Images Saint Simeon Al Bara Mushabak Maez

In 1899 Princeton University of New Jersey inaugurated an archaeological expedition to Syria. Extensive surveys of both monumental buildings and complete settlements, accompanied with detailed discussions of the architectural material, was published by Howard Crosby Butler in 1903. Butler was the first scholar to ask questions about the contrast between the barrenness of the environment at his time and the prosperity that the ancient settlements suggested. The most thorough study of the region was later done in the 1930s and 40s under the direction of a Russian architect, Georges Tchalenko of the French Archeological Institute in Syria. In the 1950s, Tchalenko supplied his meticulous study with a summary of social and economic history of the region.