Lebanese ArabicLebanese Arabic (عَرَبِيّ لُبْنَانِيّ ; autonym: ˈʕaɾabe lɪbˈneːne), or simply Lebanese (لُبْنَانِيّ ; autonym: lɪbˈneːne), is a variety of North Levantine Arabic, indigenous to and spoken primarily in Lebanon, with significant linguistic influences borrowed from other Middle Eastern and European languages and is in some ways unique from other varieties of Arabic. Due to multilingualism and pervasive diglossia among Lebanese people (a majority of the Lebanese people are bilingual or trilingual), it is not uncommon for Lebanese people to code-switch between or mix Lebanese Arabic, French, and English in their daily speech.
Kadisha ValleyKadisha Valley (وادي قاديشا), also romanized as the Qadisha Valley and also known as the Kadisha Gorge or Wadi Kadisha (Ouadi Qadisha), is a gorge that lies within the Bsharri and Zgharta Districts of the North Governorate of Lebanon. The valley was carved by the Kadisha River, also known as the Nahr Abu Ali when it reaches Tripoli. Kadisha means "Holy" in Aramaic, and the valley is sometimes called the Holy Valley. It has sheltered Christian monastic communities for many centuries.
ZahléZahlé (زَحْلة) is the capital and the largest city of Beqaa Governorate, Lebanon. With around 150,000 inhabitants, it is the third-largest city in Lebanon after Beirut and Tripoli and the fourth largest taking the whole urban area (the Jounieh urban area is larger). Zahlé is located east of the capital Beirut, close to the Beirut-Damascus road, and lies at the junction of the Lebanon mountains and the Beqaa plateau, at a mean elevation of 1,000 m.
BatrounBatroun (ٱلْبَتْرُون ; Christian and בִתרוֹן "the Cleft") is a coastal city in northern Lebanon and one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. It is the capital city of Batroun District. Batroun appears in Western Aramaic, and is attested in as bṯrwn (بثرون) in premodern Arabic texts, with the expected lenition of t for an Aramaic term. Elie Mardini suggests the shift of the th to t in Aramaic terms in the Levant is due to the merger of certain fricatives in Levantine Arabic.
Patriarch of AntiochThe Patriarch of Antioch is a traditional title held by the bishop of Antioch (modern-day Antakya, Turkey). As the traditional "overseer" (ἐπίσκοπος, episkopos, from which the word bishop is derived) of the first gentile Christian community, the position has been of prime importance in Pauline Christianity from its earliest period. This diocese is one of the few for which the names of its bishops from the apostolic beginnings have been preserved.
MaronitesThe Maronites (Mārūniyyah; Marunoye) are a Christian ethnoreligious group native to the Eastern Mediterranean and Levant region of West Asia, whose members traditionally belong to the Maronite Church, with the largest concentration long residing near Mount Lebanon in modern Lebanon. The Maronite Church is an Eastern Catholic sui iuris particular church in full communion with the Pope and the rest of the Catholic Church.
Catholic particular churches and liturgical ritesA particular church (ecclesia particularis) is an ecclesiastical community of faithful headed by a bishop (or equivalent), as defined by Catholic canon law and ecclesiology. A liturgical rite, a collection of liturgies descending from shared historic or regional context, depends on the particular church the bishop (or equivalent) belongs to. Thus "particular church" refers to an institution, and "liturgical rite" to its ritual practices.
Eastern Catholic ChurchesThe Eastern Catholic Churches or Oriental Catholic Churches, also called the Eastern-Rite Catholic Churches, Eastern Rite Catholicism, or simply the Eastern Churches, are 23 Eastern Christian autonomous (sui iuris) particular churches of the Catholic Church, in full communion with the Pope in Rome. Although they are distinct theologically, liturgically, and historically from the Latin Church, they are all in full communion with it and with each other. Eastern Catholics are a distinct minority within the Catholic Church; of the 1.
Lebanese peopleThe Lebanese people (الشعب اللبناني / ALA-LC: ALA, eʃˈʃæʕeb ellɪbˈneːne) are the people inhabiting or originating from Lebanon. The term may also include those who had inhabited Mount Lebanon and the Anti-Lebanon Mountains prior to the creation of the modern Lebanese state. The major religious groups among the Lebanese people within Lebanon are Shia Muslims (27%), Sunni Muslims (27%), Maronite Christians (21%), Greek Orthodox Christians (8%), Melkite Christians (5%), Druze (5.2%), Protestant Christians (1%).
Mamluk SultanateThe Mamluk Sultanate (سلطنة المماليك), also known as Mamluk Egypt or the Mamluk Empire, was a state that ruled Egypt, the Levant and the Hejaz (western Arabia) from the mid-13th to early 16th centuries. It was ruled by a military caste of mamluks (manumitted slave soldiers) headed by the sultan and Abbasid caliphs were the nominal sovereigns. The sultanate was established with the overthrow of the Ayyubid dynasty in Egypt in 1250 and was conquered by the Ottoman Empire in 1517.
