Qurfays

Qurfays
قرفيص
Qorfeis
Village
Qurfays is located in Syria
Qurfays
Qurfays
Coordinates: 35°15′59″N 35°59′19″E / 35.26639°N 35.98861°E / 35.26639; 35.98861
Country Syria
GovernorateLatakia
DistrictJableh
Subdistrictal-Qutailibiyah
Population
 (2004)[1]
 • Total
799
Time zoneUTC+2 (EET)
 • Summer (DST)UTC+3 (EEST)

Qurfays (Arabic: قرفيص, also spelled Qurfeis or Korfeis) is a village in northwestern Syria, administratively part of the Jableh District in the Latakia Governorate, located south of Latakia. Nearby localities include Arab al-Mulk to the west, Jableh to the northwest, al-Aqibah and al-Qutailibiyah to the northeast, Sarabion and Dweir Baabda to the southeast. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics, Qurfays had a population of 5,566 in the 2004 census.[1] Its inhabitants are predominantly Alawites and is one of the centers of the large Douba family. Ali Douba, the former longtime Chief of Military Intelligence.[2]

The municipality of Qurfays was established in 1979 to administer the local affairs of the village as well as nearby al-Barazin, al-Zahra, Bishnana and Mahwarta. There are about 7,000 people living in the municipality whose mayor in 2008 was Abdullah Ehsan.[3]

History

Qurfays served as minor fortress village under the authority of the Knights Hospitallers fortress of Margat in the 13th-century and was referred to as Corveis.[4] In 1271 the Mamluk sultan Baibars defeated the Crusaders in the coastal mountain range of Syria and forced the Hospitallers to evacuate Qurfays, among other fortresses.[5] However, before they withdrew, they destroyed Qurfays and nearby Balda.[5][6] In the 1281 treaty between Mamluk sultan Qalawun and the Crusader king Bohemond IV of Antioch, Qurfays was among the many fortresses officially handed to the Mamluks.[7]

References

  1. ^ a b General Census of Population and Housing 2004. Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). Latakia Governorate. (in Arabic)
  2. ^ Batatu, 1992, p. 240.
  3. ^ Khatib, Sharaf.Municipality Qrfais and Wide Range of Services and Suffering from Lack of Central Lines for Sanitation. Unity Foundation for Press, Printing and Publishing. 2008-09-14.
  4. ^ Riley-Smith, 2012, p. 91.
  5. ^ a b Riley-Smith, 2012, p. 211.
  6. ^ Bronstein, 2005, p. 44.
  7. ^ Holt, 1995, p. 63.

Bibliography

  • Batatu, Hanna (1999). Syria's Peasantry, the Descendants of Its Lesser Rural Notables, and Their Politics. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0691002541.
  • Bronstein, Judith (2005). The Hospitallers And The Holy Land: Financing The Latin East, 1187-1274. Boydell Press. ISBN 1843831317.
  • Holt, Peter Malcolm (1995). Early Mamluk Diplomacy, 1260-1290: Treaties of Baybars and Qalāwūn with Christian Rulers. BRILL. pp. 149–150. ISBN 9004102469.
  • Riley-Smith, Jonathan (2012). The Knights Hospitaller in the Levant, C.1070-1309. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-0230290839.