Cathedral of Our Lady of Tortosa

Also known as Tortosa Cathedral, Notre-Dame de Tortose, Cathedral of Tartus

Captured by the Franks in 1099, Tortosa (modern Tartus on the Syrian coast) hosted what is widely considered the best-preserved Crusader religious building anywhere in the Levant. The Knights Templar took the city in 1152 and rebuilt the cathedral around an older shrine that pilgrims believed had been consecrated by Saint Peter. Anticipating Mamluk attacks in the 1260s, the Templars added defensive sacristies, machicolated buttresses, and arrow-loops directly into the cathedral fabric — a rare example of a true 'fortress church'. Even after the fall of the city in 1291, the Templars held the offshore fortress of Arwad until 1302, the last Crusader-held territory on the Levantine coast. The cathedral itself was converted into a mosque under the Mamluks and today functions as a national museum, with its three aisles, transept and apse still essentially as the Templars left them.

Coordinates: 34.8889°, 35.8865°

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