For nearly 1,000 years the minaret of the Great Mosque of Aleppo soared above Syria's largest city. But it now lies in ruins - one of the many victims of Syria's civil war. The minaret of Aleppo's Great Mosque was unusual - unlike traditional cylindrical minarets, it was square in cross-section. At 45m high, its pinkish-beige stone, wrapped in intricate Arabic inscriptions, stood out on the city's skyline. It tells the story of Aleppo - or Halab as it's called in Arabic - one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. The mosque was said to hold the...
