In the wild mountains of the Anseiriyeh other remains of the same period have been found. Though attributed by popular tradition to Solomon, these buildings, by the details of their architecture, and by the Roman eagle, whose winged form occurs here as well as at both Baalbek and at Rukhleh on Hermon, are to be ascribed to the Roman period, to which also we must refer the curious monument near the source of the Orontes called Kamu’at el Hirmil, on which, in bas-relief, is represented the chase of the stag, the boar, and the bear.
Homs, the ancient Emesa, was the birthplace of Julia Domna, the mother and bride of emperors. This city also had a famous fane--that of the Black Stone, which was transported to Rome. When El Mukaddasi in the tenth century visited the city, he found a remarkable statue still standing in the mosque--“the figure of a man in brass standing on a fish, and the same turns to the four winds.” It was regarded as a talisman against scorpions, and was apparently a kind of weathercock. It was perhaps to this statue that the Greek inscription which I copied in the same mosque originally belonged, the text, when translated, reading thus:--
“Image of the round earth, the king ... The people having all, with wise mind ...”
El Mukaddasi says that this mosque was formerly a church, and its nave and aisles I found still clearly traceable in the later Moslem building.
The third century saw the rise and fall of Palmyra, the great Syrian trading city which formed the emporium of Northern Syria, connecting the coast towns with the Euphrates by a route across the desert from its oasis. As the bulwark of the Roman Empire against Persia, the Palmyrene colony was allowed privileges amounting almost to independence, and under Odenathus and his widow Zenobia it flourished until rebellion brought down on that famous queen the heavy Roman hand. Its celebrated buildings show how strong was the influence of Græco-Roman art on the Aramaic inhabitants; but its numerous inscriptions are for the most part in the native script--a late form of the old Phœnician alphabet--and its gods are the old Phœnician deities, though Christian heretics found shelter at Zenobia’s capital. Whether any remains of earlier ages are to be found in the desert city is still perhaps open to inquiry, since a very curious Aramean tablet was recovered from the vicinity by M. Peretié. The ruins as yet known are of Zenobia’s time, but tradition points to Palmyra as the Tadmor or Tamar in the wilderness founded by Solomon--Tamar, which is perhaps the better-authenticated reading, being the Hebrew name (“palm tree”) equivalent to the classic title Palmyra.