Tyre
Tyre (Sur) Historic city on the coast of modern Lebanon. Built on an island, it was a major commercial port of ancient Phoenicia. It supplied both craftsmen and raw materials, especially cedarwood, for the building of the temple in Jerusalem in the 10th century bc. It established colonies, including Carthage, around the e Mediterranean. Tyre was never successfully besieged until Alexander the Great built a causeway linking the island to the mainland (332 bc). Ruled by successive empires, including the Romans, it was captured by the Arabs in ad 638 and destroyed by the Mamelukes in 1291. It never regained its former eminence. Pop. (2002 est) 114,800.
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