Aleppo Citadel

Aleppo Citadel ranks amongst the most fantastic castles I have ever visited and nearly 5000 years of history are waiting for your visit on this battle scarred mound. Occupied by all of the regional powers over time, the citadel has recently been damaged by the civil war.

My Experience

My visit to the Aleppo Citadel was part of a wider tour of Syria and Lebanon, detailed in my travel blog here. We were dropped in the old city and walked through the souks before coming out into the sunshine and being presented with the citadel in front of us.

The current structure dates to the twelfth century Ayyubid period, the time of Nur ad Din, precursor of Saladin. It was devastated both by the Mongols and Tamerlane’s forces but always bounced back, such was the importance of the city.

The entranceway is iconic although I don’t think I’d have fancied defending the first gateway, with no line of retreat. Likewise the towers dotted around the glacis don’t seem to have any link to the citadel itself. Once inside the walls it is a bit of a jumble with excavations and structures from various periods. The Mamluk Palace has been restored along with several towers and gateways but there is a lot left to do.

During my visit there were excavations being sponsored by the Agha Khan that had discovered some Bronze Age stele amongst other things. Several interior rooms had been restored to the Mamluk era and these are quite magnificent but difficult to photograph without a tripod, certainly 20 years ago.

Aleppo Citadel Photo Gallery

These next photos were taken in the dim and distant past of 2004 and they were not taken in RAW so these are pretty much unedited jpgs. I’d like to think my own skill in photography has moved on since then too so these may not be ideal pictures. Sorry!

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History

Usage of the Citadel hill dates back at least to the middle of the 3rd millennium BC when a temple to the ancient Storm God Hadad stood there. The first use of the hill as a fortification, in the form of a Macedonian acropolis, was probably during the reign of Seleucus I Nicator in the 4-3th century BC.

In 64 BC the Roman Emperor Julian visited a temple dedicated to Zeus in the acropolis.

During the 7th century the population of Aleppo is said to have taken refuge in the citadel because the city walls were in a deplorable state. In 636 AD Aleppo was conquered by Muslim troops and later repairs were made to the citadel after a major earthquake.

In 944 the Muslims of the Hamdanid dynasty took Aleppo and made it their capital city. They strengthened Aleppo Citadel. In 962 the Byzantines attacked and largely destroyed the city.

During the 12th century Aleppo Citadel was ruled by the Zengid dynasty and several famous crusaders were imprisoned in the citadel, among them Count of Edessa, Joscelin II, who died there, Raynald of Châtillon, and the King of Jerusalem, Baldwin II, who was held for 2 years. In 1157 the dilapidated citadel was extensively damaged by an earthquake. It was then rebuilt en modernized by Sultan Nur ad-Din Zangi.

His successor; Az-Zahir Ghazi, son of Saladin, also reconstructed and further fortified Aleppo Citadel between 1193 and 1215. It are mainly the remains of his works that we see today. It was than almost a palatial city within the city of Aleppo itself.

In 1260 Aleppo Citadel was taken by the Mongols under Hulagu Khan and was badly damaged as a result. Before the end of the 13th century these damages were repaired by the Mamluk Sultan Al-Ashraf Khalil.

Around 1400 the city and the citadel were again taken by the Mongols, this time under Timur. Almost all the buildings inside the citadel were destroyed. In 1415 Aleppo Citadel was again restored.

During the Ottoman period the military role of the citadel as a defense fortress slowly diminished. In 1521 the citadel was restored by Sultan Suleiman I and Aleppo Citadel was used as a barracks for Ottoman soldiers. In 1822 the citadel was again badly damaged by an earthquake. Around 1850 the citadel was restored by Sultan Abdülmecid I. During the French Mandate in the first part of the 20th century archaeological excavations and extensive restoration works were carried out.

References

There is an excellent guide to visiting the citadel post war here.

The history above is copied from the castles.nl site here.

There is a more comprehensive history on the Wikipedia site here.