Dhat al-Hajj

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Dhat al-Hajj
Tabuk Province, Saudi Arabia
The fort of Dhat al-Hajj, 1907
Dhat al-Hajj is located in Saudi Arabia
Dhat al-Hajj
Dhat al-Hajj
Coordinates29°02′50″N 36°10′09″E / 29.047272°N 36.169288°E / 29.047272; 36.169288
Length20 by 20 meters (66 ft × 66 ft)
Site information
Controlled bySaudi Arabia
ConditionWell-preserved
Site history
Built1559 (completed 1563)
Built bySuleiman the Magnificent
MaterialsStone, lime mortar

Dhat al-Hajj is an archaeological site in the Tabuk Province of Saudi Arabia, located north of Tabuk and 16 kilometers (9.9 mi) south of the border with Jordan. Beginning sometime in the Middle Ages, Dhat al-Hajj served as a rest stop and watering place on the Hajj caravan route connecting Egypt and Syria to the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina. The Ottomans fortified the site in the late 16th century. It fell into ruin by the early 18th century and was taken over by Bedouin tribesmen, though it was restored in later decades. The fort is a three-story square structure built around a courtyard and reservoir.

History

The earliest possible reference to Dhat al-Hajj was by the 9th-century geographer

Abu'l-Fida noted that in 1313, Dhat al-Hajj was the site of an attack by Banu Lam tribesmen against a group of merchants heading for Tabuk to trade with Muslim pilgrims returning to Syria.[3] The merchants, twenty of whom were killed, and their guards forced back the Bedouin tribesmen and captured eighty of their camels.[3]

The Ottoman Empire annexed the

Banu Sakhr and its allies launched a massive raid in 1757 against the Hajj caravan near Dhat al-Hajj, and at al-Qatranah and Al-'Ula, during which 20,000 pilgrims were killed or died of thirst or starvation.[3][5] The fort had apparently been repaired by 1779 when a traveler's account did not mention it being destroyed and noted the abundant water sources in its vicinity.[3] At the time, the fort was controlled by Bedouin tribesmen from the Banu Salim.[3]

Hejaz Railway
station at Dhat al-Hajj, 1916

In the early 19th century, John Burckhardt visited Dhat al-Hajj and remarked that it was surrounded by an abundance of fruitless date palms.[3] A formal inspection of the Dhat al-Hajj fort was carried out under the auspices of the Ottoman viceroy of Egypt, Muhammad Ali Pasha.[3] The report noted that the fort was in good condition and contained a cistern that was supplied with water by a spring within the fort's walls and via a canal by a spring located some distance from the fort.[3] Charles Doughty gave the first detailed European description of the fort in the late 19th century, during which he reported that the Hajj had "so much ... diminished from its ancient glory".[4] The Rubillat branch of the Banu Atiya tribe dominated the vicinity of Dhat al-Hajj at that time.[4]

Architecture

According to Petersen, Dhat al-Hajj "is one of the best preserved 16th-century forts on the Hajj route and despite several restorations ... the fort appears to be close to its original design."[4] The fort is a square, three-story structure that measures roughly 20 meters (66 ft) on each side.[4] The ground floor consists of a courtyard with a cistern.[4] The upper floor is a parapet indented at intervals for gun or arrow slits.[4] There are no window openings on the walls of the ground floor, but the second floor's walls have five narrow, arched openings on each side and the upper floor has two rows of openings on each side, with the upper row's openings wider than the bottom row.[4] On the corners nearest to the fort's gateway are two small, box-shaped latrines.[4] There are also three buttresses on each wall.[4] The fort was built with roughly-cut stone blocks set in white lime mortar.[4]

See also

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Zat ul Hajj.
  1. ^ a b c d Petersen 2012, p. 130.
  2. ^ Petersen 2012, pp. 130–131.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Petersen 2012, p. 131.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Petersen 2012, p. 132.
  5. ISBN 9780940670112
    .

Bibliography

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