Tripoli

Tripoli stands near the Mediterranean below the northern Lebanon mountains. The medieval city grew inland from the old harbour around a citadel and the river Abu Ali, with mosques, markets, baths and caravanserais built under the Mamluks. Its port connected the olive-growing country of the coast and mountains to merchants sailing across the eastern Mediterranean.

The Ottomans incorporated Tripoli into their empire in the sixteenth century, and in 1579 it became the capital of a province bearing its name. New mosques and other buildings added to the Mamluk town, while French merchants maintained a strong presence at the harbour. Trade brought together the produce of the coastal hinterland and goods from the interior of Syria. Soapmaking became a notable local industry. The city's workshops used olive oil and an alkaline ingredient supplied from the deserts around Homs and Hama. Production expanded in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and Tripoli's soap was traded within the Ottoman lands. The city's bazaars and khans thus joined the port to a wider network of farmers, merchants and artisans.