Alanya Castle (Alanya Kalesi) is a medieval castle in the southern Turkish city of

Alanya Alanya (; ), formerly Alaiye, is a beach resort town, resort city, a municipality and Districts of Turkey, district of Antalya Province, Turkey. It is on the southern coast of Turkey, in the country's Mediterranean Region, Turkey, Mediterranean R ...

History

Most of the castle was built in the 13th century under the Seljuq

Sultanate of Rûm The Sultanate of Rum was a culturally Turco-Persian Sunni Muslim state, established over conquered Byzantine territories and peoples (Rum) of Anatolia by the Seljuk Turks following their entry into Anatolia after the Battle of Manzikert in 1071. ...

following the city's conquest in 1220 by Alaeddin Keykubad I, as part of a building campaign that included the

Kızıl Kule The Red Tower () is a historical tower in the Turkish city of Alanya. The building is considered to be the symbol of the city, and is used on the city's flag. History Construction of the building began in the early reign of the Anatolian Sel ...

The castle was built on the remnants of earlier

Byzantine era The Byzantine calendar, also called the Roman calendar, the Creation Era of Constantinople or the Era of the World (, also or ; 'Roman year since the creation of the universe', abbreviated as ε.Κ.), was the calendar used by the Eastern Orth ...

and

Roman era In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Em ...

fortifications. After the area was pacified under the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...

, the castle ceased to be purely defensive, and numerous villas were built inside the walls during the 19th century. Today the building is an

open-air museum An open-air museum is a museum that exhibits collections of buildings and artifacts outdoors. It is also frequently known as a museum of buildings or a folk museum. Definition Open air is "the unconfined atmosphere ... outside buildings" ...

. The castle is located high on a rocky peninsula jutting into the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern Eur ...

, which protects it from three sides and the entire castle complex covers approximately 10 hectares. The wall which surrounds the castle is long and includes 140 towers. 400 different cisterns were built to serve the castle. In 2009, city officials filed to include Alanya Castle and Tersane as

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

s, and they were named to the 2009 Tentative List.
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References

External links

Go Turkey guide to Alanya CastleNomad's Guide to Turkey
{{Authority control Buildings and structures completed in 1226 13th-century fortifications Alanya Castles in Turkey Seljuk castles Buildings and structures in Antalya Province Tourist attractions in Antalya Province Forts in Turkey Museums in Turkey Buildings and structures of the Sultanate of Rum Castles in Antalya Province