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This entire area -- the light gray with periodic dots -- is a covered suq. More properly, it is several covered suqs, but they run together at the edges. Satellite photos fail to do justice to what is underneath the roof. "Monuments of Syria" devotes a section to Aleppo's suqs and khans, and says, "The suqs of Aleppo which form a labyrinth totaling 7 km in length are unsurpassed in the Middle East for sheer interest and atmosphere. Largely unchanged since the 16th century (some go back as far as the 13th), they preserve superbly the atmosphere of the Arab/Turkish mercantile tradition. The maps split up the suq into trade areas, where particular goods can be found, but if they were to be all labeled, they would outnumber labeled mosques 3 to 1. Everything from cotton to lawyers is traded in the suq. Ibn Jubayr mentions the covered suq, though the current stone complex is after his time, the buildings he saw were made of wood. It is interesting to note that the Great Mosque is all but surrounded by the suq – in fact the only way to get into the mosque is through the suq.