Culture & History

Lebanon’s rich history has been shaped by many cultural traditions, including Phoenician, Greek, Roman, Islamic (including Mameluke), Crusader, Ottoman Turkish, French, and recently American. The resulting culture is distinctively Lebanese, a combination of East and West, past and present. Folk music and dancing have a long tradition and are very popular. Influential Lebanese writers emerged in the early 20th century and greatly influenced the Arabic language. 

Painters, sculptors, and performers and producers in theater, film, and television have recently distinguished themselves. Lebanon’s coastal plain is divided into several isolated sections by gorges, which are cut by streams that pour down the mountains in winter and spring. In ancient times, north-south movement along the plain was nearly impossible. 

Villages developed on larger sections of the plain, and those with good harbors and better agricultural areas evolved into the city-states of Phoenicia. These cities then used the Mediterranean Sea to communicate and trade with one another and beyond the coastal plain. Due to geographical and other barriers, however, Phoenicia never unified politically. 

Later, mountainous areas provided protection for groups seeking refuge, but these groups, too, were isolated and did not form a unified nation. The modern nation of Lebanon was formed after World War I (1914-1918), when the defeated Ottoman Empire, which had controlled the area, was divided. 

When France received a mandate from the League of Nations to rule Lebanon after the war, the region’s people were aligned along religious and cultural lines, but felt little unity based on a Lebanese nationality.

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