Bayt ar-Ridaydah
A restored fort with an arms museum.
Lionel Duchoiselle (https://www.geodiversite.net/auteur386) — CC BY-SA 3.0 · John Crane from Prague, Czech Republic — CC BY 2.0 · Andries Oudshoorn — CC BY-SA 2.0 · John Crane from Prague, Czech Republic — CC BY 2.0 · Richard Mortel — CC BY 2.0
A village and oasis in the wilayat of Nizwa, at the entrance of Wadi al-Muaydin, where the road up Jebel Akhdar begins. Its name means banana pool, after the banana trees among its palms. It is known for Bayt ar-Ridaydah, a restored 17th-century fortified house, and Falaj al-Khatmeen, one of five Omani aflaj on UNESCO's World Heritage List since 2006. The fort is credited to Imam Sultan bin Saif al-Ya'rubi; it was enlarged in the time of Sayyid Muhammad, son of Imam Ahmed bin Said, and comprehensively restored in 1990. Its plan, a small entrance and a hall opening onto a galleried courtyard, resembles that of Jabreen Castle, built by Imam Sultan's son Bil'arab. The falaj, fed by Wadi al-Muaydin and probably dug in the 17th century, runs 2.4 km from its mother well, mostly underground. Its open channel runs beneath the fort, now a museum of historic arms, and beside the Ya'aribah Mosque. Dated by local tradition to 1649, this working mosque is a plain stone and sarooj building with no dome or tall minaret. Harat al-Saybani, the old quarter, climbs the slope to the north in stacked mud and stone houses, some entered from the upper floor, below a ruined watchtower. The village lies about 14 km east of Nizwa Fort and 16 km south of the Saiq plateau as the crow flies. Any car reaches the village; only four-wheel drives may take the steep road on to the plateau. Harat al-Saybani is unrestored and many houses have collapsed, so keep to the lanes.
A restored fort with an arms museum.
A World Heritage channel split three ways.
Old houses stacked up the hillside.
Birkat al-Mawz, wilayat of Nizwa, where the Jebel Akhdar road begins
Where the channel enters the village it divides into three equal streams: one waters the villagers' own plots and the other two the farmland of the state treasury, Bayt al-Mal. The evaluation prepared for UNESCO notes that three balls of the same size and weight dropped in above the split each run into a different branch.
Rifles and pistols from several centuries fill both floors: matchlocks, called abu fatila in Oman; Martini-Henry rifles, known locally as al-sam'a; a 17th-century flintlock pistol; and pistols of the 20th century.