Hajjah

Hajjah is the capital city of Hajjah Governorate in north-western Yemen. It is located 127 kilometres northwest of Sana’a, at an elevation of about 1800 metres.As of 2003, the Hajjah City District had a population of 53,887 inhabitants.

Historically, the name Hajjah referred to a district rather than a town. It was the mountainous region around the modern town, stretching northward towards al-Zafir, and separated from the mountain formations to the east, west, and north by the Wadi Sharis and the Wadi Mawr. There were numerous forts in this area during the middle ages. The 10th-century writer al-Hamdani counted Hajjah as part of the broader districts of Sarāt Qudam or Sarāt al-Maṣāniʽ, with Hajjah appearing to be on the border between the two. He wrote that its population mostly belonged to the Qudam tribe, and that its name was derived from one Ḥajjah b. Aslam b. ‘Aliyyān b. Zayd, of the tribe of Hashid.