In 1867 after relocating his family from France to Beirut, Lebanon (having first visited the Middle East with an army expedition in 1860), Félix Bonfils (1831–1885) founded one of the best-known and most productive commercial photographic studios of the late nineteenth century. By 1871, just four years after the move, La Maison Bonfils studio had created 591 negatives that had produced 15,000 individual prints and 9,000 stereo views of sites in Syria, Greece, Lebanon, and other popular Mediterranean areas. Returning to France in 1876, he published his five-volume Souvenirs d’Orient in 1878. The successful Bonfils regularly dressed in regional costumes, posing in his own photos, often shown leaning against columns or within towering doorways in order to indicate the scale of the monument being photographed.
Although the Bonfils studio never completely moved away from exotic and contrived Orientalist visual conventions derived from painting, their photographs remain an important historical record, showing preferred points of view of popular ancient monuments while giving the modern-day viewer fascinating insight into the itineraries of the nineteenth century traveler. All members of the family took part in the production and marketing of their photos, and after Félix died in 1885, control of the firm passed to his wife Marie-Lydie (1837–1918) and their son (1861–1928) until the studio closed in 1918.
While living in Lebanon, the Bonfils studio photographed the stunning ruins of Baalbek also known as the Sun City, the most important ancient Roman site in the Middle East. When the Roman Empire arrived in the area in 64 BC, it was known first as Phoenicia, and later as Heliopolis. The conquerors began an ambitious building program that spanned two centuries and whose monumental constructions still mystify archaeologists and architects in the twenty-first century.
The origin of the name Baalbek is vague, though modern archaeological excavations suggest this site was occupied as early as 2300 BC by the Phoenicians, a sea-faring people who worshipped the god Baal. Depending on the interpretation, Baal translates as “lord” or “god.” Therefore, the name Baalbek may translate as “God of the Town” or similarly “God of the Beqaa valley” (the local area).
By Romanizing the existing god Baal and other minor deities of Phoenicia, the conquering Romans were able to join two distinct cultures by combining religions. The temple complex photographed by Bonfils consisted of the primary temple of Jupiter, as well as the temples of Venus and Mercury.
As construction progressed, the site became one of the most renowned sanctuaries of the Roman Empire. Pilgrims of both Roman and Eastern descent traveled there to worship the deities, and they must have been awed by the massive structures built in devotion to the Romanized versions of existing gods.
The Temple of Jupiter consisted of fifty-four columns, all twenty meters high, as well as an architrave and frieze comprised of stone blocks ranging in weight from sixty to 100 tons each. It is thought that multiple cranes were used to raise these heavy blocks into position, as a single one would have been structurally unable to lift such a great weight. The platform foundation, built of limestone blocks quarried and transported about a quarter of a mile to the site ranged in size from sixty-three to sixty-five feet long, weighing around 1,000 tons each.
Only a small portion of the rear of the round structure remains of the Temple of Venus. Much of the damage can be attributed to earthquakes and the denigration of time, but many scholars also point to early Christian attacks on the temple whose worshipers appeared to have practiced sacred prostitution in accordance with the worship of the goddess Venus. A raised area in the earth covered by a wide ascending stone staircase is all that is left of the Temple of Mercury located on what is today known as Sheikh Abdullah Hill to the southwest of the main complex. Stones from this site and others were removed and used in a Muslim shrine.
The Grand Court, comprised of an impressive colonnade made of 128 rose granite columns quarried in Aswan, Egypt, surrounds a variety of sacred buildings and altars. Construction of the court began in 98–117 AD. When the temples were in use as places of veneration, they must have been shadowy and mystifying spaces filled with the intoxicating aroma of incense and dimly lit by oil lamps. Today only a few columns remain standing.
There is no doubt that this building project displayed fully the wealth and supremacy of the Roman Empire, but why did they choose this location? Phoenicia was situated along two important historical trade routes, between the interior of Syria and the Mediterranean coast, as well as routes from northern Palestine and northern Syria. Although the Romans were the first in written history to conquer the area, they were not the only group to set their sights on this integral geographic location. Muslim armies beset the city of Baalbek in 634 AD, erecting a mosque within the temple complex. Over the intervening centuries a variety of Islamic groups took over the area, using, converting, and adding to the compound.
Damage over time is inevitable, even to such an impressive structure as the temples of Baalbek. Byzantine Emperor Justinian seized eight columns from the Temple of Jupiter to use in the construction of the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople around 560 AD. Earthquakes in 1158, 1203, 1664 and 1759 damaged or completely destroyed many of the structures and temples of Baalbek. That these ruins remain extant is the result of fortifications built by the Arabs, as well as the efforts of nineteenth century German archaeologists, who worked tirelessly to preserve what was left of the great structures. After World War I, French scholars took up restoration by diligently reconstructing some of the temples as closely as possible to their original magnificence.
Teresa Shannon
FÉLIX Bonfils, Intérieur du Temple du Soleil, c.1880, albumen print, 20.7 x 27.3 cm, SOLARI 94.023.022L