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As-Safira ( ar, السَّفِيْرَة / ALA-LC: ''as-Safīrah''; Aleppo dialect: ''Sfīre'') is a
Syria Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...
n city administratively belonging to the Aleppo Governorate. It is the administrative center for the
as-Safira District as-Safira District ( ar, منطقة السفيرة, manṭiqat as-Safīrah) is a district of Aleppo Governorate in northern Syria. Administrative centre is the city of as-Safira. At the 2004 census, the district had a population of 178,293. T ...
. As Safīrah has an altitude of , and a population of 106,382 , making it the 11th largest city per geographical entity in Syria.


Name

Medieval geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi spells the name ''Asfīrah''le Strange, 1890, p
400
/ref> (), not ''as-Safira'' (), which indicates that the definite article in the modern spelling is a result of
hypercorrection In sociolinguistics, hypercorrection is non-standard use of language that results from the over-application of a perceived rule of language-usage prescription. A speaker or writer who produces a hypercorrection generally believes through a mi ...
. As-Safira was known in pre-Islamic times as Sipri.Ball, Warwick (2006) "The desert edges" ''Syria: A Historical And Architectural Guide'' Interlink Publishing Group, Northampton, Massachusetts, page 157, HistoriansNotably Dossin and Lewy, see Sasson, Jack M. (1966
"A Sketch of North Syrian Economic Relations in the Middle Bronze Age"
''Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient'' 9(3): pp. 161–181, page 169, note 2
have suggested that the name ''Sipri'' may have come from the Akkadian word ''siparru'' meaning "bronze", which might indicate that copper was mined and bronze was worked there.


History

Since ancient times the city has been the distribution point for salt gathered from the nearby
Sabkhat al-Jabbul Sabkhat al-Jabbūl or Mamlahat al-Jabbūl or Lake Jabbūl ( ar, سبخة الجبول) is a large, traditionally seasonal, saline lake and concurrent salt flats (sabkha) 30 km southeast of Aleppo, Syria, in the Bāb District of Aleppo Go ...
.


Climate

As-Safira has a cold semi-arid climate ( Köppen climate classification: ''BSk'').


Notes


Bibliography

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Safirah Cities in Syria Populated places in al-Safira District