Hazm Village in Sweida Contains the Largest Basalt Door in Syria

The village of Hazm, which is located in the  basaltic Lajat region in Sweida province , tells the story of civilizations that have  passed  over the region since the third millennium BC..

The village is famous for its ornate old houses, which were built of basalt stones, in addition to the monuments including  stone doors and channels to draw water from the old wells and ponds, which were used by  man ,who inhabited the area , for various purposes.

Head of  Sweida Antiquities Department, Dr. Nashaat Kiwan, told SANA  that Hazm village  was mentioned in  ancient references by historians, travelers as well as  Arab and foreign archaeologists  because it contains the largest basalt stone door in Syria, which is   2.6 meters high and dates  back to the Roman era.

Kiwan pointed  out that Hazm was inhabited for long periods, especially during the Nabataean, Greek, Roman, Byzantine and Ghassanid eras, up to the Arab and Islamic era.Among the most important of its antiquities are the remains of houses that still keep their doors and stone arches, tanks to collect water and the ruins  of ancient dams.

He added that Hazm village  also contains  about sixty Roman wells for preserving water, which until recently were  the only source of drinking water, in addition to many ancient Roman roads which were studied  by a number of foreign archaeologists, who considered  these roads as the most important transportation routes in the past.

Head of  Sweida  Department of Antiquities indicated  that Sultan Al-Malik Al-Nasir during the Ayyubid era at the end of the 12th century AD visited   the village of Hazm. The village  was mentioned by the Swiss archaeologist J. Berckhardt in his book (Journeys in Syria and the Holy Land) .  The French researcher Joseph Maskal in 1994 described the largest basalt door  saying “I had never seen a stone door of this magnitude in the whole region”.

Hazm’s  lands are also part of the rugged rocky lands of the Lajat region and contain various features of biological diversity and forested trees whose roots extend for thousands of years .The village is surrounded by many archaeological ruins , especially in the western and southern sides, which indicated the presence of human activity during ancient times and this continued until modern times in addition to the presence of the so-called  (Al-Faht) hole , which is one of the most important archaeological features surrounding the village. 

It is worth noting that Hazm village  is located about 50 km to the north of   Sweida city  , about 32 km from the ancient city of Shahba  and about 57 km to the south of the city of Damascus.

Rawaa Ghanam