Featured places
Mosques, caravanserais, souks, museums — and why they are worth the walk.
813 Places
The Mar Sarkis Monastery in Maaloula
A 4th-century church built over a pagan temple on the cliff above Maaloula. Behind its icon screen is the temple’s altar stone; an icon of Thecla dates from 1820.
Damascus · 4th-century church on a temple site; Salvatorian order since 1732
Mar Elias al-Hayy: Elijah’s Cave Chapel near Saidnaya
A cliff-top shrine to the Prophet Elijah south of Maarat Saidnaya, set above a cave chapel found in 1982 with murals from the first half of the 13th century.
Damascus · 13th-century murals; shrine building of 1897
Al-Kiswah, the First Stage on the Damascus Hajj Road
A town on the Awaj 13 km south of Damascus: first stage of the hajj road, site of the 1303 defeat of the Mongols, a listed Great Mosque and a Hejaz Railway station.
Damascus · Roman — Ghassanid — Mamluk — Ottoman
Qatana
A district town 25 km southwest of Damascus at 879 metres, where Tamerlane made camp and the road to the Burqush and Rakhlah temples begins. Access note inside.
Damascus · From an Ayyubid-era record to the present; Ottoman and French Mandate periods
Mount Karachok
The only high ground in the north-east corner of the Jazira plain: a basalt ridge 45 km long and 770 metres high. Its geology, oil history and what to watch for.
Qamishli · Natural; basalt-capped Neogene anticline
St Joseph’s Armenian Catholic Cathedral, Qamishli
The Armenian Catholic cathedral of Qamishli since 1954. How a community from Mardin regathered here, where the church stands, what happened in 2019, who remains.
Qamishli · 20th century · Armenian Catholic
Shrine and Mosque of Hujr ibn Adi, Adra
An Ayyubid mosque and shrine in old Adra, built with Roman columns and repaired in 1205. Wrecked in 2013 and reportedly reopened; check before you go.
Damascus · Ayyubid
Lake Khatuniyah
A natural lake of about 6 square kilometres east of Hasakah, near the Iraqi border. Its fish, shore birds and wildlife, and whether the area can be visited today.
Hasakah · Natural
The Assyrian Cathedral of the Virgin Mary, Hasakah
The Syrian seat of the Assyrian Church of the East, built in the 1990s by Hasakah railway station. The Khabur Assyrians, what happened in 2015 and what to look at.
Hasakah · Late 20th century · Assyrian Church of the East
St George’s Syriac Orthodox Cathedral, Hasakah
The Syriac Orthodox cathedral finished in 1943 in the heart of Hasakah’s church quarter: a dome with 12 windows, two bell towers, how to find it, who worships there.
Hasakah · 20th century · Syriac Orthodox
Kharab Sayyar (al-Jarud)
An Abbasid town 40 km east of the Balikh inside a square wall 650 metres a side: an excavated mosque, market and bathhouse, and stucco in the style of Samarra.
Hasakah · Abbasid (the caliphate ruling from Baghdad and Samarra)
Khan Sa’sa’
A Mamluk and Ottoman halt on the Damascus–Jerusalem road: a 150 by 125 metre enclosure with its seraya, arched gateways and a rock-cut well. People live inside now.
Damascus · Mamluk — Ottoman