Belvoir Castle ( he, כוכב הירדן, Kochav HaYarden "Star of the Jordan"; ar, كوكب الهوا, Kawkab al-Hawa "Star of the Wind") is a Crusader castle in northern

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

, on a hill on the eastern edge of the Issachar Plateau, on the edge of

Lower Galilee The Lower Galilee (; ar, الجليل الأسفل, translit=Al Jalil Al Asfal) is a region within the Northern District of Israel. The Lower Galilee is bordered by the Jezreel Valley to the south; the Upper Galilee to the north, from which it is ...

south of the

Sea of Galilee The Sea of Galilee ( he, יָם כִּנֶּרֶת, Judeo-Aramaic: יַמּא דטבריא, גִּנֵּיסַר, ar, بحيرة طبريا), also called Lake Tiberias, Kinneret or Kinnereth, is a freshwater lake in Israel. It is the lowest f ...

. Gilbert of Assailly, Grand Master of the

Knights Hospitaller The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic military order. It was headq ...

, began construction of the castle in 1168. The restored castle is located in Belvoir National Park (a.k.a. Jordan Star National Park). It is the best-preserved Crusader castle in Israel.National Parks Authority of Israel
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Strategic location

Standing above the Jordan River Valley level, the plateau commanded the route from

Gilead Gilead or Gilad (; he, גִּלְעָד ''Gīləʿāḏ'', ar, جلعاد, Ǧalʻād, Jalaad) is the ancient, historic, biblical name of the mountainous northern part of the region of Transjordan.''Easton's Bible Dictionary'Galeed''/ref> ...

into the

Kingdom of Jerusalem The Kingdom of Jerusalem ( la, Regnum Hierosolymitanum; fro, Roiaume de Jherusalem), officially known as the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem or the Frankish Kingdom of Palestine,Example (title of works): was a Crusader state that was establish ...

via a nearby river crossing. To the north is the

and to the west are hills. The site of the castle dominated the surrounding area, and in the words of Abu Shama, the castle is "set admidst the stars like an eagle's nest and abode of the moon".

History

Roman and Byzantine periods

The Hebrew name, Kochav Hayarden, meaning ''Star of the Jordan'', preserves the name of Kochava – a Jewish village which existed nearby during the Roman and

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantino ...

periods.

Crusader period

The

purchased the site from Velos, a French nobleman, in 1168. As soon as the Knights Hospitaller purchased the land, they began construction of castle. While Gilbert of Assailly was Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller, the order gained around thirteen new castles, among which Belvoir was the most important. The castle of Belvoir served as a major obstacle to the

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abraha ...

goal of invading the Crusader

from the east. It withstood an attack by Muslim forces in 1180. During the campaign of 1182, the Battle of Belvoir Castle was fought nearby between King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem and

Saladin Yusuf ibn Ayyub ibn Shadi () ( – 4 March 1193), commonly known by the epithet Saladin,, ; ku, سه‌لاحه‌دین, ; was the founder of the Ayyubid dynasty. Hailing from an ethnic Kurdish family, he was the first of both Egypt an ...

. Following

's victory over the Crusaders at the

Battle of Hattin The Battle of Hattin took place on 4 July 1187, between the Crusader states of the Levant and the forces of the Ayyubid sultan Saladin. It is also known as the Battle of the Horns of Hattin, due to the shape of the nearby extinct volcano of t ...

, Belvoir was besieged. The siege lasted a year and a half, until the defenders surrendered on 5 January 1189. An Arab governor occupied it until 1219 when the Ayyubid ruler in Damascus had it

slighted Slighting is the deliberate damage of high-status buildings to reduce their value as military, administrative or social structures. This destruction of property sometimes extended to the contents of buildings and the surrounding landscape. It is ...

. In 1241 Belvoir was ceded to the Franks, who controlled it until 1263.Colum Hourihane (ed.),''The Grove Encyclopedia of Medieval Art and Architecture,'' Oxford University Press, Vol. 2, 2012 p.298

Ottoman and British Mandate periods

During the Ottoman period it became an Arab village, Kawkab al-Hawa, whose inhabitants were forced out by the Zionist forces during the 1947-48 civil war phase of the First Arab-Israeli war. After a military assault by

Yishuv Yishuv ( he, ישוב, literally "settlement"), Ha-Yishuv ( he, הישוב, ''the Yishuv''), or Ha-Yishuv Ha-Ivri ( he, הישוב העברי, ''the Hebrew Yishuv''), is the body of Jewish residents in the Land of Israel (corresponding to the s ...

forces.

Israel

The Arab buildings on the site were demolished by the Israeli authorities between 1963 and 1968.

Architecture

After the end of the Second World War, the study of Crusader castles experienced a lull. Syria, for instance, declared independence in 1946 and had little money to spare for archaeology. In Israel, the study of Crusader castles developed under Joshua Prawer. Its most significant discovery was made at Belvoir. Between 1963 and 1968 the Israel Department of Antiquities carried out excavations at the castle. Before the investigations, it had been assumed that Belvoir was a simple castle, with just a single enclosure. Excavations in the 1960s demonstrated the complex nature of early military architecture in the

. Belvoir's design bore similarities to that of a Roman castrum: the inner enclosure was rectangular with towers at the corners, and large gatehouse in the middle of one wall, in this case the west. Belvoir is an early example of the

concentric castle A concentric castle is a castle with two or more concentric curtain walls, such that the outer wall is lower than the inner and can be defended from it. The layout was square (at Belvoir and Beaumaris) where the terrain permitted, or an irregul ...

plan, which was widely used in later crusader castles. The castle was highly symmetric, with a rectangular outer wall, reinforced with square towers at the corners and on each side, surrounding a square inner enclosure with four corner towers and one on the west wall. According to historian H. J. A. Sire, the principle of concentric design used at Belvoir "was to influence castle design for the next several centuries." Vaults on the inner side of both walls provided storage and protection during bombardments. The castle was surrounded by a moat wide and deep.

References

;Notes ;Bibliography * * *

External links

Belvoir National Park
- official site
Cochav Hayarden (Belvoir)
at the Israeli Parks Authority site.

{{Authority control Archaeological sites in Israel National parks of Israel Forts in Israel Protected areas of Northern District (Israel) Castles in Israel Buildings and structures in Northern District (Israel) Castles and fortifications of the Kingdom of Jerusalem Castles and fortifications of the Knights Hospitaller 1168 establishments in Asia Principality of Galilee 1160s establishments in the Kingdom of Jerusalem 13th-century disestablishments in the Kingdom of Jerusalem