A man looks on as a waterwheel (one of the Norias of Hama) brings water from the Orontes River to an aqueduct in Hama, Syria 🇸🇾 c. 1920s
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The Norias of Hama is a series of 17 norias, historic water-raising machines for irrigation along the Orontes River in the city of Hama, Syria. Specific dates are known for the two exceptionally large norias from their inscriptions: Noria al-Muhammadiya, created in 1361 CE and Noria al-Ma’muriyya in 1453 CE. A 13th-century regional historian wrote that norias existed in Hama in the late 9th century CE with Norias in use near Hama by 350 CE, judging from mosaics and tiles bearing images of norias at a city close to Hama.
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Noria al-Muhammadiya is 21 meters (69 feet) in diameter. It was built to supply water to the Great Mosque of Hama, one kilometer away, and it also provided a public hammam and fountains, houses and gardens nearby.
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In February 1982 the army of Syria's first Baathist dictator, Hafez Assad, launched a massive attack on Hama to crush local protests - now known as the 1982 Hama Massacre. For three weeks, the city was bombed by airplanes, shelled by artillery and tanks, and finally, large areas were demolished with dynamite and bulldozers. Many thousands of Hama citizens were killed. Heritage buildings like Hama's Great Mosque were leveled to the ground, and large parts of historic Hama were rendered wholly unrecognizable.