Byblos

Byblos — known in Arabic as Jbeil — sits on the Lebanese Mediterranean coast and is considered one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities on Earth, with evidence of settlement stretching back to the 8th millennium BCE. The Phoenicians made its harbor the principal entrepôt for Egyptian papyrus across the ancient Mediterranean; the Greek name of the city gave papyrus its name, and through it the word 'Bible.' The archaeological heart of the old city layers epochs visibly on one site: a 12th-century Crusader castle rises directly above exposed Roman colonnades and the foundations of Phoenician temples. From the ancient harbor wall, visitors look out over intact medieval fortifications with open sea beyond. The adjacent souq and narrow Ottoman-era lanes lead toward the seafront, where the city transitions from living neighborhood to one of the Levant's densest open-air archaeological sites.