Tripoli is a city in Lebanon. Situated north of Batroun and the cape of Lithoprosopon, Tripoli is the capital of the North Governorate and the district of the same name. The city is located 85 km north of the capital Beirut, and can be described as the easternmost port of Lebanon.
In ancient times, it was the center of a Phoenician confederation which included Tyre, Sidon and Arados, hence the name Tripoli, meaning "triple city" in Greek. Later, it was controlled successively by the Assyrian Empire, Persian Empire, Roman Empire, the Caliphate, the Seljuk Empire, Crusader States, the Mamluks, and the Ottoman Empire. The Crusaders established the County of Tripoli there in the twelfth century.
Tripoli is today the second-largest city and second-largest port in Lebanon, with approximately 500,000 inhabitants, mainly Sunni Muslims , along with fairly large communities of Christians and Alawite Muslims. The city borders El Mina, the port of the Tripoli district, which it is geographically conjoined with to form the greater Tripoli conurbation. |
