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Aleppo
Al-Madrasah al-Halawiyyah stands just west of the Great Umayyad Mosque of Aleppo. The building was originally the city's great Byzantine cathedral of the…
Al-Madrasah al-Halawiyyah stands just west of the Great Umayyad Mosque of Aleppo. The building was originally the city's great Byzantine cathedral of the sixth century. It was turned into a mosque in 1124 by the qadi of Aleppo, Ibn al-Khashshab, during the Crusader attacks on the city, and Nur al-Din Zangi later made it into a madrasa in 1149, one of the first in the city. Inside, the prayer hall still keeps the ancient columns of the cathedral with their finely carved capitals, beneath a dome added in Islamic times.