Editing Baalbek (section)

===Excavations===
[[File:Baalbek-stoneofpregnantwoman.jpg|thumb|[[Stone of the Pregnant Woman#Second monolith|The largest stone at Baalbek]], uncovered in 2014]]
[[Emperor of Germany|Emperor]] [[William II, German Emperor|Wilhelm&nbsp;II]] of [[German Empire|Germany]] and his wife passed through Baalbek on 1 November 1898,{{sfnp|Cook|1914|p=[http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/cook1914bd1/0639 556]}} on their way to Jerusalem. He noted both the magnificence of the Roman remains and the drab condition of the modern settlement.{{sfnp|Cook|1914|p=[http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/cook1914bd1/0639 556]}} It was expected at the time that natural disasters, winter frosts, and the raiding of building materials by the city's residents would shortly ruin the remaining ruins.{{sfnp|Jessup|1881|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=mzdQAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA476 476]}} The archaeological team he dispatched began work within a month. Despite finding nothing they could date prior to Baalbek's [[Ancient Romans|Roman]] occupation,{{sfnp|Wiegand|1925}} [[Otto Puchstein]] and his associates worked until 1904{{sfnp|Cook|1914|p=[http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/cook1914bd1/0639 556]}} and produced a meticulously researched and thoroughly illustrated series of volumes.{{sfnp|Wiegand|1925}} Later excavations under the Roman flagstones in the Great Court unearthed three [[skeletons]] and a fragment of [[Achaemenid Empire|Persian]] pottery dated to the 6th–4th&nbsp;centuries&nbsp;BC. The [[sherd]] featured [[cuneiform]] letters.{{sfnp|Jidejian|1975|p=15}}

In 1977, [[Jean-Pierre Adam]] made a brief study suggesting most of the large blocks could have been moved on rollers with [[machine]]s using [[Capstan (nautical)|capstans]] and [[pulley]] blocks, a process which he theorised could use 512 workers to move a {{convert|557|tonne}} block.{{sfnp|Adam & al.|1999|p=35}}{{sfnp|Adam|1977}} "Baalbek, with its colossal structures, is one of the finest examples of Imperial Roman architecture at its apogee", [[UNESCO]] reported in making Baalbek a [[World Heritage Site]] in 1984.<ref>{{cite web |ref={{harvid|WHC}} |title=Baalbek |url=https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/294 |publisher=[[UNESCO]] [[World Heritage Centre]]<!--sic--> |location=New York |date=2015 |access-date=8 September 2015 }}.</ref> When the committee inscribed the site, it expressed the wish that the protected area include the entire town within the Arab walls, as well as the southwestern extramural quarter between Bastan-al-Khan, the Roman site and the Mameluk mosque of Ras-al-Ain. Lebanon's representative gave assurances that the committee's wish would be honoured. Recent cleaning operations at the Temple of Jupiter discovered the deep trench at its edge, whose study pushed back the date of Tell Baalbek's settlement to the [[PPNB]] [[Neolithic]]. Finds included pottery [[sherd]]s including a spout dating to the early [[Bronze Age]].{{sfnp|Genz|2010}} In the summer of 2014, a team from the [[German Archaeological Institute]] led by Jeanine Abdul Massih of the [[Lebanese University]] discovered a sixth, much larger stone suggested to be the [[World's largest ancient block#Monoliths|world's largest ancient block]]. The stone was found underneath and next to the Stone of the Pregnant Woman ("Hajjar al-Hibla") and measures around {{convert|19.6|×|6|×|5.5|m|abbr=on}}. It is estimated to weigh <ref name=":9">{{Cite news |date=2024-10-24 |title=Lebanon's ancient city of Baalbek bears the scars of Israeli bombs |url=https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2024/10/24/lebanon-s-ancient-city-of-baalbek-bears-the-scars-of-israeli-bombs_6730359_4.html |access-date=2024-11-04 |language=en}}</ref>{{convert|1650|tonne}}.{{sfnp|Kehrer|2014}}