Arab Souq

The souq is the oldest continuously functioning institution in most Arab cities. Long before the shopping street existed, the covered market organised trade by craft: a lane for goldsmiths, another for spice merchants, another for coppersmiths, each with its own guild, its own quality standards and often its own gate that closed at night.

The architecture serves the climate. Vaulted stone or timber roofs, narrow lanes and small openings keep the interior many degrees cooler than the street outside, and the light that filters down through the shafts is one of the defining visual experiences of the Arab city.

Some of the great examples are World Heritage in their own right: the covered souq of Aleppo, several kilometres of stone vaulting beneath the citadel; the markets of Fez el-Bali; Khan el-Khalili in Cairo, trading since the fourteenth century. In the Gulf, Souq Waqif in Doha and the Mutrah souq in Muscat have been restored rather than replaced.

Bargaining remains part of the transaction, and it is a conversation rather than a contest — the price is arrived at, not extracted.