There are various hypotheses about how these unique structures were built: starting with simple ideas or complex technical devices, and ending with assumptions about ancient civilizations and aliens from other planets. Special mention should be made of the hypothesis of the Swiss writer Erich von Däniken, which he outlined in the book "Chariots of the Gods". He supports the hypothesis of the visits of "ancient astronauts" or, in other words, claims that Baalbek's structures were erected by alien creatures. In 1970, director Harald Reinl made an Oscar-nominated documentary, Memories of the Future, based on the book.
Imad ad-Din Raif