Lebanon in a Picture

Laid Back. Reclined all serene and elegant upon their couch, or as the... (National Museum of Beirut)

Laid Back. Reclined all serene and elegant upon their couch, or as the... (National Museum of Beirut) Laid Back. Reclined all serene and elegant upon their couch, or as the Greeks called them (to my etymological delight) their klinē, this Hellenized southern Lebanese couple are posed as if ready to settle into an eternity of wine (wo)men and song, which I suppose is in some ways the Classical World post-mortem equivalent of Netflix and Chill. We don’t know their names but they died some time in the 3rd Century AD in the great city of Tyre and were buried in this magnificent flesh-eater, a marble marvel covered in practically pristine tableaux depicting scenes of the great hero/destroyer, Achilles and his role in the Trojan War. Apparently, the Iliad was a popular funerary motif in Tyrus, at the time, for a number of other sarcophagi have been found with similar scenes. Their sarcophagus was found in the Roman necropolis in Al-Bass, which was once the main entrance to the city, hence the massive triumphal arch a little further up the road. If you’re wondering why the main road into the city lead through a cemetery, that’s because in the Ancient World, the dead were generally buried outside city walls, to reduce the spread of disease. The Romans (and by the 3rd Century, Tyre was a Roman province) liked to bury theirs along main roads. Just look at the Via Appia. Probably, this was a matter of practicality. The road was outside the wall and made it easier to transport corpses. But what has often struck me about this practice is the salutatory moral story it subtly imparts to travellers, a delicate reminder that the safety of the civitas lies behind them and the road ahead, well, it leads through death. Caveat viator!
by wsinghbartlett / Instagram