Qualla: Sanaa

Sanaa: Introduction

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dan from Brussels, Europe, CC BY-SA 2.0. The song of Sanaa is a musical style so old and so central to the city's identity that UNESCO designated it Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2003. It dates to the 14th century. Musicians play it at weddings during the evening party called the samra and at the daily afternoon gatherings called magyal. The instruments are simple - the turbi lute, the sahn copper tray used as a percussion plate - but the songs preserve seven hundred years of poetry, lament, and praise. What makes Sanaa feel ancient is not just the mud-brick tower houses or the 1,000 Quranic manuscripts discovered in the Great Mosque in 1972. It is the continuity of small daily things.

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Image: Dan from Brussels, Europe | CC BY-SA 2.0

Sanaa: The Fastest-Growing Capital

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dan from Brussels, Europe, CC BY-SA 2.0. From the 1960s onward, Sanaa grew faster than almost any capital on earth - a 7 percent annual growth rate, more than double the national rate of 3.2 percent, fed by rural migrants coming to the city for jobs and schools that only Sanaa could offer. About 10 percent of the popula...

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Image: Dan from Brussels, Europe | CC BY-SA 2.0

Sanaa: The Jewish Quarter

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Rod Waddington from Kergunyah, Australia, CC BY-SA 2.0. Sanaa held one of the oldest continuous Jewish communities in the world. For most of its history, Jewish residents of Sanaa lived in a series of evolving neighborhoods - first within the citadel near the ruins of Ghumdan Palace, then in al-Marbaki, then in al-Quzali, then in al-S...

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Image: Rod Waddington from Kergunyah, Australia | CC BY-SA 2.0

Sanaa: The Tower Houses

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Rod Waddington from Kergunyah, Australia, CC BY-SA 2.0. Sanaa's tower houses are six to nine stories tall, built from earth, basalt, and burnt brick, their walls white-highlighted with gypsum in geometric patterns, their upper floors crowned with qamariya - half-moon windows of colored glass and alabaster tracery. Some are more than f...

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Image: Rod Waddington from Kergunyah, Australia | CC BY-SA 2.0

Sanaa: Qat, Daily

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit stepnout, CC BY 2.0. Every afternoon, Sanaa's men - and many of its women - chew qat. The leaves are bought fresh each morning at the qat market; they must be consumed the same day, because the mild amphetamine-like alkaloids degrade within hours. Three varieties exist - Ahmar, Abiad, Azraq, translat...

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Image: stepnout | CC BY 2.0

Sanaa: A Capital at War

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit W. Marek (user Womarek), CC BY-SA 3.0 de. The ongoing civil war has reshaped Sanaa. Since 2014 it has been under Houthi control. Commercial flights from the airport resumed in May 2022 after a six-year halt, and intermittent truces have allowed humanitarian operations to continue. Israeli airstrikes hit the airport in De...

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Image: W. Marek (user Womarek) | CC BY-SA 3.0 de