The Bimaristan al-Qaymari

North of the walls, on the main street of Salihiyya. The doorway is what marks the building: laid from top to bottom in alternating black and white stone, crowned by a deep muqarnas hood with three lines of thuluth inscription beneath it. Sayf al-Din al-Qaymari, an Ayyubid emir, founded the hospital in 1248, and it went on working as a hospital into modern times.

Who founded it

Sayf al-Din came from the Kurdish Qaymari house and was known as a fighter. The inscription says construction began in 646, that is 1248; the figures for the completion date cannot be read. But the emir’s death is dated: he was killed fighting the Crusaders at Nablus in 1256, so the building was finished by that year at the latest.

That a hospital of this size went up outside the walls is itself a fact worth reading. Salihiyya was founded as a quarter in the mid-11th century, and by 1248 it had grown enough to carry its own hospital and to work apart from the city.

What to see

The plan follows the Nur al-Din Bimaristan inside the city: square, with four central iwans, each opening into rooms. At the door the facade stones are cut square while the voussoirs of the arch are curved. The three lines of inscription name who paid for the building and who supervised the work, and most inscriptions of the period do not say that. It is a receipt as much as a dedication.

Much of the stucco in the south iwan is still there. A naskhi band runs round three walls repeating the shahada, and the plant forms threaded between the letters are finely cut, among them lotus flowers of Chinese derivation. The shift from Ayyubid restraint to Mamluk abundance is visible right here, on one iwan wall.

Don’t miss

Every room facing south was given a window, and all of them look over Damascus and the gardens of Salihiyya. That was not a decorative choice but a medical one: a good view was believed to speed recovery. The windows were part of the treatment. Few details in medieval hospital architecture state their reasoning so plainly.

How long it takes

15 minutes. This is not a museum with visiting hours; the portal is visible from the street and getting inside depends on whoever is at the door. Read it together with the Nur al-Din Bimaristan in the walled city: one of 1154 inside, one of 1248 outside, a century and a grown suburb in between.