Malabadi Bridge

Malabadi Bridge
Coordinates	38°09′13″N 41°12′13.8″E / 38.15361°N 41.203833°E / 38.15361; 41.203833Coordinates: 38°09′13″N 41°12′13.8″E / 38.15361°N 41.203833°E / 38.15361; 41.203833
Crosses	Batman River
Locale	Near Silvan, Diyarbakır Province, Eastern Anatolia Region, Turkey
Characteristics
Design	Pointed arch bridge
Material	Stone
Total length	150 m (160 yd)
Width	7 m (23 ft)
Height	19 m (62 ft)
Longest span	38.6 m (127 ft)
No. of spans	1
History
Construction begin	AH 541 (1146/1147)
Construction end	AH 548 (1153/1154)
Malabadi Bridge Location of the Malabadi Bridge

The Malabadi Bridge (Turkish: Malabadi Köprüsü, Kurdish: Pira Malabadê‎) is an arch bridge spanning the Batman River near the town of Silvan in southeastern Turkey. Construction began in the year AH 541 (1146/1147) during the Artuqid period, and appears to have been completed in AH 549 (1154/1155). The bridge was commissioned by Temür-Tash of Mardin, son of Ilghazi, and grandson of Artuk Bey.

According to the local 12th-century historian Ibn al-Azraq al-Farīqī, the current bridge replaced one built in AH 48 (668/669) that had collapsed in AH 539 (1144/1145). Inconsistencies between the two surviving manuscript copies of Ibn al-Azraq's account make it difficult to definitively identify the Malabadi bridge as the one he refers to as the Qaramān or Aqramān bridge. Nevertheless, many aspects of his geographical description and historical account support this identification.

Ibn al-Azraq says that construction of the current bridge was initiated by the Artuqid ruler of Mayafaraqin and Mardin al-Saʿīd Ḥusām al-Dīn Temür-Tash in AH 541 (1146/1147), under the supervision of al-Zāhid bin al-Ṭawīl. After al-Zāhid had built the bridge's eastern footing it was destroyed by floods. Al-Zāhid was fined for "defective craftsmanship" and replaced by Amir Saif al-Dīn Shīrbārīk Maudūd bin ʿAlī (bin Alp-Yaruq) bin Artuq. Shīrbārīk restarted the work under the supervision of Abuʾl-Khair bin al-Ḥakīm al-Fāsūl, who used massive timbers in the construction. By AH 548 (1153/1154) the bridge was nearly finished. And yet, at the time of the death of Ḥusām al-Dīn Temür-Tash on 2 Dhuʾl-Qaʿda 548/18 January 1154, the arch was not yet complete. His successor, Najm al-Dīn Alpī, set about completing the bridge, and, although work was again interrupted by flooding, "[h]e built and repaired it and completed the joining of the arch."

The French architectural historian Albert Gabriel and epigraphist Jean Sauvaget visited the bridge in 1932 and Sauvaget discerned an inscription in the name of Temür-Tash with the year AH 542 (1147/1148), which possibly corresponds to the start of the second construction under Shīrbārīk.