Weapon injuries in the crusader mass graves from a 13th century attack on the port city of Sidon (Lebanon).

Archaeological excavations close to St Louis' castle in Sidon, Lebanon have revealed two mass grave deposits containing partially articulated and disarticulated human skeletal remains. A minimum of 25 male individuals have been recovered, with no females or young children. Radiocarbon dating of the human remains, a crusader coin, and the design of Frankish belt buckles strongly indicate they belong to a single event in the mid-13th century CE. The skeletal remains demonstrate a high prevalence of unhealed sharp force, penetrating force and blunt force trauma consistent with medieval weaponry. Higher numbers of wounds on the back of individuals than the front suggests some were attacked from behind, possibly as they fled. The concentration of blade wounds to the back of the neck of others would be compatible with execution by decapitation following their capture. Taphonomic changes indicate the skeletal remains were left exposed for some weeks prior to being collected together and re-deposited in the defensive ditch by a fortified gateway within the town wall. Charring on some bones provides evidence of burning of the bodies. The findings imply the systematic clearance of partially decomposed corpses following an attack on the city, where adult and teenage males died as a result of weapon related trauma. The skeletons date from the second half of the Crusader period, when Christian-held Sidon came under direct assault from both the Mamluk Sultanate (1253 CE) and the Ilkhanate Mongols (1260 CE). It is likely that those in the mass graves died during one of these assaults

A Transient Pulse of Genetic Admixture from the Crusaders in the Near East Identified from Ancient Genome Sequences.

During the medieval period, hundreds of thousands of Europeans migrated to the Near East to take part in the Crusades, and many of them settled in the newly established Christian states along the Eastern Mediterranean coast. Here, we present a genetic snapshot of these events and their aftermath by sequencing the whole genomes of 13 individuals who lived in what is today known as Lebanon between the 3rd and 13th centuries CE. These include nine individuals from the "Crusaders' pit" in Sidon, a mass burial in South Lebanon identified from the archaeology as the grave of Crusaders killed during a battle in the 13th century CE. We show that all of the Crusaders' pit individuals were males; some were Western Europeans from diverse origins, some were locals (genetically indistinguishable from present-day Lebanese), and two individuals were a mixture of European and Near Eastern ancestries, providing direct evidence that the Crusaders admixed with the local population. However, these mixtures appear to have had limited genetic consequences since signals of admixture with Europeans are not significant in any Lebanese group today-in particular, Lebanese Christians are today genetically similar to local people who lived during the Roman period which preceded the Crusades by more than four centuries

Continuity and Admixture in the Last Five Millennia of Levantine History from Ancient Canaanite and Present-Day Lebanese Genome Sequences.

The Canaanites inhabited the Levant region during the Bronze Age and established a culture that became influential in the Near East and beyond. However, the Canaanites, unlike most other ancient Near Easterners of this period, left few surviving textual records and thus their origin and relationship to ancient and present-day populations remain unclear. In this study, we sequenced five whole genomes from ∼3,700-year-old individuals from the city of Sidon, a major Canaanite city-state on the Eastern Mediterranean coast. We also sequenced the genomes of 99 individuals from present-day Lebanon to catalog modern Levantine genetic diversity. We find that a Bronze Age Canaanite-related ancestry was widespread in the region, shared among urban populations inhabiting the coast (Sidon) and inland populations (Jordan) who likely lived in farming societies or were pastoral nomads. This Canaanite-related ancestry derived from mixture between local Neolithic populations and eastern migrants genetically related to Chalcolithic Iranians. We estimate, using linkage-disequilibrium decay patterns, that admixture occurred 6,600-3,550 years ago, coinciding with recorded massive population movements in Mesopotamia during the mid-Holocene. We show that present-day Lebanese derive most of their ancestry from a Canaanite-related population, which therefore implies substantial genetic continuity in the Levant since at least the Bronze Age. In addition, we find Eurasian ancestry in the Lebanese not present in Bronze Age or earlier Levantines. We estimate that this Eurasian ancestry arrived in the Levant around 3,750-2,170 years ago during a period of successive conquests by distant populations

La Transition du fer Météoritique au fer terrestre à Sidon (College Site).

International audienceLes découvertes archéologiques indiquent que la métallurgie du fer est probablement apparue vers 1200 BCE quelque part au Proche-Orient, l’Age du Fer ayant commencé très peu après lorsque la pratique métallurgique se fut bien établie. Des analyses récentes d’objets en fer de l’âge du Bronze ont effectivement montré que tous ces objets étaient constitués de fer météoritique. Parmi les questions importantes qu’il nous reste à résoudre pour l’apparition du fer métallurgique, on peut mentionner : à quel endroit? dans quelle culture? et à quelle date? On ne pourra répondre à ces questions que par l’analyse précise d’objets bien datés, trouvés sur des sites variés autant que possible. Aucun objet de fer de l’âge du Bronze ou de l’Age du Fer précoce n’a été analysé au Liban jusqu’ici et le présent travail d’analyse des objets de fer trouvés sur le site du collège à Sidon a pour but de contribuer à combler cette lacune. Ce site parait aussi particulièrement intéressant car il présente une séquence stratigraphique continue de la fin du 4ème millénaire av. J.-C qui se prolonge jusqu’à l’époque romaine avec des éléments de l’époque médiévale. Le 13ème siècle bien documenté représente l’âge d’or de Sidon. La fouille des niveaux du 12ème siècle av. J,-C est en cours et de récentes découvertes ont révélée des niveaux d’occupation continue du milieu du 11ème siècle av. J.-C au 8ème au siècle. Cette continuité stratégique (Bordreuil & Doumet-Serhal 2013, 83-112) témoigne d’un temple conçu à long terme, selon une formule qui sera pérennisée durant l’époque phénicienne. Comme on pouvait s’y attendre, une bague de l’âge du Bronze Moyen, constituée d’un anneau d’oret d’un tore planoconvexe en fer, s’avère être en fer météoritique alors que les 4 objets de l’âge du Fer précoce (de la 2ème moitié du 11ème siècle BCE et du début du 10ème siècle) sont en fer terrestre

Un nouveau temple phénicien à Sidon

Bordreuil Pierre, Doumet-Serhal Claude. Un nouveau temple phénicien à Sidon. In: Comptes rendus des séances de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 157e année, N. 1, 2013. pp. 83-112

Sidon and Tell el-Dab'a : an example of Levantine/Egyptian commercial and cultural relations : a step towards the understanding of the Hyksos phenomenon

From the exchange of artefacts uncovered in Sidon and Tell el-Dab ‘a respectively, the close ties that existed between these two ancient centres of civilization are irrefutably well established. This paper sums up the range of contacts between the two cities which encompassed commercial ties, transmission of ideas, beliefs and concepts as well as examining how the spatial organisation of each city compared to the other. In Sidon during the Middle Bronze Age, the evolution between the MB IIA and the MB IIB manifested itself in the arrangement of human internments and the architecture surrounding them. Two main units, each with a different function, were encountered at Sidon: one for cultic purposes and the other for housing the dead. This type of arrangement, with a separate special area for the dead, was also found in Tell el-Dab ‘a where it was known as “ Totenhäuser”. A further link between the two was the fact that this practice ended in both cities during the same time period (Sidon str. 6, Tell el-Dab‘a E/2–1.

Sidon : les fouilles du British Museum de 1998 à 2005

Doumet-Serhal Claude, Karageorghis Vassos. Sidon : les fouilles du British Museum de 1998 à 2005. In: Comptes rendus des séances de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 150ᵉ année, N. 1, 2006. pp. 305-331

Thirteenth and fourteenth season of excavation (2011-2012) at Sidon : preliminary Report

Report on seals excavated in Bronze and Iron Age contexts in Sidon (Lebanon)

An interdisciplinary approach to Iron Age Mediterranean chronology through combined archaeological and 14C-radiometric evidence from Sidon, Lebanon.

The construction of the Iron Age Mediterranean chronology began in the Levant based on historical evidence and has been additionally supported in recent decades by means of radiocarbon analysis, although with variable precision and ratification. It is only in recent years that new evidence in the Aegean and the western Mediterranean has opened discussion towards its further acceptance as an authoritative i.e. highly reliable, and widely applicable historiographic network. Altogether, the Mediterranean Iron Age chronology has only undergone minor changes during the last hundred years. The Phoenician metropolis of Sidon in southern Lebanon now provides a new, large and robust dataset obtained through a combination of archaeological and 14C-radiometric analysis of materials from stratified contexts that allow their statistical assessment. The appearance of substantial amounts of pottery of Greek, Cypriot and Egyptian origin together with Phoenician local wares in a long stratigraphy is a benefit for the synchronisation of regional pottery styles and allows wider geographic correlation of relative chronological systems. The close association of the archaeological data with a long series of AMS-14C-dates on short-lived samples provides new evidence for the absolute dating of many of the regional pottery styles that are represented in the stratigraphy of Sidon, and contributes towards a considerable improvement of the Mediterranean chronology