[13][11] After Antiochus IV's reign, the name of the city reverted to Edessa, in Greek,[11] and appears in Armenian as Urha or Ourha (Ուռհա),[14] in Aramaic (Syriac) as Urhay or Orhay (Classical Syriac: ܐܘܪܗܝ, romanized: ʾŪrhāy / ʾŌrhāy), in local Neo-Aramaic (Turoyo) as Urhoy, in Arabic as ar-Ruhā (الرُّهَا), in the Kurdish languages as Riha,[15] Latinized as Rohais, and finally adopted into Turkish as Urfa or Şanlıurfa ("Glorious Urfa"), its present name.

[17] In 1984, the Turkish National Assembly granted Urfa the title "Şanlı", meaning "glorious", in honor of its citizens' resistance against British and French troops at the end of the First World War, hence the present name "Şanlıurfa".

The pedestal contains an inscription with an invocation to the god Tarhunza and mentions a city whose name is only partly visible, but which Bahattin Çelik restores as "Umalia", in the country of Bit Adini.

[29]: 195 In 132 BC, following the decline of the Seleucids, Edessa became the capital of the kingdom of Osrhoene, which was ruled by the Abgarids, an Arabized tribal dynasty with origins in Nisibis.

[28] In the early second century AD, Abgar VII supported the Roman emperor Trajan's campaign in Mesopotamia and received him "sumptously" at his court, but later rebelled.

Abgar was stripped of most of his domains except for Edessa, and Osrhoene became a Roman province, when his ally Pescennius Niger lost the civil war to Septimius Severus.

Abgar granted a remission of taxes for people affected by the flood and immediately began a large-scale reconstruction project of the city after the old Seleucid plan.

[29]: 201  The city was led by a group of distinguished citizens, including magnates and agricultural landowners, who "formed a partly self-governing body" that dealt with the caliphal government rather than the bishop.

[30]: 11  In 812, Urfa's citizens had to pay a large sum to the anti-Abbasid rebel Nasr ibn Shabath al-Uqayli to prevent him from attacking the unprotected city.

The rebels besieged Tahir's forces in Urfa, but the local civilians (one of them was the future Syriac church leader Dionysius I Telmaharoyo) supported the soldiers and the siege was unsuccessful.

[32]: 590  On the other hand, while Skylitzes does mention that "Maniakes sent an annual tribute of 50 pounds [of gold] to the emperor", Niccolò Zorzi remarks that this "does not necessarily imply that Edessa 'enjoyed a certain amount of independence from Byzantium'".

[30]: 23  Alp Arslan eventually lifted the siege in return for a large payment and possibly also the submission of its ruler, the doux Basilios Alousianos (son of Alusian of Bulgaria).

[32]: 590  The rise of a single powerful Muslim rival – namely Imad ad-Din Zangi, the crafty atabeg of Mosul – spelled disaster for the county.

[32]: 590–1  The tipping point came in late 1144, when Joscelin II left Edessa with a big chunk of his soldiers to assist Zengi's rival Kara Arslan.

[30]: 60  Urfa was then the site of a battle in 1451, where Uzun Hasan successfully defeated other Aq Qoyunlu leaders shortly before gaining control of the tribal confederation as a whole.

[30]: 60  This happened during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, prompting Fazlallah Khunji Isfahani to liken Yashbak's actions to the tyrant Nimrod torturing the prophet Abraham with fire – also in Urfa, according to tradition.

[32]: 591  The earliest surviving Ottoman tax register for Urfa, compiled in 1518, documented 1,082 families (700 Muslim and 382 Christian), suggesting a total population slightly exceeding 5,500 people.

[30]: 67  Eventually, though, Ottoman troops (backed by reinforcements from Damascus and Aleppo) surrounded the inner citadel, dug trenches, and engaged the rebels in a bloody battle in the middle of the city.

[39]: 259  Powerful ümera families from Urfa assumed responsibility for governance of the eyalet, while the actual office of governor was a sinecure for prominent Ottoman generals or their sons.

[32]: 592 According to Onur Usta, part of why Urfa appeared to European visitors as "a derelict city with houses reduced to rubble" during this period was because it had a lot of residents from nomadic and tribal backgrounds.

[40]: 309  Among the bazaars mentioned in late 19th-century records: Kadıoğlu, Köroğlu, Eski Arasa, Teymurcu, Sarayönü, Belediye, Beykapı, Akar, Sipâhî, Bedestan, Hânönü, Kafavhâne, and Hüseyniye.

[45] In response to the Urfa resistance in October, Mehmet Celal Bey, who had served as governor of Aleppo before being sacked for refusing to comply with the order to deport the local Armenians, commented: "Each human has the right to live.

[56] Just to the east of the Haleplibahçe museum complex is the Kızıllkoyun necropolis, where at least 75 rock-cut cave tombs were carved into a limestone ridge during the Roman period, in the 3rd and 4th centuries.

[58] Its narrow streets are lined with shops and stalls selling a wide variety of goods: herbs and spices, many different types of fabric, "green Diyarbakır tobacco by the kilo", even guns.

[61] A popular figure in Urfa politics, Fakıbaba first rose to prominence as Chief Physician at the Şanlıurfa SSK Hospital, a role which he held for 11 years.

[66] The Armenian and Assyrian Genocides, undertaken by Ottoman troops and Ottoman-sponsored militias such as the special organization,[67] led to the slaughter, deportation,[65] and ethnic cleansing of much of the Christian population of Urfa and the surrounding region.

[48]: 122  Syrians with the lowest incomes are most heavily concentrated in run-down neighborhoods with a lot of squatting that were previously inhabited mostly by poor people who had moved to Urfa from the countryside.

[75] The largest number of Syrians in Urfa are in the Haliliye district, where they are especially concentrated in the neighborhoods (mahalles) of Devteşti, Ahmet Yesevi, Süleymaniye, Bağlarbaşı, Şehitlik, Cengiz Topel, Şair Nabi, Yeşildirek, İpekyolu, Sancaktar, İmam Bakır and Yavuz Selim.

[48]: 122  The rapid increase in Syrian-owned businesses in Urfa, depressed wages for workers, and a perception that Syrians are "cheap labor" have all contributed to anti-Syrian sentiment among Turks.

It is widely believed that Urfa is the birthplace of many dishes, including Çiğ köfte, that according to the legend, was crafted by the Prophet Abraham from ingredients he had at hand.