Citadel of Arbil The Citadel of Arbil ( Kurdish : قهڵای ههولێر " Qelay Hewlêr " ; Arabic : قلعة أربيل ) is a tell or occupied mound , and the historical city centre of Arbil in Iraq . It has been claimed that the site is the oldest continuously inhabited town in the world . The earliest evidence for occupation of the citadel mound dates to the 5th millennium BC , and possibly earlier . It appears for the first time in historical sources during the Ur III period , and gained particular importance during the Neo - Assyrian period . During the Sassanian period and the Abbasid Caliphate , Arbil was an important centre for Christianity . After the Mongols captured the citadel in 1258 , the importance of Arbil declined . During the 20th century , the urban structure was significantly modified , as a result of which a number of houses and public buildings were destroyed . In 2007 , the High Commission for Erbil Citadel Revitalization ( HCECR ) was established to oversee the restoration of the citadel . In the same year , all inhabitants , except one family , were evicted from the citadel as part of a large restoration project . Since then , archaeological research and restoration works have been carried out at and around the tell by various international teams and in cooperation with local specialists . The government plans to have 50 families live in the citadel once it is renovated . The buildings on top of the tell stretch over a roughly oval area of occupying . The only religious structure that currently survives is the Mulla Afandi Mosque . The mound rises between from the surrounding plain . When it was fully occupied , the citadel was divided in three districts or " mahalla s " : from east to west the Serai , the Takya and the Topkhana . The Serai was occupied by notable families ; the Takya district was named after the homes of dervish es , which are called " takyas " ; and the Topkhana district housed craftsmen and farmers . History . Prehistory . The site of the citadel may have been occupied as early as the Neolithic period , as pottery fragments possibly dating to that period have been found on the slopes of the mound . Clear evidence for occupation comes from the Chalcolithic period , with sherds resembling pottery of the Ubaid and Uruk periods in the Jazira and southeastern Turkey , respectively . Given this evidence for early occupation , the citadel has been called the oldest continuously occupied site in the world . Ur III to the Sassanids . Arbil appears for the first time at the end of the 3rd millennium BC in historical records of the Ur III period as Urbilum . King Shulgi destroyed Urbilum in his 43rd regnal year , and during the reign of his successor Amar - Sin , Urbilum was incorporated into the Ur III state . In the 18th century BC , Arbil appears in a list of cities that were conquered by Shamshi - Adad of Upper Mesopotamia and Dadusha of Eshnunna during their campaign against the land of Qabra . Shamshi - Adad installed garrisons in all the cities of the land of Urbil . During the 2nd millennium BC , Arbil was incorporated into Assyria . Arbil served as a point of departure for military campaigns toward the east . Arbil was an important city during the Neo - Assyrian period . The city took part in the great revolt against Shamshi - Adad V that broke out over the succession of Shalmaneser III . During the Neo - Assyrian period , the name of the city was written as " Arbi - Ilu " , meaning ' Four Gods ' . Arbil was an important religious centre that was compared with cities such as Babylon and Assur . Its goddess Ishtar of Arbil was one of the principal deities of Assyria , often named together with Ishtar of Nineveh . Her sanctuary was repaired by the kings Shalmaneser I , Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal . Inscriptions from Assurbanipal record oracular dreams inspired by Ishtar of Arbil . Assurbanipal probably held court in Arbil during part of his reign and received there envoys from Rusa II of Urartu after the defeat of the Elam ite ruler Teumman . After the end of the Assyrian Empire , Arbil was first controlled by the Medes and then incorporated into the Achaemenid Empire before it became part of the empire of Alexander the Great after the Battle of Gaugamela , which was fought near Arbil in 331 BC . The Roman and Parthian Empire fought over control of Arbil , or Arbira as it was known in that period , and the city became an important Christian centre . During the Sassanid period , Arbil was the seat of a governor . In 340 AD , Christians in Arbil were persecuted and in 358 , the governor became a martyr when he converted to Christianity . A Nestorian school was founded in Arbil by the School of Nisibis in " c " . 521 . During this period , Arbil was also the site of a Zoroastrian fire temple . Muslim conquest until the Ottomans . Arbil was conquered by the Muslim s in the 7th century . It remained an important Christian centre until the 9th century , when the bishop of Arbil moved his seat to Mosul . From the first half of the 12th century until 1233 , Arbil was the seat of the Begteginids , a Turkman dynasty that rose to prominence under the reign of Zengi , the atabeg of Mosul . Muzaffar Din Gökburi , the second dynast of the Begtegenid dynasty and a staunch supporter of Saladin , created a lower town around the city on the citadel mound and founded hospitals and madrasah s . Gökburi died in 1233 without an heir and control of Arbil shifted to the Abbasid Caliph Al - Mustansir after he had besieged the city . When the Mongols invaded the Near East in the 13th century , they attacked Arbil for the first time in 1237 . They plundered the lower town but had to retreat before an approaching Caliphate army and had to put off the capture of the citadel . After the fall of Baghdad to Hülegü and the Mongols in 1258 , they returned to Arbil and were able to capture the citadel after a siege lasting six months . Hülegü then appointed a Christian governor to the town and there was an influx of Jacobite s , who were allowed to build a church . As time passed , sustained and horrible persecutions of Christians , Jews and Buddhists throughout the Ilkhanate began in earnest in 1295 under the dictatorship of the ferocious and fanatical Muslim Oïrat amir Nauruz . This manifested early on in the reign of the Ilkhan Ghazan . In 1297 , after Ghazan had felt strong enough to overcome Nauruz ' influence , he put a stop to the persecutions . An unfortunate chapter in the history of this area took place during the reign of the Ilkhan Öljeitü . Muslim mobs felt emboldened to harass the Christians . The Assyrians had but one stronghold , the citadel itself . In the Spring of 1310 , the Malek ( governor ) of the region attempted to seize it from them with the help of the Kurds . Despite Mar Yahballaha ' s best efforts to avert the impending doom , the Christians strongly resisted . The citadel was at last taken by Ilkhanate troops and Kurdish tribesmen on July 1 , 1310 , and all the defenders were massacred , including all the Christian inhabitants of the lower town . During the Ottoman period , Arbil was part of the province of Baghdad , which was established in 1535 . In 1743 , the city was held for a short time by the Afsharid ruler Nader Shah after a siege lasting 60 days . An engraving from 1820 shows that at that time both the citadel mound and the plain at its southern foot were occupied . Mohammed Khor , a local Kurdish beg of Rowanduz , controlled Arbil for a short period in 1862 . In 1892 , the town had approximately 3 , 200 inhabitants , including a sizeable Jewish minority . Modern period . During the 20th century , the citadel witnessed significant urban and social changes . A high steel water tank was erected on the citadel in 1924 , providing the inhabitants with purified water , but also causing water damage to the foundations of the buildings due to increased water seepage . The number of inhabitants gradually declined over the 20th century as the city at the foot of the citadel grew and wealthier inhabitants moved to larger , modern houses with gardens . In 1960 , over 60 houses , a mosque and a school were demolished to make way for a straight road connecting the southern gate with the northern gate . Some reconstruction works were carried in 1979 on the citadel ' s southern gate and the " hammam " . In 2007 , the remaining 840 families were evicted from the citadel as part of a large project to restore and preserve the historic character of the citadel . These families were offered financial compensation . One family was allowed to continue living on the citadel to ensure that there would be no break in the possible 8 , 000 years of continuous habitation of the site , and the government plans to have 50 families live in the citadel once it is renovated . In 2004 , the Kurdish Textile Museum opened its doors in a renovated mansion in the southeast quarter of the citadel . Architecture and layout . The citadel is situated on a large tell – or settlement mound – of roughly oval shape that is between high . The area on top of the mound measures and is large . Natural soil has been found at a depth of below the present surface of the mound . The angle of the citadel mound ' s slopes is " c " . 45° . Three ramps , located on the northern , eastern and southern slopes of the mound , lead up to gates in the outer ring of houses . The southern gate was the oldest and was rebuilt at least once , in 1860 , and demolished in 1960 . The current gate house was constructed in 1979 . The eastern gate is called the Harem Gate and was used by women . It seems unclear when the northern gate was opened . One source claims that it was opened in 1924 , while another observes that there were only two gates in 1944 – the southern and eastern gates . During the early 20th century , there were three mosques , two schools , two " takyas " and a hammam on the citadel . The citadel also housed a synagogue until 1957 . The only religious structure that currently survives is the Mulla Afandi Mosque , which was rebuilt on the location of an earlier 19th - century mosque . The hammam was built in 1775 by Qassim Agha Abdullah . It went out of service during the 1970s and was renovated in 1979 , although many original architectural details were lost . When it was still occupied , the citadel was divided in three districts or " mahalla s " : from east to west the Serai , the Takya and the Topkhana . The Serai was occupied by notable families ; the Takya district was named after the homes of dervish es , which are called " takyas " ; and the Topkhana district housed craftsmen and farmers . An inventory made in 1920 shows that at time the citadel was divided in 506 house plots . Since that time , the number of houses and inhabitants has gradually declined . For example , in 1984 , 4 , 466 people lived in 375 houses whereas a 1995 census showed that the citadel had only 1 , 631 inhabitants living in 247 houses . Until the opening - up of the main north – south thoroughfare , the streets on the citadel mound radiated outward from the southern gate like the branches of a tree . Streets were between wide and ranged in length from for major alleyways to for cul - de - sac s . The perimeter wall of the citadel is not a continuous fortification wall , but consists of the façades of approximately 100 houses that have been built against each other . Because they have been built on or near the steep slope of the citadel mound , many of these façades were strengthened by buttress es to prevent their collapse or subsidence . There were circa 30 city - palaces ; most of them located along the perimeter of the citadel . The oldest surviving house that can be securely dated through an inscription was built in 1893 . The oldest houses can be found on the southeastern side of the mound , whereas houses on the northern perimeter date to the 1930s – 1940s . Before the introduction of modern building techniques , most houses on the citadel were built around a courtyard . A raised arcade overlooking the courtyard , a flat roof and a bent - access entrance to prevent views of the courtyard and the interior of the house were characteristic elements of the houses on the citadel . Research and restoration . In 2006 and 2007 , a team from the University of West Bohemia , together with Salahaddin University in Arbil , carried out an extensive survey and evaluation of the entire citadel . As part of this project , geodetic measurements of the citadel were taken and these were combined with satellite imagery , regular photographic imagery and aerial photographs to create a map and digital 3D model of the citadel mound and the houses on top of it . Geophysical prospection was carried out in some areas of the citadel to detect traces of older architecture buried under the present houses . Archaeological investigations included an archaeological survey on the western slope of the citadel mound , and the excavation of a small test trench in the eastern part of the citadel . A Neo - Assyrian chamber tomb was found at the foot of the citadel mound during construction activities in 2009 . It was subsequently excavated by the local Antiquities Service and archaeologists from the German Archaeological Institute ( " DAI " ) . The tomb was plundered in antiquity but still contained pottery dating to the 8th and 7th centuries BC . The cooperation between the Antiquities Service and the DAI was continued later that year with a further investigation of the tomb and with a small excavation nearby and geophysical survey of the surrounding area , in which also students from Salahaddin University participated . These investigations revealed the presence of architecture probably dating to the Neo - Assyrian period , as well as more burials belonging to subsequent centuries . In 2007 , the Kurdistan Regional Government ( KRG ) established the High Commission for Erbil Citadel Revitalization ( HCECR ) to preserve and restore the citadel with the help of UNESCO . Among other things , the HCECR advocates the establishment of a zone extending up to from the citadel in which building height should be restricted to approximately . This would ensure the visual dominance of the citadel over its surroundings . On 8 January 2010 , the HCECR and the Iraqi State Board for Antiquities and Heritage ( SBAH ) submitted the Citadel of Erbil to the Iraqi Tentative List of sites that are considered for nomination as World Heritage Site . The submission states that " The Citadel is today one of the most dramatic and visually exciting cultural sites not only in the Middle East but also in the world . " Two further agreements between the HCECR and UNESCO were signed in March 2010 , and it was disclosed that Arbil Governorate will finance the restoration project with US $ 13 million . The first restoration works have been carried out in June 2010 .