Maurice Chehab
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Emir Maurice Hafez Chehab (27 December 1904 – 24 December 1994) was a Lebanese archaeologist and museum curator. He was the head of the Antiquities Service in Lebanon and curator of the National Museum of Beirut from 1942 to 1982. He was recognised as the "father of modern Lebanese archaeology"
Life
Chehab was a member of the
He returned to Beirut in 1928 and worked with the
The museum's building was completed by 1937, and opened by the President of the Lebanese Republic Alfred Naqqache on 27 May 1942. Chehab became head of the Antiquities Service in 1942, director in 1944, and then director general; he was also curator of the museum from 1942. He worked to establish the administrative structure of the Antiquities Service, with local inspectors. He remained its director until 1982. He was also a professor of history at the Lebanese University, teaching from 1945 to 1974.
Chehab's work focussed on the history of the Levant, from Ancient Egypt and Phoenicia, through Greek, Persian, Macedonian, Seleucid and Roman influence and occupation, to the Muslims and Crusaders in the Middle Ages, and the Ottoman Empire from the 16th century.
He supervised archaeological digs of ancient Tyre, and digs at Sidon with Maurice Dunand. He was involved with the restoration of the Ottoman Beiteddine Palace.
As the
He established an archaeological journal in 1936, the "Bulletin du Musée de Beyrouth" (the "Bulletin of Beirut Museum") which reached 36 volumes before publication was stopped in 1986 by the civil war. He also published many books on the archaeology of Lebanon, on the
He married Olga Chaiban in 1945. She was the daughter of the doctor to the Emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie.
Chehab retired 1982. After peace returned to Lebanon in 1991, the museum was opened in 1993 in its damaged state, with bomb and bullet holes in the burnt and graffiti-clad walls. Chehab died in 1994, and did not live to see the museum reopen fully in 1999 after extensive reconstruction and restoration.
He was an officer of the French
References
- Will Ernest. Nécrologie: Maurice Chéhab (1904-1994). In: Syria. Tome 73 fascicule 1-4, 1996. pp. 205–206.
- Maurice Chehab, the guardian angel of Lebanon's cultural heritage
- Homage to an Enlightment Man: Emir Maurice Chehab
- In Memoriam Emir Maurice Chehab - Nina Jidejian
- Chéhab Maurice, Comité des travaux historiques et scientifiques