This paper considers the account of the ruins of Baalbek in Jean de la Roque’s
Voyages de Syrie et du Mont-Liban. Published in 1722, thirty-three years after
his visit to Lebanon, it represents the first detailed account of the ruins. The
re-attribution of a manuscript letter in Aix-en-Provence confirms that La Roque
never visited the site; instead, he seems to have based his account on the drawings
of André de Monceaux executed around 1670. Yet, although not based on genuine
autopsy, his detailed description presents the architecture from the perspective
of a viewer moving among the ruins. This prominent imagination of the motion
of the spectator, derived from Lucian’s architectural narratives, constitutes a
revolution in the genre of architectural description.
On One Architectural Description Given by P. Pallas
