Emir Chebah This is Me

Education

 Web References

1. 1. Emir (Prince) Maurice Chehab In Perpetuum Honorum

   www.phoenicia.org/honor.html - [Cached]

   Published on: 7/14/2003   Last Visited: 11/4/2006

   Emir (Prince) Maurice Chebah was born in 1904 and received his education at the St. Joseph's University Jesuit Institute in Lebanon. He continued his education and received his graduate degree in archaeology from the Louvre Institute in France. He was the first Lebanese ever to receive such a degree in this field.
   
   Achievements
   
   During the French Mandate over Lebanon (1918-1943), he worked for the French Institute for Archaeology that included a large number of distinguished French scholars of this field. He became a member of the Friends of the National Museum Committee that included many prominent personalities in the field of education, science, public service and the press.
   
   During the early of the French Mandate and the Lebanese Independence, the government designated him head of the commission for archaeological research. It developed under his guidance to a general directorate. He was appointed in 1928 and remained in his post until 1982. He worked as a professor of history at the Lebanese University as well as other universities and institutes. During this time also, he personally supervised archaeological digs of ancient Tyre.
   
   He established, managed and published the " Bulletin du Musee de Beyrouth," an annual journal of archaeological research. He wrote many of the articles that appeared in that publication along with the world's most renowned archaeologists.
   ...
   Other co-workers of the museum, at the time such as Rinata Ortali Tarazi, worked hand in hand with Emir Maurice and his wife, Olga to hide antiquities and evade robbery and damage caused by shelling.
   ...
   Then this strange cortège, consisting of Emir Maurice and his wife, his secretary, Suzy Hakimian (then 21 years old), and a few workmen carrying bags of cement, plywood and rolls of thick sheets of plastic, would be seen going into the museum to work.
   ...
   These sarcophagi and mosaics survived because of the foresight of Emir Maurice. During a lull in the war, he had the sarcophagi encased in reinforced cement and the floor mosaics covered first with plastic sheeting and then with a layer of cement.