Downtown historic area

The Diyarbakır Fortress and Hevsel Gardens Cultural Landscape is a historic area located on an escarpment in the Upper Tigris River Basin. The fortified city has been an important centre since the Hellenistic period, through the Roman, Sassanid, Byzantine, Islamic and Ottoman times to the present. The site encompasses the Inner castle, known as İçkale, and the 5.8 km-long city walls of Diyarbakır with their numerous towers, gates, buttresses, and 63 inscriptions. The site also includes the Hevsel Gardens, a green link between the city and the Tigris that supplied the city with food and water. The city walls, and the evidence of their damage, repair and reinforcement since the Roman period, present a powerful physical and visual testimony to the history of the city