Hadeths Chehab Palace Now Restored

Bruce Condè, 1955 and 1960

But in 1860, during Lebanon's last great civil war, the 40-room 350-year-old palace. So recently restored, was again sacked and burned by enemy forces, its famous library of rare Lebanese historical manuscripts and books burned, its walls to stand in gaunt memory of better days for two more generations.

The marble plaque could read, even more truthfully today: "Restored in 1950 by Emir Farid Chebab...", but Emir Fares' grandson, then Director of the Sûreté-Générale, who completed restoration of the ancestral home for the third time in the early 1950's, has left the plaque and the ornate portral, with its Chebab coat-of-arms (two chained lions, facing each other, each toying with a miniature head) untouched, and has concentrated on an unusual experiment in 20th Century Lebanese housing.

Advice From Expert
"Yes" he laughed, in answer to a query as to whether or not he had consulted his cousin, Lebanese Director of Antiquities Emir Maurice Chehab, on the proper preservation, decorating and furnishing of this minor national treasure, "but I only followed his advice in certain cases. Had I agreed to restore the place exactly as suggested, it would have been of great interest to a dozen antiquarians and suitable as a tourist museum, but hardly habitable as the Chehab family home any more."

The truth of Emir Farid's statement was easily verified by those friends who visited his new home within the ancestral walls as the restoration work, under the supervision of Beirut Architect Pierre-Henri Coupel, neared completion, after more than four years.

A miniature of the great old fortress palace of the first Lebanese Chehabs in Hasbaya, when viewed from the road to the southwest. the palace at Hadeth faces west, toward the sea, with a sweeping view of the red sands-of Khalde, the sea, Beirut, the river, and the coastal mountains. Its backdrop is a tree-covered bit of mountainside topped with an old monastery. Around its feet are the winding streets of the picturesque hill town of Hadeth.

Few Windows Alike
The front wall shows three types of stonework: heavy, brown, closely-set large stones of the early 17th Century; smaller greyish, roughly finished stones with flaked, flint-like surfaces, of Emir Fares' 18th Century restoration; and the modern, buff colored stonework of today. Arches and windows are finished in alternating cream and yellow-ochre stones of fine workmanship. Seldom are two windows alike, the ancient architects having tried to treat the eyes of the early Chehabs to a variety of arches, columns, traceries and geometric designs.

Within, the brilliantly colored ceilings, columns and arches, remmiscent of the more modern Beit ed-Din, return the visitor to the colorful days of the Princes of Mount Lebanon, and this effect is heightened by the oriental rugs on the tile floor, the hanging lamps of ancient design, heavily carved old-style furnishings and a small fountain, lined with bright blue tiles, into which jets of water are spurted from the mouths of four lion heads.

Ancient Stones Preserved
Here and there arched doorways, each one of distinct design, like the windows, Preserve a few of their ancient stones and rosette carvings, tastefully fitted into matching modern stonework.

Loopholes and slits in the walls for firing at surrounding enemy forces, which saw action in innumerable sieges throughout the old stronghold's three centuries of history, have been preserved for their historic interest, as has the triangular courtyard and a small private chapel with a portal of 17th Century stonework in three or four colors.

"At this point" says the emir, "we drew the line and resisted Cousin Maurice attempts to have us live in a museum atmosphere."

In this historical setting the Chehabs installed a perfectly modern household, replete with white tile and chrome fixtures, indirect lighting, modern kitchens and servants quarters, garages, card tables, buffets, an up-to-date bar and a play room for their young son Haris.

Modern Lebanese Precedent
ActuaIly they have set the precedent for the the preservation of an 18th Century ancestral house Bikfaya by the Sheikh Pierre Jemayel, very little has been done to date to prevent the gradual disappearance of traditional Lebanese architecture and its replacement by nondescript cosmopolitan modern styles. Restoration of the Fares Chehab Palace in its present form should provide a suitable compromise between traditionalism and modernism, with a distinctly Lebanese flavor.

And what of the 1797 restorer, whose name the historic structure bears today?

Fares and his brother Selman, representatives of the senior line of the thousand-year-old Chehab dynasty in the late 18th Century (when that family succeeded its kinsmen the Maanids to the princely throne of Mount Lebanon) fled to their fief and strong castle of Byblos in the early 19th Century in the course of an intrafamily feud.

Blinded by Bashir II
Captured through a strategm and blinded with hot irons by their triumphant cousin the reigning Prince Bashir II, lt seemed that the rest of their days were to be spent in darkness and oblivion.

But the Emir Fares refused to accept this fate, or to blame his victorious kinsman Bashir the Great for his misfortune. On one occasion, when the blind emir struck his head against the stone arch of a doorway, getting a severe cut on the forehead, his wife cried out bitterly against Prince Bashir.

"No, no", protested Fares, "we must be honest about it. Had Selman and I won the war we would have put Bashir to death!"

He determined to lead a useful life, blind though he was, and managed to assemble a library and to secure the services of competent secretaries who read to him and took dictation. In time he became a famous historian of Arab, Lebanese and Chehab family history.

That Lebanon's Chehabs stemmed from al-Hareth, a Companion of the Prophet, and, like Mohammed, a member of the ruling tribe of the Quraysh, was finally confirmed by the Emir Fares' researches. A more important revelation was that their princely title of emir is one of the most ancient in the Arab world, having been granted to al-Hareth by the first Caliph, Abu Bakr, and confirmed to his son, Malik, by the Caliph Omar.

Malik Chehab was the first emir to bring his tribe to the Hauran of Syria, where they remained until Crusader days, when the Emir Munqiz started for Egypt to assist Saladin but received later orders to move against the Crusaders in Hasbaya and at Beaufort Castle

Chehabs Here 1172 A.D.
It was thus, in 1172 A.D. that the Chehabs first came into what is now Lebanon. After capturing the' Crusader castle of Hasbaya whose ten sided tower now forms part of their fortress-palace in that town, they defeated the Franks in several pitched battles in the vicinity and were given the entire Wadi Taym as a fief by King Nur ed-Din in Damascus, thus becoming suzerains of the Druzes but without themselves belonging to that sect.

In 1280 the Mamluk Sultan Qalawun called on the Chehabs to defend the land from Mongol invasion and they responded with 9,000 warriors who assisted in defeating a Mongol force near Homs but were later themselves besieged in Hasbaya. The reigning Emir Saad cut his way through the Mongol host with a loss of 700 knights and brought his people safely to refuge in Mount Lebanon.

The Chehabs again came to the mountain in 1400 when Tamelane occupied Hasbaya and eventually established branch families permanently on the western slopes, preparatory to succeeding their cousins the Maanids as Lebanon's last ruling royal family.

Unfortunately, many of the rare source materials and important details of the life work of Emir Fares were destroyed in the fire of 1860. The aged emir escaped, however, with his princess and their children, the night before the fall of the palace. The Princess Chehab had a premonition in the form of a twice repeated dream, in which she had been warned by a white angel to flee with her husband and children, and it was only due to her insistence that the family escaped safely to Beirut in the nick of time.

Bashir III Deposed
The Princess was a daughter of the last reigning Prince of Lebanon, His Highness Bashir III Chehab, who, 19 years earlier (following the less-serious disorders of 1841 ) had been deposed by the Turks and the Lebanese monarchy abolished.

An unsuccessful attempt to restore it under the regency of the emirs Malik Chehab and Adel Arslan in October of 1918 was not encouraged by the French mandatory authorities, and subsequentlv the Emir Farid himself suffered imprisomnent for serving in the struggle for independence.

It was not until September of 1952, nearly a century after the fall of the dynasty, that a Chehab prince was to serve again as Chief of State of Lebanon In that year General the Emir Fuad Chehab, Lebanese Commander-in-Chief, served briefly as Provisional President of the Republic and interim Prime Minister between the resignation of former President Sheikh Beshara al-Khoury and the election of President Camille Chamoun.

Finally, in 1958, the Emir Fuad was formally elected President of the Republic in his own right for a term of six years. This brought to an end the civil stife which had raged for nearly a half year between the supporters and opponents of former President Chamoun, since the Commander-in-Chief enjoyed the confidence and respect of both parties. And thus the House of Chehab has again returned to the scene to lead Lebanon's destinies in the Twentieth Century.

In 1958 Emir Farid and Princess Yolanda left for Ghana, where the Prince was appointed Lebanese Minister to the newly-independent African nation.

Rather than close Hadeth Palace for several years, the Chehabs made arrangements with their friends the Marques and Marquesa de Merry del Val to take it over as the Royal Spanish Embassy's Residency during that period.

In 1959 Their Excellencies, the Ambassador and his wife, celebrated Spain's National Day by a brilliant diplomatic reception in this historic old Lebanese palace for the first time.

"Let us hope that this house's days of strife have come to an end" once said Emir Farid, gazing at the chained stone lion carvings on the portal "After all", he added, pointing out the devise Emir Fares had carved over the white marble plaque, "it is time that the symbols of peace should take over and do a better job than our lions of war".

Emir Fares' devise consists in two doves drinking from a single cup.

From See Lebanon, Bruce Condè, second edition, Harb Bijjani Press, Beirut, 1960