Nimrod Fortress was built around 1229 to preempt an attack on Damascus by participants of the Sixth Crusade. The fortress was further expanded to contain the whole ridge by 1230, and Baibars strengthened it and added larger towers after 1260. Following the Muslim conquest of Akko and the end of Crusader rule in the Holy Land, the fortress lost strategic value. The Ottoman Turks conquered the land in 1517 and used the fortress as a luxury prison for Ottoman nobles who had been exiled to Palestine. The fortress was abandoned later in the 16th century and was ruined by an earthquake in the 18th century.