THE TEMPLES OF BAALBEK
CHAPTER XXXVIII
part III - Freemasonry, Religion and Civilisation
THE SQUARE AND COMPASSES
W.
M. Don Falconer PM, PDGDC
Constructed over a sanctuary
the Canaanites built in 1200 BCE on an ancient sacred site, the
temples tower above the town and are by far the most magnificent the
Romans ever built.
Baalbek is in the fertile
Beqa'a valley in Lebanon, lying between Jabal Lubnan (the Lebanon
Mountains) and Al-Jabal Ash-Sharqi (the Anti-Lebanon Range). The
valley was part of Syria in Hellenistic times and part of Aram in
Abraham’s time. Joshua called Beqa'a the Valley of Lebanon and
classical writers referred to it as one of the "Granaries of Rome". The
narrow valley runs from north to south and is about 175 kilometres
long, generally less than 25 kilometres wide and 900 metres or more
above sea level. Baalbek is in the centre of the valley at an
elevation of 1,150 metres, where the watershed of the Orontes River
flowing north joins the watershed of the Leontes River flowing
south. The name Beqa'a is derived from the Arabic word biqa', the plural of buq'ah meaning a place
with stagnant water, alluding to the fact that the valley was
covered with swampy areas when the first settlers arrived there.
Baalbek is a Semitic name that refers to the great Semitic god Baal and signifies "Lord of the Beqa'a".
Modern Baalbek is a district capital and has a population of 15,000
or more.
When Alexander the Great
invaded western Asia, the importance of Baalbek as a religious
centre was emphasised by the Greeks who called it Heliopolis, meaning the
city of the sun, adding "in Phoenicia" or "in the Lebanon" to
distinguish it from its famous Egyptian namesake. Alexander died in
Babylon in 323 BCE and the Beqa'a valley became part of the
Ptolemaic Empire. After a lengthy struggle the Seleucid kings
annexed Phoenicia and the Beqa'a valley in 198 BCE. When part
of the Seleucid Empire the Beqa'a valley was called Coele-Syria
meaning "hollow Syria". The
Roman general Pompey the Great marched southwards through the Beqa'a
valley to Damascus in 64 BCE, thence through Jerash to
Jerusalem in 63 BCE. He conquered the Seleucid Empire, when
Syria and Palestine became part of the Roman Empire. Except from 611
to 622, when Syria was a Persian satrapy, its allegiance to Rome
continued into the Byzantine period that began in 306 under the rule
of the Emperor Constantine the Great, who saw the Sign of the Cross in the
sky and established Christianity as the religion of the Roman
Empire. However, Khalid ibn al-Walid's general Abu Obaida conquered
Damascus in 637, when Syria became an Arab state and embraced Islam
and Heliolopolis resumed its Semitic name of Baalbek.
Pastoralists of Canaanite
origin were the first settlers in the Beqa'a valley who arrived
there about 8,000 years ago. They were devotees of the moon, in
whose cool light their flocks could graze comfortably during the
summer months. The short though rich period of spring growth in the
Beqa'a valley is brought on by a rainy winter, when water flows in
torrents. The summers are long hot droughts when nothing can survive
without the aid of irrigation. During the thousand years or so after
their arrival, the pastoralists progressively introduced mixed
farming. They constructed a maze of irrigation and drainage channels
that converted the swampy terrain into arable land and supported
their crops. As these agricultural pursuits were being established,
the farmers realised that the sun's warmth was essential for the
production of crops and they became devotees of the sun. This
natural cycle is reflected in ancient beliefs that a sun god, an
earth mother and a goddess of fertility were responsible for the
climate cycle and the procreative process. The religion of the
Canaanites was based on a theme of birth, life, death and
resurrection, reflecting the cycle of nature in their harsh and
unforgiving region. Like the Babylonians and Egyptians, they
developed a distinct pantheon of deities and a religion that greatly
influenced the lives of the people.
The supreme god of the
Canaanites was the sun god El, usually represented
by a bull, alluding to the agricultural basis of their society. El's wife Ashera, the goddess of
the sea, represented the sea-oriented branch of their society later
identified with the Phoenicians. It was believed that this supreme
couple could only be approached through the mediation of their son
Baal, signifying lord,
who was the master of rain, thunder and tempest. Although
Baal shared the bull with his father he also had his
own symbol, which was a thunderbolt terminating in a spear and ears
of corn. Baal had a son Aliyan, who was the god
of springs and floral growth; also a daughter Anat, who was Aliyan's faithful lover.
There also was Astarte, the goddess of
love and fertility. The positive attributes of these deities were
offset by Mot, signifying death.
Mot was the god of summer and drought who brought all
fruit to ripeness, but who also killed all vegetation unless
sustained by Aliyan's springs. The
characteristics that are represented in the father-son-daughter
relationship of Baal, Aliyan and Anat are recognizable in
Zeus, Hermes and Ahprodite of the Greeks
and in Jupiter, Mercury and Venus of the Romans,
although not identical with either of those relationships. The
Assyrians adopted Baal as Bel, which is the
equivalent of the Egyptian Seth, the Phoenician Reshef and the Aramean
Haddad.
Clay tablets from Alalakh (now
Tell Atchana) that date from about 1800 BCE, also thousands of
clay tablets found in what apparently was a library between two
great Canaanite temples at Ugarit (now Ras Shamra) that date from
about 1500 BCE, give a full description of the Canaanite
pantheon and tend to confirm Biblical assertions that early
Canaanites' fertility cults and idolatrous worship were immoral and
corrupt. The Ugaritic texts mention the sacrifice of cattle, rams,
lambs and birds to the gods, but there is no archaeological evidence
of any human sacrifice. Despite their apparently corrupt ways, the
Canaanites were a very talented people who developed the arts and
sciences and excelled in ceramics, music and architecture. When
Joshua assumed command of the Israelites in about 1400 BCE,
they entered Canaan and defeated the Amorites. Joshua then crossed
the River Jordan with his army and destroyed Jericho. He conquered
the whole of Canaan during the next six years, removing the threat
of Canaanite practices to the monotheistic faith of the Hebrews.
Notwithstanding their early paganism, the Canaanites appear to have
developed a belief in an after life before the Achaean Greeks
overran Palestine soon after 1200 BCE. Later invading Dorian
Greeks expelled the Achaean Greeks from the Aegean Islands, after
which they occupied the coastal areas of Lebanon and Syria until
about 332 BCE, merging with the Canaanites who called them
Philistines from which the name Palestine is derived. The Hellenic
Greeks called them Phoenicians, from the Greek phoinix meaning
purple-red, alluding to the dye industry for which they became
famous. The Egyptians called them the "sea people"
because they were renowned for their seafaring ability.
Excavations of stoutly walled
Canaanite cities prove that their construction was far superior to
the later buildings erected by the Israelites, which no doubt was
the reason why King Solomon sought the assistance of Hiram King of
Tyre when building the temple at Jerusalem, although it may not have
been the only reason. Until fairly recently it had been thought that
the temple at Jerusalem followed Egyptian patterns, but modern
archaeological studies have shown otherwise. Although there is scant
reference in the Bible to the prowess of the Canaanites, they had
constructed many temples throughout Canaan long before the temple at
Jerusalem. Some of their important temple remains are at Alalakh,
Ebla, Emar, Moumbaqat and Ugarit in Syria and at Beth-shan, Hazor,
Lachish, Megiddo and Shechem in Palestine, many of which have only
been discovered or studied in detail during the last fifty years.
The temples at Ebla and Moumbaqat were built 800 years before the
first temple at Jerusalem and those at Emar are from 200 to 400
years older. Their ground plans and other features clearly show that
the temple at Jerusalem was patterned on the Canaanite temples. A
religious structure at Baalbek was contemporaneous with those at
Emar.
Myths are stories that
express primitive beliefs relating to the origin of a race or a
religion, expressed in language comprehensible to ordinary people.
The Greek word myth means words, from which is
derived the Greek word mythos meaning a fable, although a myth
is not the same as a fable or a legend. A myth conveys something of
racial or universal significance of greater importance than the
moral contained in a fable or legend. Even if a myth has an obvious
link with actual events in ancient times, it should not be regarded
as history in the accepted
sense. Myths develop forms closely related to the type of society
that creates them. Pastoral people, like the original settlers of
the Beqa'a valley, often adopt a powerful and protective deity
associated with the sky. Farming people, which the pastoralists of
the Beqa'a valley became, usually emphasise a mother-earth deity and
develop rituals concerned with fertility. Legends originally were
chronicles of the lives of saints, to be read in religious houses,
but although based on actual events their traditional histories were
not necessarily authentic in detail.
An appreciation of the
relationship between mythology, religion and pantheism is important
for an understanding of the significance of the temples at Baalbek.
Mythology reflects a people's search for the truth in relation to
creation and their place in the universe. Mythology has a real place
in religion and indeed is one of the foundations of all religions,
both ancient and modern. Religion is a belief in and recognition of
a higher unseen controlling power or powers, coupled with the
associated emotions, morality and related rites and ceremonials of
worship. The concept of a life after death seems to have developed
in the Middle East by about 3000 BCE. Within the compass of
religion, pantheism is the doctrine that identifies the universe
with God, conceiving Him as wholly and in some cases exclusively
immanent in all things. The Canaanites were pantheists who
considered God to be omnipresent, the driving force of the universe
and identical with the universe and all of nature, although
apparently they were not animists who visualised objects as having
spirits, nor did they deify humans.
Greek mythology derived
directly from the Minoan mythology of Crete, dating from some time
before 3000 BCE and passed down through the later Mycenaean
civilisation. The people of Crete appear to have come from the
Middle East and their ancient religion reflected Middle Eastern and
Egyptian influences. Religion in Crete probably began with a
superstitious reverence for natural phenomena and was centred on an
earth goddess. With the decline of the Minoan civilisation and the
rise of the more warlike and mobile Mycenaeans, the sky god Zeus
supplanted the earth goddess. The Greek religion was tolerant,
practical and closely related to everyday life, not demanding too
much of the individual. Greek gods were believed to be superhuman,
but they had human personalities and were seen to behave like
ordinary people, not being regarded as creators of the world. Nor
did mystical prophets claim to represent the word of God. The
persecution and punishment of people on the grounds of their
religion was completely alien to the Greeks. Their Eleusinian Mysteries,
which originated in about 1800 BCE, culminated in a symbolic
restoration from death to eternal life.
As the Roman gods originally
did not have human personalities, but were as illusory as the
supernatural forces that animists associate with natural phenomena,
they had no myths attached to them. Roman gods had clearly defined
functions, but having no families attached to them they had none of
the usual attributes of the Greek gods. The chief Roman god was
Jupiter, believed in from a time before the use of metals. Like
Zeus, Jupiter was a sky god or god of light, primarily associated
with the weather and especially with thunderstorms. However, by the
time the Romans constructed the temples at Baalbek, they had
developed a mythology that primarily was an assimilation of Greek
mythology with some fragmentary elements of Latin and Etruscan
myths. In contrast to the Greek religion, the Roman religion placed
great emphasis on devotion to the state, in a much more complex way
than is required in patriotism. Stoicism was essential and the
individual was always subservient to the social group of which he
was a member. The Romans put great value in the order and permanence
of things, with stability and security of the state as their primary
concern, which is reflected in the differences between Greek and
Roman architecture.
The Greeks are renowned for
their several orders of architecture, of which the Ionic, Doric and
Corinthian probably are the best known. Although ancient Greek
structures are outstandingly extrovert, their external magnificence
is seldom matched by their interior decoration, which often seems
lifeless. The structures on the Acropolis in Athens incorporate many
of the orders of architecture and include some of the best examples
of the Greek style, with the Parthenon taking pride of place. The
Parthenon was about 115 metres long, with massive Doric columns that
formed a colonnade completely surrounding the structure, decorated
externally with a continuous series of sculptures. The Parthenon
typified the monolithic unity of a Greek temple and was the ultimate
expression of the Greek city-state. The Propylaea, or stepped
gateway providing the main access at the western end of the
Acropolis, had pitched roofs supported by massive Doric columns at
the lower entrance level and slender Ionic columns at the higher
level. The Erechtheum, a relatively small though highly adorned
temple, had Ionic columns and also a series of sculptured figures as
columns. These two buildings cast aside the monolithic unity of the
Greek temple that had prevailed for centuries. All of these and the
various smaller temples, sanctuaries and monuments on the Acropolis
were constructed in less than fifty years and completed in
432 BCE, reflecting the ultimate in Greek architecture.
Although Roman architecture
owes much to Greek architecture, it is not simply an extension of
it. Perhaps the two most significant differences are the magnitude
of Roman buildings and the adornment of their interiors. All of the
great buildings of the Roman Empire were larger than their Greek
predecessors and were more elaborately decorated within. By
comparison with the Greeks, the Romans aimed above all to create and
adorn magnificent structures with interiors that would match their
exteriors, reflecting their imperial pride and growing awareness of
themselves. Although their great buildings were also very large
buildings, they were designed with such finesse that their magnitude
did not seem out of place, but blended into their surroundings even
though they often overshadowed them. The Greeks knew the principles
of the arch and vault, but they used neither, whereas the Romans
used them to superb advantage. The value of the arch and vault was
clearly demonstrated in the buildings housing the Roman baths, whose
magnitude and interior grandeur was outstanding. They were centres
for every kind of entertainment and incorporated halls to stage
boxing and wrestling matches, theatres, libraries and galleries of
shops that would compete with the best of the modern shopping
complexes.
Many of the open-air
amphitheatres constructed in the Middle East and around the
Mediterranean were enormous. They were usually located on a hill to
provide a wonderful vista of the city. A notable exception with
regard to location was the huge Colosseum in Rome, which was
constructed between 72 CE and 80 CE. It was as an ellipse
200 metres by 166 metres in plan and was almost 50 metres high. The
exterior facade is in four tiers ornamented by columns graduated
from heavy Doric at the bottom to the lighter and more decorative
foliated orders at the top, with arched entrances between each pair
of columns in the lower three tiers. The Pantheon of Rome, where
Raphael was buried, is another remarkable example of Roman
architecture. Its interior, with a superbly coffered dome and seven
deep wall recesses each fronted with pairs of Corinthian columns,
contrasts starkly with a less imposing exterior. Entrance to the
Pantheon was gained through a gabled portico supported by sixteen
Corinthian columns. Constructed between 120 CE and 124 CE,
the Pantheon reflected not only the monolithic structure of the
Roman Empire and its monarchy, but also what ultimately would become
its monotheistic religious doctrine. Nevertheless, it also was an
early example of the Roman tendency to become progressively more
introverted.
The earliest forms of worship
usually reflected ancient animistic beliefs and developed around
distinctive natural features like unusual rock outcrops, crevices in
rocks and springs. High places also developed special significance
as the dwelling place of God, which in Mesopotamia crystallised in
the form of a ziggurat with a
sanctuary on top. These influences are evident in the earliest
religious structure at Baalbek, where the place of veneration was
located on a tel on the hill that
defined the western boundary of the town. The sacred site itself was
situated in a natural crevice about 50 metres deep, which was
difficult of access and reserved for high priests only. It is not
known when this site was first used, but it was very ancient. In
about 1200 BCE the need for greater public participation
apparently was felt, because a raised stone court about 230 metres
square was built with a surrounding stone wall to create a
sanctuary, which had a sacrificial altar in the centre, connected to
the natural crevice by a vertical shaft. Access to the sanctuary was
gained by a stairway at the eastern end, flanked by two massive
stone towers. The arrangement of the sanctuary was typical of the
cult terraces associated with many temples in Syria and Palestine,
which had stone tables of offering near the sacrificial altar. The
inner court, or court of the priests that was in front of King
Solomon's temple, which was constructed about 250 years after the
sanctuary at Baalbek, served the same purpose although its brazen
altar, brazen sea and brazen lavers were much more elaborate.
When the Beqa'a valley became
part of the Egyptian Empire, the Ptolemies decided to construct a
temple at Baalbek. It was intended to be an embellished monument,
towering in the west behind the sacrificial altar, clearly visible
from all directions. Building of the temple was delayed by disputes
between the Ptolemies and the Seleucids, as a result of which it
only began when the Seleucids won the Beqa'a valley under Antiochus
the Great in 198 BCE. Because the sanctuary was at the edge of
the hill, it was necessary to enlarge the tel to accommodate the
temple. An artificial podium was constructed to extend the ancient
sanctuary towards the west. When the Roman general Pompey occupied
Phoenicia in 64 CE, almost four hundred years after the
Ptolemies first proposed the temple, the podium was nearing
completion, but the Temple of Jupiter had only been under
construction for about four years.
As their first priority the
Romans secured and fortified the town and developed all their usual
civic facilities, including public administration buildings, a town
hall, theatre, forum and necropolis. A solid defensive wall of stone
enclosed the town in a lozenge shaped area about one and a half
kilometres from east to west and a kilometre from north to south.
The wall, in nine sections of various lengths from 150 to 750
metres, was about 3 metres thick and 10 metres high, with massive
square defensive towers at about 30 metre intervals. There were only
four fortified and elaborately decorated gates, one each in the
north-east, south-east, south-west and north-west, so that the main
axial roads between them intersected almost at right angles. The
streets and roads were buried under 4 metres or more of dirt and
debris over the centuries. The Romans constructed four temples on
the tel and later, some time
before 250 CE, another stately temple on the crest of the
Sheikh Abdallah hill about a kilometre south of the town centre,
called the Temple of Mercury. The Temple of Mercury, which had a
single row of surrounding columns and was surmounted by a caduceus,
was accessed by a monumental flight of stairs 10 to 12 metres wide
cut into the rocky hillside.
The Romans constructed four
temples of various sizes on the tel, of which three
were typical rectangular colonnaded structures and the fourth,
though not the smallest, was circular and of a distinctly different
character. The largest was the Temple of Jupiter, often referred to
as the Acropolis of Baalbek. It had pride of place and retained the
orientation of the sanctuary established in pre-Roman times, facing
14° north of east. The rising sun shone directly into the temple in
mid-summer, from about the middle of May until the middle of June,
as well as at the autumnal equinox from the end of August to the end
of September, echoing the influence of El the
Canaanite sun god. The Temple of Jupiter stood 48 metres high and
was surrounded by a colonnade of 54 columns. It was erected on a
podium 12 metres high in a separate precinct that was only
accessible from the Great Court. Construction of the Temple of
Jupiter had begun by about 60 CE and was finished in
about 70 CE, but embellishing work continued for many more
years. The Temple of Jupiter had been in use for several generations
when Emperor Hadrian visited Baalbek in 130 CE, but the
embellishments were still incomplete. The temple stood in a compound
that was 340 metres long and covered an area of 27,000 square
metres, of which 10,000 square metres were open courtyards and
stairways.
The Great Court and its
surrounding walls and colonnades were not constructed until after
the Temple of Jupiter had been completed. To maintain the local
tradition of a High Place, a dominating monument was erected in the
centre of the Great Court, a cubical tower 17 metres high and
adorned with richly carved ceilings. There were separate flights of
stairs for ascent to and descent from the observation deck, which
provided a superb view of the god's statue in the rear part of the
temple. Access to the Great Court was gained after passing through
an elaborately colonnaded hexagonal Forecourt. The Forecourt could
only be reached by ascending a long flight of stairs 50 metres wide,
then entering through the colonnaded portico of the highly decorated
Propylaea that was flanked by two square towers like the Babylonian
city gates. The access stairway began in a ceremonial plaza that was
semi-circular at the eastern end and 70 metres long, which was
surrounded by a low stone wall and a continuous row of peripheral
seating. It contained much statuary and seems to have been completed
during the time of Philip the Arab (244-249), or very soon
after.
The Temple of Bacchus, with 50
columns in the entrance and surrounding colonnade, was oriented
parallel to the Temple of Jupiter. It was larger than the Parthenon
of Athens, with a clear interior span of 19 metres and a monumental
gateway that was 6.5 metres wide and 13 metres high. The Temple of
Bacchus had an area of 2,800 square metres, raised on a podium that
was 5.2 metres high and 10,000 square metres in area. The Temple of
Bacchus, which was begun in about 150 CE and completed in about
200 CE, is the best-preserved Roman temple of its size anywhere
in the world. Its incredible beauty is captured in the words of Dr
Friedrich Ragette, once the Professor of Architecture at the
American University of Beirut, who said in his book entitled Baalbek:
"The features that
strike our eyes first are forms, colours and textures. . . . with
its glowing, warm walls and generously bulging columns, its
flamboyant Corinthian capitals and boldly projecting cornice, its
superb contrast of plain and fluted column shafts and the infinite
variety of carving, delicate when seen at close range and vigorous
when looming high above us, a rich symphony of colour, texture and
form. Here is an architecture to be experienced by the senses rather
than the intellect."
The Temple of the Muses was
the smallest of the three typical colonnaded Roman temples at
Baalbek. It had an area of about 340 square metres and was the first
to be completed at the beginning of the first century of the Common
Era. Nearby the uniquely shaped Temple of Venus was slightly larger,
occupying an area of about 520 square metres. The Temple of Venus
faced north-west and overlooked a common space in front of the three
main temples. Its circular cella incorporated a domed roof and was
fronted by a small rectangular portico supported by four Corinthian
columns and accessed by a broad stairway. The circular wall of the
cella was indented externally between its six surrounding Corinthian
columns. The Temple of Venus probably was completed in
about 150 CE. Its podium was raised 2 metres, partially
superimposing that of the Temple of the Muses. These two temples
shared a colonnaded courtyard some 10,000 square metres in
area.
The Romans were well aware
that sound foundations are vital for stable and durable buildings
and therefore excavated down to solid rock, in many places as deep
as 17 metres. They did not use mortar joints, but relied on
perfectly cut stones locked together with iron or bronze clamps and
dowels embedded in lead. Weak stones were reinforced with clamps if
necessary. These methods provided an elastic structure better able
to withstand earthquakes, although earthquakes contributed greatly
to the destruction of the temples after the serious ravages of man.
The final dressing of surfaces was accomplished by marginally draft
chiselling towards the centre, followed by adzing in lines parallel
to the edges of the stone. This technique was usual in Syria,
Lebanon and Palestine where sandstone was common, contrasting with
the chisel and mallet methods of the Greeks who frequently worked
with granite and marble. The foundation stones used in the column
bases were up to 20 metres long and were 4 metres square in
cross-section, weighing up to 800 tonnes, the largest ever used in
masonry construction. Except in the small temples, the smallest
stones used in the buildings were the ceiling slabs over the
external colonnade in the Temple of Bacchus. They were 5 metres
long, 3 metres wide, 1.2 metres thick and weighed 45 tonnes each.
Rough dressed stones were moved on rollers from the quarry sites,
which were up to a kilometre away, then finished on site. Ramps were
used to elevate some stones, all of which were hoisted into their
final positions using multiple pulleys attached to Lewis cramps,
with each cramp supporting up to 5 tonnes.
The columns in the Temples of
Jupiter and Bacchus were pink granite brought from Aswan in Egypt.
Rough-hewn square sections were transported from the quarry in Egypt
down the Nile River, then by sea and land to the temple site in
Lebanon. The columns were then rough dressed to shape up to 10
centimetres oversize before erection, then finished and polished
after erection. The columns of the Temple of Jupiter had shafts
16.6 metres high, 2 metres in diameter and each weighed 135
tonnes. They were set on bases 1 metre high and were surmounted by
capitals 2 metres high. Except for some of the columns in the
Hypostyle Hall of the Temple of Amon at Karnak, which are a few
centimetres taller but comprise many sections, the columns at
Baalbek are the tallest columns existing from antiquity. All of the
corner columns had monolithic shafts, but the others were in three
sections, the bottom section weighing 62 tonnes, the middle section
40 tonnes and the top section 33 tonnes. The shaft sections were
joined together and connected to the bases and the capitals by
inserting three bronze dowels set in lead, on a circle 1 metre in
diameter concentric with the column at each joint. The columns of
the Temple of Bacchus were 2 metres shorter.
The Emperor Constantine I
“the Great” declared Christianity the official
religion of the Roman state in 313 and a Christian church was built
in the township of Baalbek. When Emperor Julian "the Apostate" succeeded
Constantine in 361 he destroyed the church and reverted to paganism.
Pagan worship seems to have continued at Baalbek until Emperor
Theodosius I “the Great” (379-395) destroyed the altar
of sacrifice and the observation tower in the Great Court and
constructed a Christian basilica immediately in front of the Temple
of Jupiter. The basilica, dedicated to St Peter, was 63 metres long
by 36 metres wide, raised 2 metres above the level of the court.
When Syria became an Arab state in 637, the basilica was used as a
palace and the Temples of Jupiter and Bacchus were converted into a
huge walled fortress. The Sultan Barquq (1382-1392) demolished the
stairway to the Propylaea and used the stone to fill in between the
portico columns, as well as constructing a surrounding moat. The
fortress was abandoned when Baalbek became a part of the Ottoman
Empire in 1517, but the precinct is still called the Kala'a by the Arabs,
meaning a fortress.
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