Hammam Nur al-Din

The Hammam Nur al-Din was documented as part of Project Anqa, a collaboration between the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), CyArk, and Carleton University and was funded by the UK based charity the Arcadia Foundation. The project began in 2015 in response to the catastrophic loss of heritage in the Middle East and aimed to protect monuments by providing training on digital preservation techniques for local heritage professionals in the region. CyArk provided training and workshops in Lebanon to Syrian heritage professionals in 2016 and 2017 in partnership with the UNESCO Office for the Preservation of Syrian Cultural Heritage. The Syrian team documented six sites in Damascus and the data was sent back to CyArk for further processing. Believed to date to sometime around 1160, the Hammam Nur al-Din is one of the oldest bathhouses in Damascus and is so well preserved it is still in use today. Hammams, or bathhouses, were places for everyone to enjoy ritual cleansing and socializing. The structures' location among the shops of a marketplace show what an integral part hammams played in the daily life in old Damascus. Entering the hammam visitors are first greeted with the ornately decorated mashlah, a large domed chamber meant for changing and lounging, before proceeding to a series of chambers. The cold water chambers were called barrani, warm-water chambers, wustani, and the hot-water chambers were known as juwwani, where bathers would sweat in the steam entering from a side vent linked to the furnace. External Project Link: https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/dwKS8cRB3RToJg Additional Info Link: https://cyark.org/projects/hammam-nur-al-din