The Latakia Regional Museum is housed in the old Khan al-Dukhan, a caravanserai that once served merchants trading along the Syrian coast. The building itself is worth a look: a series of vaulted stone rooms arranged around a central courtyard, with the slightly battered grandeur of a structure that has served many purposes over several centuries.
The collection covers the archaeology of the Latakia coast from ancient Ugarit through the Hellenistic, Roman, and Islamic periods. Finds from the excavations at Ras Shamra (ancient Ugarit) form the core of the display — pottery, figurines, and cuneiform tablets that document one of the world's earliest alphabets. The Islamic-period section includes decorated ceramics, metalwork, and glass from the medieval coastal cities. The labelling is uneven, but the collection is genuinely important. Allow an hour.