Byzantine

Paul was a Jew from Tarsus (modern Turkey). He embarked on three journeys to spread his ideas about the end of the world. His views were shaped by the Jewish scriptures which anticipated a time of divine judgment on all evil. At this time the world…

This photograph shows a small aedicule, a chapel built over the rock cut empty tomb believed to belong to Jesus. It stands at the center of the rotunda, the round architectural structure that was built there by the Crusaders and right underneath the…

This map was found to be part of the mosaic floor of a 6th century CE church in Madaba, Jordan (east of the Dead Sea), and includes this map of Byzantine Jerusalem. A broad, column-lined street runs from the north gate south through the center of the…

This plan shows the original layout of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the time of Constantine and his mother Helen. The complex is made of 3 separate units: at the bottom of the plan, a basilica ending with an apse and Golgotha incorporated into…

This close-up of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which is looking northwest, shows the two domes of the church: the Anastasis (the larger dome, on the left) and the dome over the basilica (the smaller dome, on the right). The entrance to the…

This monastery in the Judaean Desert, initially called the Great Laura and later Mar Saba (after its founder, Sabas of Cappadocia), was built in 483 CE. It is the result of Byzantine-era hermetic monasticism: in 457 CE, at the age of 18, Mar Saba…

This photograph shows the cliff-side monastery called Choziba or St. George's Monastery, which is in the Wadi Qelt, approximately 3 miles west of Jericho, in the Judaean Desert. The monastery was established in the early fifth century, during the…

This photograph shows the interior of the Aedicule of the Anastasis, where Christians as early as the 4th century CE believed that Jesus' body was laid before his resurrection.

This photograph is taken from the Armenian chapel dedicated to Queen Helena (the mother of Constantine who was entrusted by her son to oversee the building of the church in the 4th century CE). The steps in the background are the 29 steps that lead…

This photograph shows a gold ring that depicts the Aedicule of the Anastasis at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It was found in a 6th-century building south of the Temple Mount and shows the Anastasis as a free-standing structure (which was how it…

This map shows the provinces of Roman control around the Mediterranean. The red circle is around Rome, the capital of the Roman Empire, and the arrow points to the city of Constantinople, which is where Constantine moved the capital of the Empire in…

This map represents the common scholarly opinion about what the layout of Jerusalem looked like after the Second Temple period. The Jewish Temple has been destroyed and, as many scholars believe, a new temple to the Roman god Jupiter has been erected…

In the background of this aerial photograph of the Old City of Jerusalem we see the hills of the Judaean desert, as well as Transjordan in the distance. In the near distance, just beyond the city, is the Mount of Olives and Mt. Scopus. In the center…

This close-up aerial photo of the Old City of Jerusalem depicts the complex of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (at the bottom left, with the two grey domes). In the middle background is the Temple Mount and the golden dome of the Dome of the Rock.…