قلعة
“قلعة” (кальʿа) — a fortress in Arabic. Noun, level B1. "qal-ʿa" — the ʿayn at the end, the throat tightens. In a live sentence: “القلعة فوق الجبل” — The fortress is above the mountain. Written with the characters ق, ل, ع, ة. A word from the everyday Arabic course, level B1.
In short
| Written in Arabic | قلعة |
| Read in Latin letters | кальʿа |
| Translation | a fortress |
| Part of speech | noun |
| Level | B1 |
How to pronounce it
"qal-ʿa" — the ʿayn at the end, the throat tightens
Why it looks that way
Fortress and castle are not separated in Arabic: qalʿa covers both. Algiers is al-Jazaaʾir, and the famous Alhambra is al-Qalʿa al-hamraa — the red fortress
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- القلعة فوق الجبلаль-кальʿа фаук аль-джабальThe fortress is above the mountain
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “a fortress” in Arabic?
«قلعة», read “кальʿа”. "qal-ʿa" — the ʿayn at the end, the throat tightens. In a live sentence: “القلعة فوق الجبل” — The fortress is above the mountain. Noun, level B1; written with the characters ق, ل, ع, ة.
How is “قلعة” written in Latin letters?
кальʿа. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
Fortress and castle are not separated in Arabic: qalʿa covers both. Algiers is al-Jazaaʾir, and the famous Alhambra is al-Qalʿa al-hamraa — the red fortress. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.