Hissar kapiya

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The eastern gate of the Three Hills, Hissar Kapiya, probably built in the 11th-13th centuries, bears the marks of numerous reconstructions from the periods of the Ottoman rule and the National Revival. The gate was restored in the early 20th century. Even nowadays it is the eastern entrance to the core of the Ancient Plovdiv Historical and Architectural Reserve.
  The existence of the medieval defensive wall in this particular place is a display of the topographic continuity in the fortification system of the Three Hills. No archaeological investigations have been carried out on the site, so it can be assumed that here or somewhere around was the gate of the 5th – 6th century fortifications, including the Round Tower to the south. During the Middle Ages, with the considerable decrease in the population of Philippopolis, the residential quarters were situated in close proximity to the Three Hills; the citadel’s fortifications that first appeared here in the 5th – 6th centuries were still maintained. There are many places around, Hissar Kapiya being probably one of them, where reconstructinos of new sectors, dated to the early and late Middle Ages, can be seen. The city passed successively under Bulgarian, Byzantine, Latin (Crusader) and, finally, Ottoman rule. Each change involved demolition and reconstruction of the separate sectors, now seen along the eastern course of the fortifications of the Three Hills. Obviously ,throughout history Hissar Kapiya kept functioning as a gate to the city’s all-time most protected areas, the Three Hills.
  Following the 14th century Ottoman invasion of the city, the medieval fortress on the Three Hills was occupied by a Turkish garrison. During the next few centuries, when this place, already the centre of the growing city of Filibe, no longer needed defense, the houses of the prosperous merchants were built here and the old Christian churches rebuilt.Nowadays the Revival Period buildings of the National Revival Museum and the Ethnographic Museum are located near Hissar Kapiya and the St. Constantine and St. Helena Church is immediately to the south.