Al-Zarah ( ar, الزارة, al-Zārah, also spelled Zara) is a village in northwestern Syria, administratively part of the

Homs Governorate Homs Governorate ( ar, مُحافظة حمص / ALA-LC: ''Muḥāfaẓat Ḥimṣ'') is one of the fourteen governorates (provinces) of Syria. It is situated in central Syria. Its area differs in various sources, from to . It is thus geographic ...

, located west of Homs. Nearby localities include district center

Talkalakh Talkalakh ( ar, تَلْكَلَخ, Talkalaḵ) is a city in western Syria administratively belonging to the Homs Governorate as the capital of the Talkalakh District just north of the border with Lebanon and west of Homs. According to the Centra ...

to the south, Aridah to the southeast, Hadidah to the east, al-Husn and

Anaz Anaz ( ar, عناز, also spelled ''Aanaz'') is a village in northern Syria located west of Homs in the Homs Governorate. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics, Anaz had a population of 2,038 in the 2004 census. Its inhabitants are ...

to the northeast, Zweitinah to the north, Tell Hawsh to the northwest, Naarah to the west and Halat to the southwest. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), al-Zarah had a population of 4,336 in the 2004 census. It is second largest locality in the Talkalakh ''

nahiyah A nāḥiyah ( ar, , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiya or nahia, is a regional or local type of administrative division that usually consists of a number of villages or sometimes smaller towns. In Tajikistan, it is a second-level division w ...

'' ("subdistrict") which consists of 40 localities with a collective population of 62,069 in 2004.General Census of Population and Housing 2004
Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). Homs Governorate. The inhabitants of the town are predominantly Sunni Muslims.

History

In 1838, al-Zarah's population was listed as Turkmen. It was one of a few Turkmen villages located in the mostly Alawite and Christian-populated area west of al-Husn.

Burj Zara tower

Al-Zarah is the site of a medieval tower known as ''Burj Zahra'', which in turn was built on the remains of a

Roman era In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC ...

temple.Steinsapir, 2005, p. 89. It was constructed by the

Crusaders The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were in ...

in sometime during the early 12th century and is among several isolated towers located in the

Homs Gap The Homs Gap ( ar, فتحة حمص) (also called the Akkar Gap and known in Arabic as al-Buqay'a) is a relatively flat passage in the Orontes River Valley of southern Syria. Nicknamed the "gateway to Syria," the gap separates the An-Nusayriyah M ...

region of

County of Tripoli The County of Tripoli (1102–1289) was the last of the Crusader states. It was founded in the Levant in the modern-day region of Tripoli, northern Lebanon and parts of western Syria which supported an indigenous population of Christians, ...

. It served as a means of passive defense against the Muslim armies and was closely linked to the stronger, permanent fortresses of the

Krak des Chevaliers Krak des Chevaliers, ar, قلعة الحصن, Qalʿat al-Ḥiṣn also called Hisn al-Akrad ( ar, حصن الأكراد, Ḥiṣn al-Akrād, rtl=yes, ) and formerly Crac de l'Ospital; Krak des Chevaliers or Crac des Chevaliers (), is a medieva ...

Safita Safita ( ar, صَافِيتَا '; phn, 𐤎‬𐤐𐤕‬𐤄, ''Sōpūte'') is a city in the Tartous Governorate, northwestern Syria, located to the southeast of Tartous and to the northwest of Krak des Chevaliers. It is situated on the tops ...

Margat Margat, also known as Marqab ( ar, قلعة المرقب, ''Qalaat al-Marqab'', lit=Castle of the Watchtower), is a castle near Baniyas, Syria, which was a Crusader fortress and one of the major strongholds of the Knights Hospitaller. It is lo ...

and

Tortosa Tortosa (; ) is the capital of the '' comarca'' of Baix Ebre, in Catalonia, Spain. Tortosa is located at above sea level, by the Ebro river, protected on its northern side by the mountains of the Cardó Massif, of which Buinaca, one of the hig ...

. It was largely ignored by medieval Latin and Arabic chroniclers.Burj Zara
Fortresses of the East. 2006-03-12. Burj Zara was built on a small podium with a ground plan of 121 square meters surrounded by greenery. The ruins of the ancient temple are strewn around the building. The tower itself was mostly constructed of

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the surface of a rocky planet or moon. More than 90 ...

ic rock, except for the edges of its doors and arches, which consist of white limestone that had probably been reused from the temple's remains. Only the northern wall is still standing and there are also remnants of the arches, the door and the steps of the stairway.

References

Bibliography

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Zarah Populated places in Talkalakh District