Atarib (al-Atharib)

Atarib is a town 25 kilometres west of Aleppo and the centre of the district that carries its name. Reyhanlı, in Turkey, is 25 kilometres to the north-west. At the 2004 census it had a population of 10657. Known in medieval sources as al-Atharib, it was one of the fortresses on the frontier between Aleppo and the Principality of Antioch, and in the 12th century it changed hands again and again.

Why it mattered

The town stood on the Roman road from Aleppo to Antioch. Arabic sources give its position in farsakhs, the old league: three from Aleppo, the same to Ebla, Qinnasrin, the Ruj plain and the Jabal al-Zawiya massif, and a little more to Antioch.

How often the fortress changed hands

In December 1110 Tancred, Prince of Galilee, battered the walls. Fakhr al-Mulk Radwan, the Seljuk ruler of Aleppo, had to buy peace: he gave Atarib and Zardana to Tancred, along with twenty thousand dinars and ten of his best Arab horses. In August 1119 Ilghazi of Mardin, with Toghtekin and two other Muslim commanders, took Atarib after the battle known as the Field of Blood. A year later, during a quarrel between Ilghazi and his son Suleiman, the town was handed back to the Crusaders. In the spring of 1135 Imad al-Din Zengi took it, together with Kafartab, Maarat al-Numan and Zardana. In 1138 the Byzantine emperor John II Komnenos held it briefly during his Syrian campaign. The Aleppo earthquake of that same year wrecked the town, and afterwards it passed to Muslim rule.

What is there today

Atarib has a large market that serves as the main trading centre for the surrounding villages. The sources do not make clear what, if anything, survives above ground of the Crusader and Zengid fortress; ask in town. The town was badly damaged in the civil war. In November 2017 an air strike hit the market, and the UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria recorded it as a possible war crime. The earthquake of 6 February 2023 caused heavy destruction as well.

Getting there

By the road west out of Aleppo, 25 kilometres. Roads and checkpoints change; ask before you set out.

What most people miss

The link with Bab Antakya. The road out of Aleppo’s Antioch Gate ran this way, and in the 12th century the frontier chapter of that road was played out in front of Atarib.