Baalbek is a city in which there are mysterious giant trilithon slabs, according to legend, which have always been here. Their size, weight and precision of manufacture are astonishing even today.
Baalbek city
Baalbek, located in the Bekaa Valley, is famous for its ancient temples. It takes about an hour to get there from the Lebanese capital Beirut. The first mention of Baalbek is found in the Assyrian inscription of 804 BC. It is believed that Baalbek was founded by the Phoenicians. Worldwide fame was brought to Baalbek by the temple of Jupiter of Heliopolis (Baalbek in the era of the Roman Empire was called Heliopolis, which means “City of the Sun”). This temple was erected by Anthony Pius (138-161 AD) on the site of the former sanctuary of Baal, the Phoenician god of the sun and fertility. According to the emperor's plan, this was to become the largest temple of Jupiter in the empire, which would overshadow other temples with its splendor. This temple was really unusual and it was built by the Romans only partially …
Baalbek, Temple of Jupiter
To get to the Temple of Jupiter in Baalbek, one had to climb the widest staircase in the world. On each of its twenty-seven steps, up to a hundred people were placed in a row. The steps of this staircase cause surprise: they were knee-deep to an adult man, as if it were a temple for giants (!). This staircase went up to a platform or basement of the temple, the dimensions of which are comparable to a football field (49x89 m). The main part of this site is now occupied by the ruins of the Temple of Jupiter, which was built of hewn 2-3 cubic stone blocks. Scattered on the ground are fragments of huge pillars, large hewn stones, giant architraves and plinths, the carving of which is striking in its perfection. On the side of the northern and southern facades, there is a stone strip about seven meters wide, called the Baalbek terrace. It is formed by huge blocksthe top row of which is located at a height of eight meters. The Temple of Jupiter was surrounded by the propyleum - an open-air colonnade of 52 columns that surpassed in size all columns in the world. The propyleum was connected by three spans with a hexagonal platform, where the altar of the main temple was located, surrounded by a wall with 320 statues of the gods. Only six twenty-meter columns with a diameter of 2.5 meters each survived, which rise above the valley and are visible far beyond Baalbek. Fragments of the remaining columns are scattered nearby. Obviously, the inhuman proportions inspired the creators of this temple building! Today there is no answer to the question of what force lifted these multi-ton masses to a height of 25 meters. However, it was not the amazing colonnade that brought glory to the city of Baalbek, but the imperceptible giant stone slabs at once …The Temple of Jupiter was surrounded by the propyleum - an open-air colonnade of 52 columns that surpassed in size all columns in the world. The propyleum was connected by three spans with a hexagonal platform, where the altar of the main temple was located, surrounded by a wall with 320 statues of the gods. Only six twenty-meter columns with a diameter of 2.5 meters each survived, which rise above the valley and are visible far beyond Baalbek. Fragments of the remaining columns are scattered nearby. Obviously, the inhuman proportions inspired the creators of this temple building! Today there is no answer to the question of what force lifted these multi-ton masses to a height of 25 meters. However, it was not an amazing colonnade that brought glory to the city of Baalbek, but imperceptible at once giant stone slabs …The Temple of Jupiter was surrounded by the propyleum - an open-air colonnade of 52 columns that surpassed in size all columns in the world. The propyleum was connected by three spans with a hexagonal platform, where the altar of the main temple was located, surrounded by a wall with 320 statues of the gods. Only six twenty-meter columns with a diameter of 2.5 meters each survived, which rise above the valley and are visible far beyond Baalbek. Fragments of the remaining columns are scattered nearby. Obviously, the inhuman proportions inspired the creators of this temple building! Today there is no answer to the question of what force lifted these multi-ton masses to a height of 25 meters. However, it was not the amazing colonnade that brought glory to the city of Baalbek, but the imperceptible giant stone slabs at once …The propyleum was connected by three spans with a hexagonal platform, where the altar of the main temple was located, surrounded by a wall with 320 statues of the gods. Only six twenty-meter columns with a diameter of 2.5 meters each survived, which rise above the valley and are visible far beyond Baalbek. Fragments of the remaining columns are scattered nearby. Obviously, the inhuman proportions inspired the creators of this temple building! Today there is no answer to the question of what force lifted these multi-ton masses to a height of 25 meters. However, it was not the amazing colonnade that brought glory to the city of Baalbek, but the imperceptible giant stone slabs at once …The propyleum was connected by three spans with a hexagonal platform, where the altar of the main temple was located, surrounded by a wall with 320 statues of the gods. Only six twenty-meter columns with a diameter of 2.5 meters each survived, which rise above the valley and are visible far beyond Baalbek. Fragments of the remaining columns are scattered nearby. Obviously, the inhuman proportions inspired the creators of this temple building! Today there is no answer to the question of what force lifted these multi-ton masses to a height of 25 meters. However, it was not the amazing colonnade that brought glory to the city of Baalbek, but the imperceptible giant stone slabs at once …Fragments of the remaining columns are scattered nearby. Obviously, the inhuman proportions inspired the creators of this temple building! Today there is no answer to the question of what force lifted these multi-ton masses to a height of 25 meters. However, it was not the amazing colonnade that brought glory to the city of Baalbek, but the imperceptible giant stone slabs at once …Fragments of the remaining columns are scattered nearby. Obviously, the inhuman proportions inspired the creators of this temple building! Today there is no answer to the question of what force lifted these multi-ton masses to a height of 25 meters. However, it was not the amazing colonnade that brought glory to the city of Baalbek, but the imperceptible giant stone slabs at once …
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In fact, the grandeur of the Baalbek terrace is emphasized by the size of the stones from which it is built. In the northwest corner of the terrace, three unusually large slabs can still be seen. These are world famous trilithon blocks (three stones), about which the ancient legend says that they lay here forever and were considered sacred, and the builders of the temple only used them in the construction of the terrace. The block sizes are really amazing: 4.34x3.65x19.1; 4.34x3.65x19.3 and 4.34x3.65x19.56 meters. The volume of each of them is from 300 to 310 cubic meters, and the weight is up to 750 tons.
The fitting of the Baalbek blocks is perfect: the stones touch each other with such precision that even a drop of water is not absorbed at the joint and rolls down the chute. The lapping area at the end of the blocks, at the base and along the long vertical edge reaches 12, 27 and 36 sq.m., respectively. The total contact area of each block of the outer row reaches 87, and the inner one - 123 square meters with the most accurate alignment of the angles and parallelism of the edges. The blocks were planted with a tolerance of about 0.01 millimeters! Such accuracy is incredible even for our time. Who could freely operate with such large masses and possessed ultra-precise processing technologies in such large-scale projects?
And yet the most famous - the fourth stone, has not been pulled out of the nearest quarry … It lies at the exit from Baalbek, fifty meters south of the acropolis and is the world's largest processed stone. Its ancient name is "Gayar el Kibli" (Stone of the South). It is not known what this monolith was intended for, but in terms of its dimensions it exceeds even a trilithon: its length is 21.72 m, the section of the southern end is 4.25x4.35 m, and the northern end is 5.35x5.35 m. The volume of "Stone of the South" reaches 433 cubic meters, and its weight is more than 1000 tons (according to some sources, the stone weighs up to 2000 tons)! Only recently have giant cranes been created to handle such masses. According to the calculations of engineer O. Kolomiychuk, in order to move this stone block from its place, one-time efforts of 60 thousand people are required, which of course is unrealistic to realize!The thousand-ton giant, abandoned in the quarry, does not reveal the secret of transporting these giant stones to the construction site. It is difficult to imagine how the Baalbek triliths were cut out in the quarry without any distortions or damage, delivered to a distance of two kilometers, laid at a height of 7-8 meters from the base of the masonry and fitted to each other with incredible precision. The processing of these monoliths also raises many questions, because it is impossible to make a flat surface of tens and hundreds of square meters with primitive hand tools. The ideal "stacking" of one block next to another indicates that somehow this operation was nevertheless carried out, so that Baalbek remains an unsolved mystery of ancient civilizations.does not allow us to understand the secret of transporting these giant stones to the construction site. It is difficult to imagine how the Baalbek triliths were cut out in the quarry without any distortions or damage, delivered to a distance of two kilometers, laid at a height of 7-8 meters from the base of the masonry and fitted to each other with incredible precision. The processing of these monoliths also raises many questions, because it is impossible to make a flat surface of tens and hundreds of square meters with primitive hand tools. The ideal "stacking" of one block next to another indicates that somehow this operation was nevertheless carried out, so that Baalbek remains an unsolved mystery of ancient civilizations.does not allow us to understand the secret of transporting these giant stones to the construction site. It is difficult to imagine how the Baalbek triliths were cut out in the quarry without any distortions or damage, delivered to a distance of two kilometers, laid at a height of 7-8 meters from the base of the masonry and fitted to each other with incredible precision. The processing of these monoliths also raises many questions, because it is impossible to make a flat surface of tens and hundreds of square meters with primitive hand tools. The ideal "stacking" of one block next to another indicates that somehow this operation was nevertheless carried out, so that Baalbek remains an unsolved mystery of ancient civilizations.how the Baalbek triliths were carved in the quarry without any distortions or damages, delivered to a distance of two kilometers, laid at a height of 7-8 meters from the base of the masonry and fitted to each other with incredible precision. The processing of these monoliths also raises many questions, because it is impossible to make a flat surface of tens and hundreds of square meters with primitive hand tools. The ideal "stacking" of one block next to another indicates that somehow this operation was nevertheless carried out, so that Baalbek remains an unsolved mystery of ancient civilizations.how the Baalbek triliths were carved in the quarry without any distortions or damages, delivered to a distance of two kilometers, laid at a height of 7-8 meters from the base of the masonry and fitted to each other with incredible precision. The processing of these monoliths also raises many questions, because it is impossible to make a flat surface of tens and hundreds of square meters with primitive hand tools. The ideal "stacking" of one block next to another indicates that somehow this operation was nevertheless carried out, so that Baalbek remains an unsolved mystery of ancient civilizations. After all, it is impossible to make a flat surface of tens and hundreds of square meters with primitive hand tools. The ideal "stacking" of one block next to another indicates that somehow this operation was nevertheless carried out, so that Baalbek remains an unsolved mystery of ancient civilizations. After all, it is impossible to make a flat surface of tens and hundreds of square meters with primitive hand tools. The ideal "stacking" of one block next to another indicates that somehow this operation was nevertheless carried out, so that Baalbek remains an unsolved mystery of ancient civilizations.