Historical Builder › Castles › Kerak Castle
How Long Did It Take to Build Kerak Castle?
Short answer: about 46 years, from 1142 to 1188. This period is our own estimate of the main building phase; the sources do not give one clear start and end.
The man who began Kerak in 1142 was, by title, a butler: Pagan the Butler.
What the sources say about the building period
Construction began 1142 under Pagan the Butler; captured by Saladin 1188; enlarged by the Mamluks from 1263. Wikipedia Secondary source
Stone and crew in numbers
- Country and type
- Jordan, castle
- Stone in the walls
- 40,000 to 75,000 m³ Estimate
- For comparison
- about 23 Olympic pools of stone, or 5,750 truckloads
- Average crew
- about 149 workers (model value: the crew that would need exactly this long, working without a break)
Volume basis: plan about 220 m long, 125 m wide at the broad end, 40 m at the narrow end; keep walls over 6 m thick; wall thickness and height assumed. Checked against measurements. Our estimates come from published dimensions and are shown as a range. The result is a simple model, not a measured fact.
Where the stone came from
The Crusaders used rough volcanic stone for the large perimeter walls. After 1187 the Muslim builders repaired and extended the castle with limestone from nearby quarries. Wikipedia: Kerak Castle Secondary source
Plan
Legend: tradition, not evidence
Reynald of Châtillon had prisoners thrown from the walls, with wooden boxes over their heads so that they stayed conscious during the fall.
What we know: Reynald was a real lord of Kerak, known for cruelty, and Saladin executed him after the battle of Hattin. We found the wooden-box detail only in later accounts, not in an early source.
History Hit: Kerak Castle Tradition, not evidence
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