Featured places
Mosques, caravanserais, souks, museums — and why they are worth the walk.
813 Places
Jubb’adin
A village in the Qalamoun, 6 kilometres from Maaloula. One of the two places on earth where Western Aramaic is still spoken, and the Muslim one of the two.
Damascus · —
Deir Atiyah
A town at 1250 metres, 10 kilometres north of Nebek. Windmills that pump water from the deep wells, a full local museum, and the habit of drinking mate.
Nebek · —
The Jarrah Mosque
A plain neighbourhood mosque beside the Bab al-Saghir cemetery. Founded in 1182 under Saladin and enlarged in 1233, with a small courtyard and timber roof.
Damascus · Ayyubid, the dynasty founded by Saladin
The Ibrahim ibn Adham Mosque and Tomb
A mosque and shrine in the middle of Jableh, just north of the Roman theatre: a Seljuk tomb, a Mamluk mosque built onto it, Ottoman domes above them both.
Latakia · Seljuk — Mamluk — Ottoman
Jebel Aqra, Mount Kasios
The bare-topped limestone mountain rising behind Kessab. In the Ugarit texts the storm god’s palace stood on its peak; the summit is now on the Turkish side.
Latakia · Cult site from the Bronze Age to Rome
The Jaqmaqiyya Madrasa and Calligraphy Museum
A Mamluk madrasa facing the north gate of the Umayyad Mosque, now the Museum of Arabic Calligraphy, with a roofed courtyard and its founder’s tomb niche.
Damascus · Mamluk, the sultanate that ruled Syria and Egypt from the 13th century
The Al-Buzuriyah Souq
The spice and herb souq of Damascus, south of the Umayyad Mosque under an arched metal roof: apothecaries, dried fruit, laurel soap and sugared almonds.
Damascus · Ottoman
Bloudan
A town at 1500 metres, 5 kilometres above the Zabadani plain. Almond woods, terraced orchards, and a name that two Arab summits once borrowed from it.
Zabadani · —
Beit Achiqbash, Aleppo
An Aleppine courtyard mansion of 1757 in Jdeideh, home to the Museum of Popular Traditions since 1973. The carving on its court is the city’s richest.
Aleppo · Ottoman
Behyo, a Dead City in Jebel al-A’la
Two churches and olive presses on the crest of Jebel al-A’la. The west wall of the south-west basilica, its medallion lintel and horseshoe bema all survive.
Idlib · Byzantine
The Bahramiyah Mosque, Aleppo
An Ottoman mosque of 1583 between Bab Antakya and Khan al-Jumruk, built by Behram Pasha. Domed arcades, one great dome, a minaret as thin as a pencil.
Aleppo · Ottoman
Basufan and the Church of Saint Phocas
A three-aisled Byzantine church standing in the middle of a living village east of Jebel Sem’an. An inscription on its south wall dates it to 491-492.
Aleppo · Byzantine
