Life on this limestone massif was not restricted to religious, ascetic or monastic activities. The population of
this mountainous area extending from north to south, through a good hundred kilometers tilled a rather barren soil,
and grew olive and vine trees, vegetables and also bred cattle and sheep. The astonishing demographic density of
all these villages and hamlets very close to each other, prove that this limestone massif must have been very prosperous
from the 4th to the 7th century.
In these agglomerations, some not more than ten houses, some the size of a small town, such as EI-Bara, on the
Djebel Zawyeh, houses are carefully built, especially those of the 5th century. One may even find there some "villas",
sometimes very nicely decorated but very basic and none comparable to those Roman villas which were erected amidst
large estates. And there are also the churches, often modest, sometimes ornate, dating from the first half of the
4th century to the beginning of the 7th A.D.
Some roads serve the limestone massif, but they are too few to allow an easy full exploration of such archaeological
wealth. A touristic development scheme could consist in the marking of roads leading to the most remarkable monuments,
the organization of guides and transport services for groups and in the creation of rest houses in some points,
like what has been done in Nepal, in order to encourage that original form of tourism called trekking. |
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