The Al-A’la Plateau: Byzantine Villages East of Hama

A basalt plateau that rises at the eastern edge of Hama and runs to the west of Salamiyah. Its top is flat and farmed, its villages sit no more than 2 km apart, and nearly every one of them is built over a Byzantine settlement. Few buildings still stand, because the old blocks went into new houses. What survives is written on the stone: black basalt lintels carry Greek inscriptions and dates. At least 50 Byzantine inscriptions are known here, most from the reign of the emperor Justinian (527–565).

Where the plateau is and what it looks like

It sits on the western rim of the Syrian steppe, a rough triangle about 15 km across and 10 km long. The sides are steep, except on the east, where the ground slopes gently into the desert. It is the detached southern end of a basalt hill country that runs 70 km north to Jabal al-Hass. The name says as much: al-A’la means “the high land”.

Getting there

By car from Hama or Salamiyah. There is no reliable information on regular public transport to the villages, so a car with a driver is the realistic option. Halban lies 30 km north of Salamiyah and Nawa 27 km north. Qasr Abu Samrah is 31 km northeast of Hama.

Can you visit today

Between late 2024 and early 2025, people were displaced from several villages, including Tuba and Tell Dahab. Which villages are inhabited and open to visitors keeps changing, so ask in Hama or Salamiyah before setting out. Most of the remains are not a fenced archaeological site; they stand inside the villages, between the houses.

What to see, village by village

• Tuba — on the north side of the plateau, with the largest ancient site. A church dated 582, a defensive tower and a house dated 573.
• Halban — lintels dated 362 and 534, and a defensive tower dated 543 looking east over the steppe.
• Nawa — a basalt monastery with a church dated 598, the only monastery on record on the plateau.
• Tell Dahab — lintels dated 470, 489, 570 and 589.
• Fan al-Shamali — the ruin of a Byzantine tower dated 576.
• Umm Haratayn — a rectangular fort with a tower at each corner.
• Qasr Abu Samrah — a church built entirely of basalt. Five columns from one of its two rows still stand, with the large doorway and a tower nearby, though neither is well preserved.

Why the houses and towers look this way

Most villages had a defensive tower. The plateau lay open to Bedouin raids from the desert, and the towers were most likely for keeping watch. The houses follow one of two plans. The smaller ones have two floors, with the ground floor for livestock, facing a paved courtyard with a well that leads down to a cistern. The larger ones follow the same layout with more rooms or two wings. Every church is a basilica.

What the inscriptions tell us

Most inscriptions date to Justinian’s reign, and about 20 fall in the 40 years after his death. Few are older than the 6th century; the latest is from 605. So the plateau was still doing well in the early 7th century, when much of Syria had stalled. No building work has been traced to the Umayyad or Abbasid periods, the first Muslim dynasties, though the houses may have stayed in use. Max von Oppenheim surveyed the area in 1899, and a Princeton University expedition followed in 1904–1905.

The later centuries

In the late 18th century the plateau became one of the two main refuges of the Mawali tribe, pushed off the steppe by stronger tribes; the other was Jabal Zawiya. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries the Mawali and the Bani Khalid sold many villages to the leading families of Hama, among them the Kaylani, Barazi and Azm, and the villagers became tenant farmers. Alawite settlers arrived in the 1920s and 1930s, under the French Mandate.

What most people miss

The inscription on the tower of 543 at Halban. It names the two masons who built it, Ioannes and Symeones, and calls them both “Holbanoi” — men of Halban. This tower, at least, was raised by the village’s own people, not by builders brought in from outside.