Manbij

Manbij lies east of Aleppo on routes linking northern Syria with the Euphrates. In antiquity it was a prominent urban and religious centre. The town was devastated by the Mongols in 1260, and its subsequent settlement history cannot be assumed to have been continuous. The surrounding countryside belonged to the wider Mamluk and later Ottoman political world, whose roads and agriculture linked Aleppo with the Euphrates. Changing security and political authority affected movement and cultivation across northern Syria. Manbij's setting reflects the importance of these inland routes, while the remains of its earlier city preserve a different scale of urban history from the rural landscape around it.