Citadel of Salah Al-Din

Thursday, October 28, 2010


Citadel of Salah Al-Din

The location, part of the Muqattam hill near the center of Cairo ( Egypt )

The Citadel situate in El Muqattam area in Salah Salem Street . It was mainly established by Saladin , Sultan Nur El Din Mahmud's nephew who managed to defeat the Crusaders . He assumed the power of Egypt in 1169 founding the Ayyubid dynasty in Egypt . He established this military Citadel to be the center of rule and placed it over the Muqattam hills in a very strategic place dominating the city of Cairo and EL Fustat .

The original plan of The citadel was insisting of two separate in closures: the northern and the southern ones . The northern part is distinguished by the half round towers and the curtain wall . In 1207 , Sultan El-Adel paid a great attention to strengthening the towers of the citadel and established two towers known now as Burg El-Ramla and Burg El-Haddad . In the reign of El-kamil , Saladin's nephew who ruled Egypt for about 20 years used the citadel as his residence . The citadel was once surrounded by some buildings such as the royal stable , a park , and a market beyond which the residences of the upper class members and the high officials were placed .

In the reign of Sultan El-Nasir Muhammed many parts of the citadel

were destroyed including the mosque , library , the audience hall and other places . In the Mamluk period , the building witnessed a great process of restoration on the hands of Baybars I who built Bab El-Qalaa to relate the southern and northern enclosures of the citadel . Another process of restoration was made in the reign of Mohammed Ali who attached his remarkable mosque it . After the restoration of 1983 , the building was added to the list of monuments in Egypt 

















abuiyad

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