Gebal

Gebal — known to the Greeks as Byblos, the source of the English word "Bible" via the papyrus trade — was a Phoenician port city about 40 km north of modern Beirut. The Gebalites (men of Gebal) were celebrated in the ancient Near East as master stonecutters, shipwrights, and caulkers. When Hiram of Tyre sent cedar and skilled craftsmen for Solomon's temple, "the stonemasons of Solomon and the stonemasons of Hiram and the men of Gebal cut them, and prepared the timber and the stones to build the temple" (1 Kings 5:18).