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List of cities with defensive walls

The following cities have, or historically had, defensive walls.

Africa

Algeria

Egypt

See List of Egypt castles, forts, fortifications and city walls.

Ethiopia

Libya

Mali

Morocco

Niger

  • Zinder, Niger was well known for its city wall, the remains of which can still be seen

Nigeria

Tunisia

Americas

Canada

Chile

Colombia

Cuba

Dominican Republic

Mexico

  • Campeche – majority of the walls around the old town survive
  • Mayapan (Maya ruins)
  • Mérida, Yucatán (mostly demolished in the late 19th century, but some segments and arched gateways remain)
  • Mexico City (the Aztec city used to have a system of fortifications which was later destroyed during Spanish colonisation)
  • Tulum (Maya ruins)
  • Veracruz (walls demolished in the 19th century, but a bastion remains)

Panama

Peru

Puerto Rico

United States

  • Boston, Massachusetts, maintained a defensive city wall and gate across Boston Neck, the sole point where the city was connected with the mainland, from 1631 until the end of the 18th century.
  • Charleston, South Carolina was a walled city from the 1690s until the 1720s. A portion of the wall, called Half Moon Battery, is still visible in the Provost Dungeon of the Old Exchange Building.
  • St. Augustine, Florida, starting in 1704, the Spanish constructed the Cubo Line – attached to the Castillo de San Marcos and enclosing the city. 18th century maps detail the walls enclosing all of St. Augustine
  • New Orleans, planned in 1718 as a walled city. The wall was present during the Battle of New Orleans, but was found to be in such a state of disarray that it could not be used.
  • New York City, in the 17th century New Amsterdam had a defensive wall across Manhattan. Wall Street is named for the barrier.

Uruguay

Asia

Afghanistan

  • Balkh, the ancient city

China

India

Indonesia

Pakuan Pajajaran, the capital of the Sunda Kingdom, was surrounded by defensive moats and walls. Now the area is part of the modern city of Bogor.

An 18th century wall made by Hamengkubuwono the 1st from the Ngayogyakarta Hadiningrat Kingdom to protect the inner capital city from the Dutch and other enemies during the Mataram Kingdom period. Today, 96% of the wall still exists and is a local landmark.

On 17 February 1745, the Surakarta Kingdom moved to a new opened forest named Sala Village and build their Royal Residential Palace and urban area with a 15 kilometers long of "Beteng Kraton" or Palace wall around it. As of 2022, 90% of the city walls still remain.

Well known as Banten Kingdom's capital. The wall was destroyed by the Dutch during its colonial period in the way to ended the Banten reign. The city wall that left is only about 10% from the real appearance.

Trowulan was the capital of the former Majapahit Empire. When its glory period, the capital being a first European systemized ancient city (with city canal system for transportation and also large aisle and road for major transportation) in Indonesia, because Trowulan was developed in Majapahit's glory period in 13th–15th century. The wall was protecting the inner "Kraton" or royal palace and some important places. Today the wall can't be seen as the original appearance.

Iran

Iraq

Israel

Lebanon

  • Baalbek: sections of the Arab fortifications (built with stones from Roman structures) can still be seen around the Acropolis and the old town
  • Batroun: the town is known for its 225 m long Phoenician seawall. There was also a 9th-century BC citadel, parts of which are still visible
  • Beirut: sections of the Phoenician and Roman fortifications and Ottoman citadel have been unearthed in the city's central district. The famous walls erected by Emir Fakhruddin II have yet to be recovered.
  • Byblos: the old town is surrounded by medieval walls, with a castle standing at their Southern edge
  • Sidon: little remains today of the city's medieval fortifications, except the Castle of St. Louis.

Malaysia

  • Malacca – Built by the Portuguese after the city's occupation in 1511, it was torn down by the British in 1806. Known locally as the A Famosa.

Pakistan

Almost every old city in Pakistan had a defensive wall. Much of these walls were destroyed by the British in order to refortify the cities. Few cities which were fortified are:

Palestine

Philippines

South Korea

Sri Lanka

Syria

Taiwan

Some other towns were fortified with thorny bamboo in the Qing era.

Thailand

Uzbekistan

Vietnam

Yemen

Europe

Albania

Austria

Azerbaijan

  • Baku retains most of the city walls that separate the historic Inner City from the newer parts of the city developed after the 19th century.
  • Shaki
  • Shusha

Belgium

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Bulgaria

  • Hisarya – the old Roman town is still almost entirely surrounded by the well preserved ruins of its defensive walls.

Croatia

Cyprus

Czech Republic

Denmark

  • Fredericia, extensive renaissance ramparts to the north and west of the city and sea facing ramparts.
  • Copenhagen, extensive renaissance ramparts to the south and east, trace remains to the north and west, nice fort at the harbor mouth, three small island fortlets outside the harbor entrance.
  • Nyborg Ã¢Â€Â“ the remains include three preserved bastions, a town gate and the old town is still mostly surrounded by a moat indicating the locations of the other (now demolished) bastions.
  • Stege, One of the town gates, the Mølleporten, still remains. Most of the earthwork rampart and dry ditch surrounding the town center still remain.

Estonia

Finland

  • Hamina Surrounded by about 4–5 km long star-shaped walled fortification
  • Lappeenranta The old center of the town is located inside a fortress
  • Loviisa It was planned to build a full fortress around the town, but only two bastions were complete
  • Suomenlinna An inhabited sea fortress off the coast of Helsinki

France

Germany

Gibraltar

Greece

Many towns and cities still retain at least parts of their defensive walls, including:

Hungary

  • Buda Ã¢Â€Â“ the Castle Hill is surrounded by preserved medieval and early modern fortifications. Only a short section survived from the walls of the Víziváros neighbourhood.
  • Pest Ã¢Â€Â“ segments of the 15th-century city walls are preserved inside the courtyards of later houses.
  • Eger Ã¢Â€Â“ some segments preserved, mostly demolished
  • Győr Ã¢Â€Â“ the walls were demolished in the 19th century but segments are preserved
  • Komárom
  • Kőszeg
  • Mosonmagyaróvár Ã¢Â€Â“ the walls were demolished in the 1820s
  • Pécs Ã¢Â€Â“ long sections of the medieval walls are preserved and freed to later intrusions.
  • Sárospatak
  • Sopron Ã¢Â€Â“ medieval circle of walls partly built on ancient Roman foundations
  • Szécsény Ã¢Â€Â“ some segments of the city walls preserved
  • Székesfehérvár Ã¢Â€Â“ long sections of the medieval walls are preserved
  • Vác Ã¢Â€Â“ some segments and one tower preserved
  • Veszprém Ã¢Â€Â“ walled old town on Castle Hill

Republic of Ireland

Italy

Latvia

  • Riga Ã¢Â€Â“ the best preserved part of the old town walls is the Powder Tower. Just north west of the Powder Tower remains a stretch of wall with a square tower. Foundations of the wall can be seen at Kalēju iela street, and there are fragments of a ruined wall at the site of a demolished building at Minsterejas iela street. The only remains of the earthen ramparts around the old town is a star shaped moat, now transformed into a park.
  • Cēsis
  • Daugavpils fortress (Not a true walled city, but a huge fortress with buildings)
  • Limbaži
  • Valmiera

Lithuania

Luxembourg

North Macedonia

Malta

Monaco

Montenegro

Netherlands

Norway

Poland

Portugal

Romania

Russia

City walls
  • Vyborg (two towers of the medieval wall remain, while one bastion on one side and a full set on the other remains from the bastioned fortifications)
  • Yaroslavl (only several towers still stand)
  • Novokuznetsk
  • Gorodets
Kremlins (citadels)

Serbia

Slovakia

Slovenia

  • Celje
  • Koper
  • Kranj – evidence of the 1st-century fortifications and parts of the medieval fortifications, with four of the original eight towers preserved
  • Ljubljana – In the 1st century AD, a Roman settlement called Emona, on the site of the present-day Ljubljana, was fortified with strong walls. A small section of the southern wall is still preserved to this day. Ljubljana got its medieval walls, like many other towns in Slovenia, in the 13th century
  • Maribor – Originally 13th-century fortifications, rebuilt several times until the 17th century; some segments, including three towers and two bastions, are still preserved. Withstood sieges by Matthias Corvinus in 1480/1481 and by the Ottoman Empire in 1532.
  • Novo Mesto
  • Piran – 7th-century fortification, expanded between 1470 and 1533
  • Ptuj – 13th-century fortification
  • Slovenj Gradec
  • Å kofja Loka
  • Vipavski Križ

Spain

Sweden

  • City wall of Visby
  • Gothenburg has a part of the western city wall left, the bastion Carolus Rex at Esperantoplatsen (Esperanto square) and most of the city moat is still left.
  • Halmstad had renaissance ramparts. To the north of the old town a bastion with adjacent town gate remains, the Norre Port. To the south of the old town a bastion with a remnant of the moat remains.
  • Kalmar substantial remains of the walls. Sizable stretches of walls and a bastion remain to the south of the old town. To the east remain two bastions. To the north remain portions of wall near Fiskaregatan. To the west the shape of two bastions is clearly recognizable, with a ravelin in front of the remaining town gate Westport (Westgate). Two other town gates still remain, an unmanned gate of later date at the Skeppsbrogatan, and a gate at Skeppsbron.
  • Stockholm has a small remainder of the medieval city wall preserved.
  • Bohus Fortress

Switzerland

Turkey

  • Troy. The ancient city of Troy was famous for its defensive walls. There is archaeological evidence that Troy VII, generally identified as the stage of the legendary Trojan War of Homer's Iliad, usually dated between 1194 BC Ã¢Â€Â“ 1184 BC, had walls with a carefully built stone base over four meters thick and some nine meters high in places, which was surmounted by a larger superstructure with towers in mudbrick. The walls in Homer's epic are so mighty that the siege of Troy by Achaeans lasts more than nine years, and only could be finished with the trickery of the Trojan Horse. Sections of the stone base of Trojan walls still survive on the archaeological site in present-day Hisarlık, in Çanakkale Province.
  • Istanbul. The system of walls around (as it was then known) Constantinople built in 412 by the Roman emperor Theodosius II was a complex stone barrier that stretched 6.5 kilometers and is often called the Wall of Theodosius. This barrier stood impregnable for ten centuries and resisted several violent sieges until 1453 when the Ottomans succeeded in breaching the walls. There was a new element in the battlefield: the Ottoman army had powder cannon and the walls offered limited resistance to them.

Ukraine

City walls
Citadels and castles

United Kingdom

England

Northern Ireland

Scotland

Wales

Vatican City

See also

References