Qualla: Citadel of Aleppo https://qualla.com/citadel-of-aleppo en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:31 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/s/y/6/m/citadel-of-aleppo-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Citadel of Aleppo https://qualla.com/citadel-of-aleppo Citadel of Aleppo: Introduction https://qualla.com/citadel-of-aleppo/ Photo credit Memorino, CC BY-SA 3.0. Five thousand years of occupation are stacked inside a single hill. The Citadel of Aleppo rises fifty meters above the old city on an elliptical mound -- 450 meters long, 325 meters wide -- that was once sheathed in gleaming limestone blocks visible for miles across the northern Syrian plain. A temple to the storm god Hadad stood here in the 3rd millennium BC, referenced in cuneiform tablets from Ebla and Mari. Arameans, Assyrians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Ayyubids, Mamluks, Ottomans, and the modern Syrian army have all held this ground. Each left something behind. Each took something away.

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Image: Memorino | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/y/6/m/citadel-of-aleppo-wp/sy6m-citadel-of-aleppo-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Citadel of Aleppo: City of the Storm God https://qualla.com/citadel-of-aleppo/ Photo credit reibai, CC BY 2.0. When Aleppo was the capital of the kingdom of Yamhad, it was known as the "City of Hadad." The recently excavated temple of the ancient storm god, uncovered by German archaeologist Kay Kohlmeyer, dates use of the citadel hill to at least the 24th century BC. Reliefs found during ...

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Image: reibai | CC BY 2.0

]]> Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/y/6/m/citadel-of-aleppo-wp/sy6m-citadel-of-aleppo-city-of-the-storm-god.mp3 0:06 2 full Citadel of Aleppo: The Sultan's Fortress https://qualla.com/citadel-of-aleppo/ Photo credit Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 3.0. The citadel as visitors recognize it today was largely shaped by one man: al-Zahir al-Ghazi, son of Saladin, who ruled Aleppo from 1193 to 1215. He strengthened the walls, smoothed the rock outcrop, deepened the moat, and connected it to water canals spanned by a soaring bridge-a...

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Image: Bernard Gagnon | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/y/6/m/citadel-of-aleppo-wp/sy6m-citadel-of-aleppo-the-sultans-fortress.mp3 0:06 3 full Citadel of Aleppo: Janissaries and Earthquakes https://qualla.com/citadel-of-aleppo/ Photo credit Khaled ajlani, CC BY-SA 3.0. Under Ottoman rule, the citadel's military significance slowly faded as Aleppo grew beyond its walls into a commercial metropolis. An anonymous Venetian traveler recorded some 2,000 people living within the citadel in 1556. By 1679, the French consul d'Arvieux counted 1,400 resid...

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Image: Khaled ajlani | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/y/6/m/citadel-of-aleppo-wp/sy6m-citadel-of-aleppo-janissaries-and-earthquakes.mp3 0:06 4 full Citadel of Aleppo: Scars of the 21st Century https://qualla.com/citadel-of-aleppo/ Photo credit Verity Cridland, CC BY 2.0. The Battle of Aleppo, which raged from 2012 to 2016, returned the citadel to its original purpose as a military fortification -- with catastrophic results. The Syrian Army used the hilltop as a base, firing from behind medieval walls and repurposing ancient arrow slits as sniper ...

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Image: Verity Cridland | CC BY 2.0

]]> Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/y/6/m/citadel-of-aleppo-wp/sy6m-citadel-of-aleppo-scars-of-the-21st-century.mp3 0:06 5 full Citadel of Aleppo: What Survives Underground https://qualla.com/citadel-of-aleppo/ Photo credit Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 3.0. Not everything in the citadel is visible from the surface. Wells penetrate 125 meters below the hilltop, and underground passageways connect to the advance towers and possibly beneath the moat to the city itself. The Ayyubid palace retains its muqarnas entrance portal -- honeycom...

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Image: Bernard Gagnon | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/s/y/6/m/citadel-of-aleppo-wp/sy6m-citadel-of-aleppo-what-survives-underground.mp3 0:06 6 full