Entrance of the Temple of Bacchus, Baalbek

View of the monumental doorway of the Temple of Bacchus at Baalbek, showing the loose lintel keystone that shifted 2 feet (1 meter) after the earthquakes of 1759. It was described as follows by the artist:

This is, perhaps, the most elaborate work, as well as the most exquisite in its detail, of anything of its kind in the world. The pencil can convey but a faint idea of its beauty. One scroll alone, of acanthus leaves, with groups of children and panthers intertwined, might form a work of itself. Even independently of the beauty of the sculpture, and its excellent preservation, we are lost in wonder at the size of the stones, and at the nature of the machinery by which such masses were raised. Earthquakes have shaken this extraordinary remnant; but from the magnitude of the blocks which form the lintel, the central one, being wedge-shaped, has slipped only so far as to break away a portion of the blocks on either side, and thus remain suspended.