The Cedars of Lebanon
Located about 120 km from Beirut, have been famous since ancient times when the Phoenicians used them to build their ships. In the third millennium B.C., the city of Byblos prospered from a flourishing timber trade from the Cedar forests. The famous Kings and Emperors, and Priests of the ancient world all wanted to use the Cedar for their temples and palaces. These mighty trees, mentioned often in the Bible, were used in the famous temple built by King Solomon in Jerusalem. The Cedar tree, majestic and indestructible, is the emblem of Lebanon and adorns its flag. It is to the Cedars that the people of Lebanon turn their eyes, for they symbolize the Lebanese spirit, and the thousand years of history that lies like a blanket over their country.

There are of course other Cedars in the world, but they are not so old, do not grow on arid rock as the Cedars of Lebanon do and therefore do not have the hardness or resistance from rot. And Lebanese Cedar wood, though sweet smelling, is very bitter tasting. This protects it against worms, and its reputation as an imperishable wood follows. For this reason, as well as the fact that it is beautiful to behold, it was a must for palaces and sanctuaries in antiquity to have Cedar wood as a building timber, for the roofing, for colonnades and for paneling.



Lebanon's pride was used most famously in the Temple of Solomon, built by Hiram Abi from Tyre [1 Kings 7:13]. History tells us "everything" was of Cedar wood; not a stone could be seen: a fact that earned the building the sobriquet "the House of the Forest of Lebanon" [1 Kings 7:2]. Cheops' barge, unearthed near the Great Pyramid of Giza in 1954, had fittings of Lebanese Cedar wood; they were still in a remarkable state of preservation after 4,400 years, and observers swore they could still detect the wood's sweet smell. Egyptian documents dating from 2600 B.C. say the pharaoh Snefru imported 40 cargoes of undressed timber from Byblos for boat building. Long-dead Sumerian and Babylonian kings are recorded as being avid customers for Lebanese Cedar. More unusually, the Egyptians used Cedar sawdust for mummification and the resin, known as Cedria, for embalming. The resin was also used to glaze and strengthen papyrus-- a very early example of "plastic" coating.