THE KRAK DES CHEVALI

THE KRAK DES CHEVALIERS


“As the Parthenon is to Greek temples and Chartres to Gothic cathedrals, so is the Krak des Chevaliers to medieval castles, the supreme example, one of the great buildings of all time”.

Military architecture is not a subject which I find particularly inspiring, or even attractive, but the Krak des Chevaliers or Qalaat al-Husn as it is known in Arabic, described by T.E. Lawrence as “perhaps the best  preserved and most wholly admirable castle in the world”, is one of the “must sees” of Syria, so we took the road northwards with the idea of finding a room at a hotel in Homs which could serve as our base for exploring that area over a couple of days.  However, when we reaached the hotel, it turned out to be full and, although there was a possibility that one room might be free later, there was no guarantee of when that information would become available, so we opted to head straight for the Krak and play it by ear.

Leaving Homs, we took the Tartous road towards the coast turning inland about forty kilometres before Tartous.  The road we took makes a detour through a number of mainly Christian villages before ascending towards the fortress, which perches atop the Jabal Kalakh.  The site of the fortress was important as a strategic position long before the Crusaders wrote their unfortunate pages of history, because it lies near a gap in the hills, known as the Homs Gap, separating Syria from Lebanon which was the natural link between Homs and the sea as well as a natural passage for the winds, and so it was important to the Egyptians during their struggle against the Hittites for domination of Syria.

The Crusaders, who were responsible for the building which now stands there, arrived in 1099.  When the eastern forces almost reached the gates of Constantinople, Europe, barely emerging from the obscurity of the Middle Ages, reacted to what they regarded as a threat and, urged on by the preaching of Pope Urban II, the Crusades began. The expressed aims - to recover the true cross and liberate the Christian holy places from the ”infidel” - were of the noblest but the real underlying spur was more probably that of material conquest.  The Franks, as they were known, did not remain united for long, and after they took Antioch with the most brutal of massacres, paying not the slightest respect for the large Greek Orthodox population, they split up, Baldwin of Boulogne heading east to set up the independent principality of Edessa in eastern Turkey while Behemond was made Prince of Antioch and Raymond Count of Toulouse set out for Jerusalem.  The brutality and bloodshed they caused makes nauseating reading, though I suppose it is only to be expected from men from a barbaric, uncultured society where the principle of dog eat dog reigned supreme.  From the point of view of the Arabs whom they invaded, who were a highly refined and cultured people at that time, the Crusaders were nothing but barbarians and savages, (It is worth reading Amin Maalouf’s book which recounts the story of the Crusades from the Arab standpoint) and, as Christian pilgrims had always had unfettered access to the Holy Places, the pretext of a holy war was never credible to them. Perhaps the most unfortunate effect of the Crusaders’ actions was on the religion which they purported to defend. When they arrived in the Levant, the Crusaders made no distinction between the Moslem and Christian inhabitants.  To them they were all the same, and the Christian communities were slaughtered with just as much savagery as the Moslem ones. This led many Christians to convert to Islam purely as a measure of self-defence because, by so doing, at least they could count on protection from the Islamic communities rather than remaining out on a limb where they were regarded as enemies by both sides. However, as they remained in the area for over two hundred years, it is reasonable to suppose that they must have had at least sporadic support from some of the Moslem princes. Most of  the Crusader fortresses are built all along the coastal fringe of the Levant rarely venturing far inland.  

The krak is a formidable fortress, blunt at the southern end and more or less horseshoe shaped the rest of the way around.  The southern end was the most vulnerable, and there they built a ditch outside the walls and, inside, a reservoir which was fed from the hills by means of a pipeline and a small aqueduct.  The outer line of defence has thirteen towers.  The ramp leading from the outside through the outer walls to the second line of defence has shafts in the roof which, apart from providing ventilation, were also used to pour boiling oil down on anyone who might manage to breach the outer wall.  The inner wall is protected on the south side by a steep glacis which, from the far side, is very imposing and must have served to discourage any would-be invaders.  


Within the second line of defence is the main courtyard and it was here that the soldiers  lived their lives when no battles were in progress.  There is a great hall where they would have eaten and next door a multi-purpose room with a kitchen in the centre.  The latrines are also still to be seen and it is plain that the refinement of the Roman world was sadly lacking here: no fine baths, no comfort, just keep your clothes on till they stink and, when they get so filthy that they can stand up by themselves, then maybe throw them away and get new ones.  Outside the great hall there is a loggia or colonnaded arcade with Gothic arches. Across the courtyard is the chapel which is from an earlier period and Romanesque in style.  During the Mameluke occupation the chapel was converted to a mosque so the qibla indicates the orientation towards Mecca.  

On the southern side is the keep which was the refuge in case of a last stand.  The keep consists of three towers which would have provided the senior ranks with some comfort and a third tower was probably the apartments of the lord of the castle.  This room is remarkably light in feel and stands in strong contrast to the massiveness of the military architecture of the rest of the defensive structure. The building is not an inspiring one but it is imposing and extremely impressive as a model of effective defensive construction.

There were quite a few visitors and many of them were young Syrians out on group excursions.  Simon became the centre of attention and had to pose every five steps to have his photograph taken with clusters of young people all around.  He grew quite blasé about it all and sat down and stayed until the click sounded before getting up again.  

Once we had visited the krak, we had intended to drive back down and visit the Monastery of St. George below but, quite simply, we forgot all about it and took another road into the hills on the assumption that it had to come out on to the main road at some point.  The road wound down the mountainside where the vegetation is identical to Andalucía and the spring flowers were in full bloom.  When the road turned into a quagmire, we were on the point of turning around to retrace our steps when we happened upon a small pick-up truck, so we asked the driver whether we would get to Tartous if we continued along the road.   He immediately left what he was doing and told us to follow him.  He drove ahead of us, through potholes and mud, to a junction where he told us to take the left fork and after two kilometres we would come to the Tartous autostrade.  They must have been two kilometres of the long variety because it seemed an age before we reached the main road, and we had to ask several times because other tracks, each looking just as likely as the other, branched off in several places and it was none too clear which was the right road.

Heading towards Tartous, we missed the turn-off, mainly because the signpost is positioned AFTER the turn-off point.  It would seem to be a common mistake, because the central reservation was punctuated with tracks indicating where vehicles had crossed over, so we took their example and did the same.  Our second plan of action was to see if there was a hotel in Tartous where we could stay, as we were looking forward to walking along the beach and seeing the sea once again, and I had visions in my mind of what this Phoenician town would look like.

Tartous and the small island of Arwad less than a kilometre offshore were twin cities. Arwad was the more important of the two and probably the most ancient too: it is mentioned in Genesis as well as in Egyptian documents as one of a number of Canaanite settlements on the coast in the early second millennium. The people of Arwad did not emulate their contemporaries at Tyre, just down the coast in modern Lebanon, but surrendered to Alexander the Great. Consequently, they prospered tremendously.  Arwad’s importance was due to its trading activities but, as an island, the security it could offer was a valuable asset until the Romans came.  As they controlled the whole of the Mediterranean, the security of the island was no longer such a plus point so the Romans  favoured Tartous. The Crusaders also took Tartous and Arwad which passed from one side to another like ping-pong balls until finally Tartous was lost.  They hung on for another thirteen years on Arwad but never again managed to gain a foothold on the mainland.  During the Crusader period Tartous was a centre of pilgrimage to the Virgin Mary and, when they finally had to flee, they took the image with them to Arwad which was the site of the Crusaders’ last stand in the Near East.


However, Tartous turned out to be a major disappointment.  The corniche or promenade has virtually been built over the beach which is now reduced to about two metres wide and serves as the place for dumping rubbish and building debris. The buildings are falling down and everything about the town is dirty and crumbling.  We did not bother to investigate the centre of the old town. The natural setting is magnificent and it is a pity that such a valuable resource is being so completely squandered.  On the other hand, in the context of an Islamic society where most people are covered from head to foot all the time, beaches may not be seen as a resource at all.  Only the children and young boys were bathing in the water.  So, although there was a hotel on the beach-front, we decided that we did not want to stay in the town and set about finding a place to have something to eat before turning around and heading back to Damascus.  

On the far end of town Robert saw a place with parking bays under the building, so we went in there.  The outside was festooned with flags and banners so we assumed that it must be some kind of restaurant for members of the ruling Baath (Revolution) party.  As we were by the sea, we ordered some red bream which came massacred from the frying pan and proved highly indigestible.  The bill, when it came, was equally indigestible and bore no relation, it seemed to us, to the quality or quantity of food we had consumed, particularly compared to other places we had eaten in.  Maybe fish is a luxury item.  It might be if they knew how to prepare it!

Another experience awaited me in the restaurant.  For the first time since I went to Lourdes with the school when I was twelve, I found myself in a toilet in a public place with only a hole in the floor and, in this case, it did not even have the two foot-rests provided in France.  A short length of hosepipe attached to a tap was the flushing mechanism. Nothing if not an experience.  

Tartous, which had seemed so seductive, was a major disappointment.

April 10th 1998