Featured places
Mosques, caravanserais, souks, museums — and why they are worth the walk.
813 Places
The Maronite Cathedral of Saint Anthony, Damascus
The Maronite cathedral stands south of Bab Touma, facing the Franciscan monastery. It opened in 1864, entry is free, and two monuments stand in its courtyard.
Damascus · Ottoman — 1864
The Memorial of Saint Paul in Tabbaleh, Damascus
A tent-shaped church outside the walls in Tabbaleh. Tradition places Paul’s conversion here; consecrated in 1971, entry free, and the windows tell the story.
Damascus · Modern — chapel 1925, church 1971
Hammam al-Qishani
The tiled bath is no longer open for washing but for shopping: the inside was divided into a small souq, and the old sign still hangs above the doorway.
Damascus · Uncertain — within the Ottoman souq fabric
The Lala Mustafa Pasha Mosque
A working mosque on Baghdad Street in the Saruja quarter of Damascus. It carries an Ottoman governor’s name, but the building is far newer than his mosque.
Damascus · Ottoman endowment; the present building dates from 1936
The Bimaristan al-Qaymari
A hospital founded on the main street of Salihiyya in 1248: a striped stone portal under a muqarnas hood, three lines of inscription, stucco in the south iwan.
Damascus · Ayyubid
Al-Qassaa, Damascus
The Christian quarter that grew up outside the walls, north of Bab Touma. Named after the clay pots once made here, with two churches and one long street.
Damascus · Late Ottoman — French Mandate
Hammam al-Qarmani
One of four bath houses counted in Souq Sarouja in the 15th century. Nobody bathes here now; the domes and their glass eyes are visible from the garden.
Damascus · Mamluk and Ottoman; no firm construction date in the sources
The Al-Qali Mosque
A Mamluk mosque on the Souq Midhat Pasha line in Damascus. Its square minaret rises above the roofs, and a sabil stands at street level right below it.
Damascus · Mamluk
The Al-Qabbani Theatre, Damascus
The hall in Sarouja opened in 1962 and is among the oldest working stages in Damascus. It carries the name of the man who founded Arab theatre in 1871.
Damascus · Republican era
The Mosque of Hisham ibn Ammar
A small Mamluk mosque on the Souq Midhat Pasha line in Damascus. Its octagonal minaret rises over the market awnings, and whose name it carries is disputed.
Damascus · Mamluk
Souq al-Khoja
The one souq in Damascus given over to leather. The first was built in 1895 beside the citadel moat; the souq you walk today went up 500 metres north in 1985.
Damascus · Ottoman; present building 1985
The Al-Khanqiyya Madrasa
A Mamluk madrasa in Midan, outside the walls: its west door opens on the main street, a wooden ceiling replaced the dome, and a kuttab sits to the north.
Damascus · Mamluk
