Zuqaq al-Blat
33°53′32″N 35°29′54″E / 33.89222°N 35.49833°E
Zuqaq al-Blat (
Etymology
Zoqaq al-Blat literally means "the cobbled alley", this was a colloquial name given to the street extending from the old city to the Qantari hill and which was covered with cobblestones in the 19th century.[2]
Zuqaq al-Blat is also commonly called "al-Batrakieh" (
History
Once a medieval walled port town, Beirut experienced rapid growth during the second half of the 19th century; the overcrowded city developed beyond its walls and the affluent citizens started to build their villas on the slopes of the surrounding hills, namely
In 1832 Beirut came under the occupation of Ibrahim Pasha's troops. The new Egyptian authorities undertook grand works of urban planning and sanitation. The appointed Egyptian-Circassian governor of Beirut, Mahmoud Naami Bey commissioned street cobbling works which stretched beyond the city's walls, the street extending from the south-western side of the city wall into the new extramural neighborhoods on the Qantari hill came to be known as Zoqaq al-Blat and gave its name to the quarter.[2]
Notable residents
Some of the notable people resided in Zuqaq al-Blat included:
- Abd el-Qader Qabbani[6]
- Butrus Bustani[6]
- Fairuz
- Hussein Beyhum[6]
- Khalil Sarkis[6]
References
- ISBN 0199281637. Archivedfrom the original on 2023-08-17. Retrieved 2020-10-04.
- ^ ISBN 9953741018.
- ^ زقاق البلاط (in Arabic). yabeyrouth.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2012. Retrieved February 14, 2013.
- ^ Kihtir Öztürk, Pelin (September 2006). Urban transformation of Ottoman port cities in the nineteenth century: Change from Ottoman Beirut to French mandatory Beirut (PDF) (MA thesis). Middle East Technical University. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2014-02-02. Retrieved 2013-02-14.
- ISBN 978-0520256682.
- ^ a b c d Speidl, Bianka (2011). "Distance in vicinity: Beirut's Zuqaq el-Blat, a place of transformation, conflict and co-existence". Études sur la Région Méditerranéenne. 20: 37. Archived from the original on 2023-04-29. Retrieved 2023-04-29.