Fortress of al-Al

The Fortress of al-Al was a short-lived castle built on the Golan Heights in Terre de Suète by Hugh of Saint Omer in 1105.

Doubts about existence

Moshe Sharon, in his monumental Corpus Inscriptionum Arabicarum Palaestinae (CIAP), plainly states that there has been no such castle at all.[1] He considers it to be a legend that must have begun with someone identifying the Arabic name of the site, Qasr Bardawil (qasr meaning castle), with the Crusader king Baldwin I, called Bardawil in Arabic chronicles.[1] The legend with all its elements (construction year 1105, with Hugh of St. Omer, who did indeed build Toron, as the man put in charge) was copied from one author to the next, including by noted medievalists Runciman and Prawer, until the archaeological survey done by Israeli archaeologists right after the Six-Day War, in 1968, and published in 1972 (Judea, Samaria and the Golan: Archaeological Survey 1967-1968, The Archaeological Survey of Israel and Carta, editor Moshe Kochavi) dated the site to the Bronze Age.[1]

Presumed history

Denys Pringle mentions the castle as being built by Baldwin I (r. 1100–1018).[2] The history of the castle is based on the works of Damascene politician and chronicler ibn al-Qalanisi (c. 1071–1160), which are interpreted as to say that Toghtekin, atabeg of Damascus, destroyed the castle in December of the same year.[2]

It was known as Qasr Bardawil, the Castle of Baldwin. The castle was one of three, including Chastel Neuf and the castle at Toron, built in the region. The uncompleted castle was first used in 1106 and Hugh was killed returning there after a successful raid in Damascene territory. Toghtekin, not wishing to have a Frankish stronghold so close to Damascus, attacked the site and imprisoned the garrison, throwing the stones of the castle into the ravine below. The Franks then abandoned the site as too difficult to defend, relocating to Cave de Suète.

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References
  1. Moshe Sharon, Corpus Inscriptionum Arabicarum Palaestinae (CIAP) Volume Two: B-C. BRILL, 1997, ISBN 9789004110830, p. 34, accessed 19 July 2019
  2. Pringle, Denys (1997). Qasr Bardawil (R 14). Secular Buildings in the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem: An Archaeological Gazetteer. Cambridge University Press. p. 117. ISBN 9780521460101. Retrieved 21 July 2019. Identified by Deschamps and others as a castle built by Baldwin I in 1105 ... However, more recent survey suggests the occupation to be principally Middle Bronze Age II.
  • Devais, Cédric, A Seigneury on the Eastern Border of the Kingdom of Jerusalem: The Terre de Suète, in Studies in the Archaeology of the Medieval Mediterranean, edited by James Schryver, Brill, 2010, (available on-line), p. 74
  • Runciman, Steven, A History of the Crusades, Volume Two: The Kingdom of Jerusalem and the Frankish East, 1100-1187, Cambridge University Press, London, 1952, pp. 95-96
  • Kennedy, Hugh, Crusader Castles, Cambridge University Press, 2001, pp. 40, 52-53

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