Saone

Also known as Saladin's Castle, Sahyun, Qal'at Salah ad-Din, Castle of Saone

Saone occupies a long mountain ridge between two deep ravines about thirty kilometres east of Latakia, in territory belonging to the Principality of Antioch. The Crusaders refortified an earlier Byzantine site in the early twelfth century, cutting a spectacular rock-hewn ditch 28 metres deep through the saddle of the spur and leaving a single needle of living rock to support the drawbridge — one of the most dramatic engineering feats of the medieval Mediterranean. Saladin captured the castle in July 1188 after a three-day siege and it remained in Muslim hands thereafter; the Syrian government renamed it Qal'at Salah ad-Din in 1957. The Frankish keep, the chapel, and the Byzantine inner citadel all still stand, and the rock-cut needle remains the most photographed feature of any Crusader castle in Syria.

Coordinates: 35.5972°, 36.0578°

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