On approaching the present western entrance, corresponding to the vanished Bāb as-Sirr of medieval times, one finds the way spanned by a wall of dubious character, apparently refaced, if not rebuilt. since the Middle Ages. There is little of this front of the defenses to be seen, as on this side the shops of Sūq al-H̱uǧā (1) are built actually against the outside of the wall, and barrack buildings against the inside (2), so that the whole is obscured. It appears, however, that one is passing over the site of the vanished Tower 13.
Traversing the entrance, one finds oneself on the parade ground of the gendarmerie barracks, which occupies this end of the enclosure. All around are buildings, ancient and modern, turned to the use of stores and regimental offices, while at the far end a high barbed-wire fence surrounds the exercise yard of the prison. Around all stand twelve enormous towers (3). These are by no means all in equally good condition; Tower 1, for instance, has lost its entire outer portion (4), and the five towers of the northern face have all been much patched and rebuilt—Tower 11, the smallest in the Citadel, is entirely secondary work—and are mostly in poor condition. The large square tower 8 at the northeast corner, however, is evidently very much in the state in which its last construction left it, and the towers of the east and south sides are largely complete, despite the loss of much of the parapets and of the upper story of Tower 5. In particular, the two huge and lofty towers, 3 and 4, dominate the whole scene.
The curtains correspond in condition to the towers; on the north they are grievously patched and breached, and on the east and south largely intact, except for curtain 4-5, which has been greatly reduced in height.
There is little to note beyond the range of loopholes remaining in the northern part of the curtain 12-13, situated on the Citadel's most exposed side. Tower 13, probably a gate-tower—as Bāb as-Sirr seems to have been there—was likely located near the middle of the curtain connecting towers 1 and 12 (5).
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1. Number 7 of the attached map (Stefan Weber: "Reshaping Damascus: social change and patterns of architecture in late Ottoman times" in Thomas Philipp and Christoph Schumann: "From the Syrian Land to the States of Syria and Lebanon", Orient-Institut der DMG Beirut 2004, p 41-58).
2. As seen on the left in the attached photograph (circa 1930).
3. D'Arvieux (p 449) describes the Citadel as having fourteen towers, two on each of the short faces. Unless the two on the west face were abnormally small, there would hardly be room for them, and it is significant that d'Arvieux entered the Citadel by the east gate where there are two towers, and that he was in disguise, and dared not make a long examination. Under these circumstances an error of this kind is very understandable; for a much more alarming miscount of the towers, see Porter (p. 50).
4. The description reflects King's observations in the early 1940s. Tower 1 has been entirely rebuilt since.
5. The western front was completely shut in between Sūq al-H̱uǧā from the outside and the barracks from the inside when King explored the fortress in the early 1940's; it was uncovered in the 1980's when Sūq al-H̱uǧā was demolished. The attached color photo taken from west to east reflects its current status.
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D. J. Cathcart King. The Defences of the Citadel of Damascus; a Great Mohammedan Fortress of the Time of the Crusades. Archaeologia, Volume XCIV, 1951 (p 57-96).
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