If, during the Crusades, the Mirdites were not at war with the Mussulmans, it follows that they were not at war with the Christians. Though mentioned by the Christian writers, and especially by William of Tyre, as a powerful and warlike Christian nation, they are nowhere spoken of as allies of the Crusaders, iior are they spoken of as their enemies, f What …
If my explanation of the otherwise inexplicable success of that monstrous and ridiculous infatuation be correct—namely, the loathing1 of the Mirdites for the Byzantine Empire, and their hatred ag-ainst the Caliphate—it would follow that, upon the removal of these causes, the effect should cease. The causes were removed by the appearance of the Crusaders upon the stage. .In the immediate danger, remoter fears and passions were forgotten.
The Maan
..It was two of his descendants who commanded the Mirdites in the battle of Rabbelias against the troops of the Sultan of Damascus in 1306…
Between the close of the Crusades, and the establishment of the Ottoman dominion there is an interval of 279 years, during which the Mirdites disappear from the history of the world, as if they had never been, or as if they had ceased to exist. Mention of them is made obscurely by Mussulman writers only at one period, 1388, when they are noticed in the same strain as on former occasions by Byzantine, Armenian, and Saracenic writers j that is, merely to state that they had ceased to exist.
The occasion of this notice is an incursion of the Turcomans in that year, when the exposed and already detached district of Kesroan was again desolated. The only notice of the invasion of the Moguls under Timour Bey is occasioned by the Emirs of Hashbaya taking refuge in Shouf, to return only after those hordes had retired. Into the Lebanon itself they never penetrated. During these eight generations they continued to be ruled by the house of Maan, the Shaab equally ruling in the Anti-Lebanon.
Native annalists record events connected with these families and some convulsions j none of which, however, affect the well being of the people, the order of government, or the state of possession of the different princedoms. Various disembarkations of the Franks are noticed; but they neither obtain support from the people nor become occasions of distrust or quarrel with the Mussulmans. The Princes and the People alike abstain from all connection with external events ; and it would not be known that there was any but one religion, nor even what that religion was, but for the contemporary ecclesiastical writers.
In approaching the period of the Ottoman supremacy, we come to the first conquest of this people : that is, it is not until the end of the seventeenth century that that fatal word can be here spoken of. So striking a circumstance in the history of man may well induce us to pause for a moment to contrast their circumstances with that of the remainder of the inhabitants of the earth…
Two years, however, had scarcely elapsed when an occasion was offered to Emir Beshir for extending- the power of the Prince of the Druzes over the original seat of the Princes of the Mirdites….
CHAPTER XVI.
HISTORICAL CONFIRMATION
For at one and the same moment, he (Gibbon) designates the Mirdites as being- one of the firmest barriers of the empire ; and, as being1 disarmed and transplanted by the suspicious policy of the Greeks. I subjoin in a note the entire passage.*
An army of “Greeks” invaded Syria , the monastery of St. Maron was destroyed with fire; the bravest chieftains were betrayed and murdered, and twelve thousand of their followers were transplanted to the distant frontiers of Armenia and Thrace.
Yet the humble nation of the Maronites has survived the empire of Constantinople, and they still enjoy, under their Turkish masters, a free religion and a mitigated servitude…
The Edenensis, here mentioned, means a Mirdite from the town of Eden; this reference shews that that people was not destitute, at the time, of native writers. The Maronite priests, in translating to me their own ecclesiastical writers, gave me no grounds for inferring that the institution of their Patriarchate…
Jan. 10th. —I spent the early part of the morning with the Vicar General, and we soon got engaged again in history. I inadvertently excited his indignation, by applying the word Arab to them. " Arab," said he, " means savage. Mahomet made something of them for a time, but he despised them j soon after they fell into discord among themselves, and from that time are known only as tyrants. They consequently lost this fine Empire, and ceasing to be the masters of others, have themselves become slaves; but, wherever they ruled, they have left evil behind them.
We, the Mirdites or Moarni, were the first obstacle to their progress j and, being1 betrayed by the bastard Greeks, were the first victims of their tyranny.
They (the Arabs) attacked us in the most tender part, our tongue, and our recollections ; they drove out our language, and we are now called by others, and often known among ourselves, by their name.
We are Sourians.
This is our country, and it bears our name.
The Syriac is an older language than the Hebrew, and the Assyrians, from whom we descend, were the first of the great people of the earth.
The Syriac is still our sacred language; now, indeed, the church is the only depositary of these ancient treasures, but even within the memory of man the Syriac has been spoken in these countries.
For these reasons, the Mountain has always been favourable to the Turks, who were tolerant in matters of faith ; and so far from attempting to impose their tongue on any other people, took care to exhibit the contrast between themselves and the Arabs, by using an interpreter as part of the ceremonial of administration, even when the Pasha or Governor could speak Arabic."
I think he might have claimed more than a descent from the Assyrian, but of this hereafter.
During these four hours I ran over the different races, testing and rating them by the men they had produced ; men I mean, not of thought only, nor of action only, but those who can adjust a plan, and then carry it out, on that double field, which must be equally trodden to secure lasting results, persuasion and management.
Amongst the Turks I had found no such men; amongst the Arabs none; amongst the English none; nor the French, nor Germans, nor Italians, nor the Spaniards.
I could call up but three men to place beside him ; I speak of course, not of careers achieved, for that belongs to accident and circumstances, but of faculties observed and possessed.
These three men belonged to races rated very low in the scale; Greeks, Servians, and Berbers.
These were, Coletti amongst the first, Petronievich amongst the second, and the Caid of Riff amongst the third.
With the man I saw before me, what were the Druzes, or rather what had been the Moarni, the Mirdites, or the Itureans ?
What they were their history shews; and if I had only known them in this Sheik Nasif, I might have supposed their history.
Endurance involves substance; the substance of a people must be contained in the men you see, just as that of a stuff in the morsel you handle.
At length the guests retired, and we were left to ourselves. His evasions and replies were alike characteristic and original, his similes were picturesque; it will be evident that I cannot reproduce the conversation on a few pages of paper. The fragments I can give are only such specimens as half a dozen bricks would be of a house, its furniture and inhabitants. I shall throw them for convenience sake into the form of dialogue, not as intending to convey thereby more than the impression.
" I am a man who goes nowhere, sees no one, is busy with his own affairs, and has nothing to do with public business: what can you want with me?"
I have heard that you do nothing without reason,..
" Ask, and I shall answer."
Is the Gebel Souria well governed ?
" What the Sultan does is well done. I am the Sultan's slave j what shall I say ?"
You said " I shall answer." Where now is your word ?
The Lebanon (Mount Souria)-By David Urquhart