Discussion

The Ottoman Empire conquered and then ruled Mesopotamia from 1509 to 1918. Early on there was either no dynamic development or no significant records now exist to track the growth of Erbil. In 1534 the Ottomans declared and approved such local Kurdish emirates as Bahdinan, Baban, and Soran. Erbil, located in the Soran emirate, expanded and flourished when Soran became one of the strongest emirates in the region. From then until recent times, the Kurds, largely retained management of Erbil (Nováček, Amin and Melčák 2008, p. 5; Doxiadis 1958, p. 7). In 1743 the city faced one final attack by Nadir Shah the Persian ruler, after which it returned to being Ottoman territory remaining under the administrative authority of the Soran emirate until its collapse in 1847 when Erbil was placed under the direct governance of Turkish administrators (Mardin 1989, p. 40). In 1870, following an announcement from Istanbul of a revision in the organization of the wilayat/province, Erbil became part of the Kirkuk administration²⁰⁷ (Doxiadis 1958, p. 7) and later was under the administrative rule of Baghdad until the end of World War 1 when it was placed under British Mandate.

Following this brief history an attempt will be made to address the question of the city’s urban environment. This will be divided into two sections, the citadel and the lowland area.

207 It became a sinjuk of the Shahrazur region

Erbil citadel

The most prominent feature in Erbil was the citadel, the qala’a. It fascinated travellers and visitors who remarked on its architecture and urban form and space. Despite the damage and devastation that had occurred in previous eras the city preserved its uniqueness. Various scholars visited Erbil and, described or referred to it in later writings. Most were foreign travellers²⁰⁸ from Europe who differed in their curiosity and in the ways they looked at the city. The focus varied between an interest in its external appearance, the architectural details of its buildings and the archaeological evidence.

The citadel impressed the travellers by its size, physical appearance, and the continuity of the urban pattern of the upper part with the lower parts of the city below the south gate; there is however, a marked lack of detailed description by foreign travellers.

Nováček, Amin, and Melčák (2013, pp. 13-14) attribute this to the obstacles of language, the absence of a local guide, a fear of the labyrinth of narrow pathways, the strong presence of Turkish troops and the limited time available to visitors. Most writers offered a description of the citadel’s main south gate (with its narrow brick-built passageway) accessed by a bridge (Nováček Amin and Melčák 2013, p. 15).

This gate, destroyed during the siege of Nader Shah in 1743, was rebuilt during the rule of Sultan Mahmoud I and paid for by the Ottoman treasury in 1745. The evidence for this comes from a script (figure 5.2), found in the Ottoman archives referring to a survey ordered by the Sultan himself to determine the cost of rebuilding the defensive elements of the Erbil and Kirkuk citadels. Most writers offered a description of the citadel’s main south gate (with its narrow brick-built passageway) accessed by a bridge (ibid., p. 15).

Figure 5.3 shows the proposed design for the rebuilding or repair of Kirkuk’s citadel gate following the Persian attack. It is similar to the existing Kirkuk gate, which might indicate that the Sultan’s order was implemented.

208 Travellers, such as Rich, Place, Fletcher, Olivier, Clement, Lycklama, Sachan, Cernik, and Herzfeld wrote their first impressions when passing the city on the journey from Baghdad to Mosul or vice versa.

Figure 5.2: The survey order made by Sultan

Source: (Ottoman Archives, Istanbul, Turkey, Cevdet Collection – Military - 51065)

Figure 5.3: A proposal, in 1882, for the design of the Topqapu gate

Source: (Prime Ministry Archives, Ottoman Section, Turkey). Published in (Saatçi 2007, p. 41).

Indirect evidence comes from Sachan who states that in addition to the main gate there was a second, small, east gate (Nováček Amin and Melčák 2013, p. 15). Sachan “…

describes the town in 1898 and observes that most of the public buildings including the Residency of the Kaimakams, [the civil administrators for a region] were within the walled Qala’a [citadel] which was accessible by means of principal gates, one opening from the south and another from the southeast” (Sachan: see Doxiadis 1959, p. 16).

With regard to the citadel wall, there is nothing to indicate that it was ever reconstructed after the Persian attack in 1743. Instead, a terrace of houses²⁰⁹ was built on the traces of its foundations (Yousef 2015; Michelmore 2013). The earliest description of the site and condition of the wall comes from an account by Carsten Niebuhr who visited Erbil in 1766 during his travels in Iraq. The citadel was being placed on a hill surrounded by a vast area of lowland, and having a brick fortification wall²¹⁰ formed by the unbroken line of house façades (Niebuhr 2007, p. 286; Houtsma 1987, p. 522).

Erbil’s paths and alleyways took their organic shape because the Usta/architect responsible for on-site city planning took into consideration the requirements of owners, i.e. a request for a larger or smaller plot of land. When choosing the terrain, he usually followed the outline configuration of the land while making alterations and improvements when possible. At that time there were no legal constraints or surveys on buildings. Anyone could choose a piece of land on which to build, and wealthy people could choose its size (Al-Sultani 2013). This is probably one of the factors leading to the development of the organic fabric that, in turn, impacted on the citadel pathways which took organic shape and were “...massive vaulted subterranean passages and chambers” (Houtsma 1987, pp. 522-523).

By the second half of the 19^th century changes had occurred to the administrative divisions of the Ottoman Empire. Erbil became the capital of the sinjuk of Shahrazour, comprised of 330 villages, and the city flourished once more when it became the region’s commercial centre. Many residential and public buildings; mosques, a

209 A terrace of houses was built instead of the wall, probably due to factors relating to stability and safety.

210From the late 19^th century onwards this unbroken row of terraced houses existed on the earlier wall. A description of a picturesque hill-top citadel encircled at its edge by a fortified wall composed of private houses sited on an earlier ruined wall, appeared in ‘E.J. Brill’s First Encyclopaedia of Islam 1913-1936’.

synagogue, a prison, houses, religious schools, and a serai, the residence of the Turkish governor, were established within the citadel (Al-Dabbagh-Chalabi, 2013a; Nováček, Amin and Melčák 2013, p. 15; Houtsma 1987, pp. 522-523). In general, the population was spread over three mehallas / districts; Serai, Topkhana, and Takia. All those rich enough or from well-known families/aghawat, lived inside the citadel, and each sector had its alleyways (Husseyn 2012, p. 128). In 1922 C.J. Edmonds stated that the most important families lived inside the citadel and that it had a hospital, a law court and a school (Doxiadis 1959, p. 16).

The above information indicates clearly that the built environment of the upper town, the citadel, included a fortified wall formed by the row of adjacent houses, two gates, paths, a residential area, religious and other public buildings. While the moat surrounding the citadel was still in existence b neglected when Rich visited the city in 1820. Eventually, when it contained enough rubbish to block the drainage it was deliberately partially filled-in and became a perimeter path (Nováček, Amin and Melčák 2013, p. 15; Houtsma 1987, p. 522).