Bakka, Lebanon Explained

Official Name:Bakka
Other Name:Beka, Bekka
Native Name:بكّا
Settlement Type:Village
Subdivision Type:Country
Subdivision Type1:Governorate
Subdivision Name1:Beqaa Governorate
Subdivision Type2:District
Subdivision Name2:Rashaya District
Unit Pref:Imperial
Area Total Km2:6.12
Population Blank1 Title:Ethnicities
Population Blank2 Title:Religions
Elevation M:1480
Aaqbe
Alternate Name:Akbeh, Aqbe, Akbe, Aqbeh
Map Type:Lebanon
Map Size:200
Location:85km (53miles) east of Beirut
Region:Rashaya
Coordinates:33.5933°N 35.9244°W
Cultures:Roman
Condition:Ruins
Public Access:Yes

Bakka, Bekka or Beka (Arabic: بكّا) is a village and municipality situated 85km (53miles) east of Beirut in the Rashaya District of the Beqaa Governorate in Lebanon.[1] [2] The population of the village is Sunni.[3]

Wadi Bakka

The Wadi Bakka or Wadi Bekka runs alongside the village. The wadi was the scene of the Battle of Wadi Bakka where a Druze uprising was put down by Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt during the 1838 Druze revolt.[4]

Roman temple

There are the ruins of a Roman temple in the village that are included in a group of Temples of Mount Hermon.[5] George Taylor classified it as a prostylos temple and noted that the north and south walls remained standing and the podium floor had survived. The site has been heavily damaged by local construction of houses over the site. The temple featured an underground crypt that was accessible via one of the houses that had been built over it.[6]

George Taylor divided up the Temples of Lebanon into three groups, one group of Temples of the Beqaa Valley lies north of the road from Beirut to Damascus. Second, there is the group in the area south of the same road, including the Wadi al-Taym and the western flank of Mount Hermon. Third, the group in the area west of a line drawn along the ridge of Mount Lebanon. There are relatively few temples along Lebanon's coastal plain. The Temples of Mount Hermon in Taylor's second group included Bakka and Ain Harcha, Aaiha, Deir El Aachayer, Dekweh, Yanta, Hebbariye, Ain Libbaya, Nebi Safa, Aaqbe, Khirbet El-Knese, Mejdal Anjar, Mdoukha.

Edward Robinson suggested that word bakka could have derived from the later Arabic meaning of crowd. Others have linked it to the Hebrew word bikha meaning plain.[7]

External links

Notes and References

  1. Book: Daniel M. Krencker. Willy Zschietzschmann. Römische Tempel in Syrien: nach Aufnahmen und Untersuchungen von Mitgliedern der Deutschen Baalbekexpedition 1901-1904, pp. 205-269 & pl, 83-116, Otto Puchstein, Bruno Schulz, Daniel Krencker. 17 September 2012. 1938. W. de Gruyter & Co..
  2. Book: Ted Kaizer. The Variety of Local Religious Life in the Near East In the Hellenistic and Roman Periods. 20 September 2012. 2008. BRILL. 978-90-04-16735-3. 76–.
  3. Web site: The Monthly - issue 91 . localiban . 25 December 2015 . 7 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20160304111732/http://www.localiban.org/IMG/pdf/iiMOnthly-Municip-E91-Feb10.pdf . 4 March 2016 .
  4. Book: Nejla M. Abu Izzeddin. The Druzes: A New Study of Their History, Faith, and Society. 20 September 2012. 1993. BRILL. 978-90-04-09705-6. 218–.
  5. Tallon, Maurice., “Sanctuaires et itinéraires romains du. Chouf et du sud de la Béqa,” Mélanges de l'université Saint Joseph 43, pp. 233-50, 1967.
  6. Book: George Taylor. The Roman temples of Lebanon: a pictorial guide. Les temples romains au Liban; guide illustré. 20 September 2012. 1971. Dar el-Machreq Publishers.
  7. Book: Emily Anne Beaufort Smythe Strangford (viscountess). Egyptian sepulchres and Syrian shrines: including some stay in the Lebanon, at Palmyra, and in western Turkey. 20 September 2012. 1862. Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts. 294–.