1 · POSITION
Tripoli, in northern Lebanon, keeps a Mamluk old city of narrow streets built for defence, where jewellers, perfumers, tanners, soap-makers and tailors still work. The register calls it the most important missing hospitality city of the region, because its khans, souqs and baths bear on the receiving of strangers more directly than any Crusader castle on the coast. [1]
2 · THE KHANS
Khan al-Khayyatin, the tailors’ khan, was built in the fourteenth century beside the Ezzedin baths; tailors and dry-goods merchants still use its ground-floor shops, and its upper rooms were restored in 1992. Khan as-Saboun, built in the early seventeenth century as Ottoman barracks, became the city’s soap khan. [1, 2]
3 · THE SOUQS
The souqs sell everything from books to imitation shoes, and the gold and silver market, Souk el-Sayagheen, and the soap market at Khan as-Saboun are among the old city’s trades. The register keeps Khan al-Khayyatin under its own code. [1]
4 · WHY THE CITY
A coast of castles tells how the Crusaders held the land; a city of khans tells how strangers were received in it. Tripoli has the second kind in working order, which is the reason the register holds it. [1]
5 · ⚑ CANDOUR
⚑ The city’s baths and the full list of its khans are not described from sources here; only two khans are. The register’s judgement of the city’s importance is the register’s. [1–2]
Sources & Further Reading
Sources checked 22 October 2026.