CELESIRIA (Καίλη Συρία = “Hollow Syria”).—Name given by the Greeks, after the conquest of Alessandro Magno, to the region lying between Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon. It is now called by the Arabs el-Beqa' (“the valley”). In Joshua (11:17; 12:7) there is mention of a valley or plain of Lebanon (Biq'ath hal-Lēbhānōn), which seems to correspond to C. in the strict sense. In the area of Ba'albek, about 1,176 m. above sea level, rise the rivers Nahr el-'Asī (Orontes) and Nahr el-Liṭānī (Leontes), which traverse C. respectively toward the north-east and toward the south-west.
This region was the object of bitter disputes between the Seleucids of Syria and the Ptolemies of Egypt. When Antiochus III, in order to settle the disagreements, gave his daughter Cleopatra in marriage to the Egyptian king Ptolemy V Epiphanes, the Egyptians demanded that she bring as her dowry C. and the neighboring regions (Judaea, Samaria, Phoenicia). From the time when the Ptolemies became masters of most of Syria (192 B.C.), the name C. was extended also to those southern regions. Yet in the books of Maccabees C. seems always distinct from Phoenicia (I Mach. 10:69; II Mach. 3:5–8; 4:4; 8:8; 10:11).
After the Roman conquest (64 B.C.), Phoenicia and Samaria were separated from C., to which Ituraea, Trachonitis, Damascus, and the Decapolis still belonged.
Pietro De Ambroggi