City of Zgharta unveils artwork with name in Syriac. Calls for official recognition of the Syriac language in Lebanon

ZGHARTA, Lebanon – The north Lebanese city of Zgharta has unveiled a decorative piece of art bearing the city’s name in Syriac letters as a tribute to the origins of the city’s Syriac name and the Syriac heritage of the country. The Syriac letter art was unveiled in the city’s main road on Martyrs’ Square near city hall in the presence of the mayor of the Zgharta-Ehden municipality Antonio Yaminne, Syriac League in Lebanon official Hikmet Suryoyo and many residents.

The Syriac letter art is intended to draw attention to the Syriac history of Lebanon and to pay tribute to its Syriac Maronite roots, ancestors and church fathers who populated the country and spoke the Syriac language, said Roy Araygi, researcher and representative of the Ehden Movement. Moreover, the aim is to revive the Syriac language in Lebanon, to incentivize the Syriac Maronite Church to speed up the planned introduction of Syriac language lessons in all its schools – Syriac was taught in local schools till the 1950s – and to call on all parliamentarians, especially the Syriac Maronite ones, to pass laws to make the Syriac language an officially recognized language in Lebanon.

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The name Zgharta is either derived from the Aramaic word ‘Zaghar’ meaning ‘fortress’ or from the Syriac word ‘Zeghartay’ meaning ‘the barricades’.