Bab al-Jinan
Bab al-Jinan (Arabic: بَاب الْجِنَان, romanized: Bāb al-Jinān), meaning the Gate of Gardens, was one of the gates of Aleppo that used to lead to gardens on the banks of the Quwēq river.[1]
The gate is thought to have been built by Sayf al-Dawla during his possession of Aleppo between 944 and 967. The gate provided access to the great palace of Halba and gardens that Sayf al-Dawla had built outside the city.[2][3][4] The gate was referred to by Al-Muqaddasi in 985 as The Watermelon Gate, and noted by Alexander Russell in his 1756 book The Natural History of Aleppo.[5]
The gate was demolished around 1900 in order to widen the road. There used to be numerous exchangers and storage houses for goods near the gate, and a pine dating back to the 16th century. The gate had a tower called the "serpent tower" in which was said to be a talisman capable of protecting from serpent bites. Bāb Jnēn today is the site of a traditional souk.
References
- Knost, Stefan (2011). Historical Disasters in Context: Science, Religion, and Politics. Routledge. p. 281. ISBN 9781136476259. Retrieved 6 March 2017.
- Tabbaa, Yasser (2010). Constructions of Power and Piety in Medieval Aleppo. Penn State Press. ISBN 9780271043319.
- Bianquis (1997), p. 105
- Humphreys (2010), p. 537
- Strange, Guy Le (2011). Collected works of Guy Le Strange : the medieval Islamic world. London: I.B. Tauris. p. 362. ISBN 9781848856707. Retrieved 6 March 2017.
Bibliography
- Bianquis, Thierry (1998). "Autonomous Egypt from Ibn Ṭūlūn to Kāfūr, 868–969". In Petry, Carl F. (ed.). Cambridge History of Egypt, Volume One: Islamic Egypt, 640–1517. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 86–119. ISBN 0-521-47137-0.
- Humphreys, Stephen (2010). "Syria". In Robinson, Charles F. (ed.). The New Cambridge History of Islam, Volume I: The Formation of the Islamic World, Sixth to Eleventh Centuries. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. pp. 506–540. ISBN 978-0-521-83823-8.