Boreasi
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posted 01-12-2006 08:39 PM
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Geoscience rediscovers Phoenicia's buried harbors
The exact locations of Tyre and Sidon's ancient harbors, Phoenicia's
two most important city-states, have attracted scholarly interest and
debate for many centuries. New research reveals that the ancient
basins lie buried beneath the medieval and modern city centers in
southern Lebanon.
A network of sediment cores have been sunk into the cities'
coastal deposits and studied using high-resolution geoscience
techniques to elucidate how, where, and when Tyre and Sidon's harbors
evolved since their Bronze Age foundations. In effect, ancient port
basins are rich geological archives replete with information on human
impacts, occupation histories, Holocene coastal evolution, and
natural catastrophes.
After the sixth and tenth centuries A.D., tectonic collapse,
tsunamogenic impacts, and relative commercial decline meant that the
harbors were no longer properly maintained, gradually buried beneath
thick tracts of coastal sediment and lost until now.
Source: Physorg.com (5 January 2006)
http://www.physorg.com/news9599.html --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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