About 1,300 arti­facts are exhib­it­ed, rang­ing in date from pre­his­toric times to the medieval Mam­luk peri­od main­ly deal­ing with Lebanon’s Arche­ol­o­gy and His­to­ry. This muse­um was on the front line of the Lebanese civ­il war, and it suf­fered near com­plete destruc­tion, it was occu­pied by mili­ti­a­men and sus­tained bul­let holes. Although much was lost, many of its most valu­able items were saved by its Direc­tor of Antiq­ui­ties at the time, Emir Mau­rice Chehab and his wife. Small­er objects were hid­den in the base­ment, and larg­er objects and the mur­al were encased in con­crete. One of the key gal­leries was reded­i­cat­ed to him as the Mau­rice Chehab Hall.