Jerusalem: Bedouin discoverers of Cave 1
The two men in this photograph, Jum'a Muhammed (on the left) and Muhammed edh-Dhib (on the right) are the two Ta'amireh Bedouin cousins who claim to have discovered the first Dead Sea Scrolls in Cave 1 in 1947. Details of the discovery differ, but the story goes that they were out shepherding their flock, saw a cave above them, threw a rock into the cave, and heard something break. Upon further investigation they found scrolls and carried three of them back to camp. They discovered four more scrolls in the cave in the following weeks. No other cave yielded as many complete scrolls, and only one other cave (Cave 11) yielded any complete scrolls.
Jerusalem: Broad Stairs at the Temple Mount
This monumental staircase, located to the south of the Temple Mount compound (the wall of which is seen in the background) is one of two that led up to the Double and Triple Huldah Gates and into the Temple Mount. They were built as part of King Herod the Great's monumental renovation project. This particular staircase is 200 feet across and allowed access to the Temple Mount platform from the Lower City (know today as the City of David) and other parts of the southern city of Jerusalem. They were probably in use until after the Crusades.
Chaim Weitzman was the first President of Israel. Prior to his presidency, he is widely credited as the one who convinced the British Foreign Minister Arthur Balfour to create the Balfour Declaration; he was also instrumental in its drafting. He generated wide-spread support for the establishment of a State of Israel. In this picture he is meeting Amir Feisal, one of the prominent Arab leaders of the time, in an attempt to reach a settlement between Jews and Arabs regarding the settlement of Palestine in the wake of World War I.
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 church, and the courtyard in front of it, are at the base of the Crusader tower that is on the far left of the picture.
Jerusalem: Church of the Holy Sepulchre - aedicule of the Anastasis
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 great dome of the church. This part of the church is also called the 'Anastasis,' which means 'raising up' in Greek, and was named as such for the belief in Jesus' resurrection from the tomb.
Jerusalem: Church of the Holy Sepulchre - Chapel of St. Helena
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 to the main hall of the church, called the Catholicon.
Jerusalem: Church of the Holy Sepulchre - plan
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 its layout. Between Golgotha and the Anastasis (which is the traditional location of the tomb of Jesus) is a portico.
Jerusalem: Church of the Holy Sepulchre - Tomb of Jesus
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.
Jerusalem: Church of the Holy Sepulchre and Dome of the Rock
This photograph, looking east, shows the proximity of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (the two domes in the foreground) to the Dome of the Rock (in the background). The Mount of Olives and the Arab village of Et Tur (the smaller of the two towers on the hilltop) is in the distance. The large dome within the complex of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is the Anastasis ('raising up'), and underneath it is the traditional location of Jesus' tomb. The smaller dome is over the main altar in the church's basilica and the place that many Christians believed was the 'navel of the earth'. The long rectangular roofed structure beyond them that looks a bit like the peaked roof a barn or a warehouse is the Chapel of St. Helena. To the right of the Anastasis Dome is a square, bulky tower from the period of the Crusades; to its right is the thin and tall minaret tower of the Mosque of Omar; just behind it is the whitish tall, square and pointed bell tower of the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer, a relatively new church build by the German Kaiser in 1893.
This view of the eastern slope of the City of David shows the steps leading down to the Gihon Spring (at the bottom of the photo, in the triangular shadow beneath the double window), 8th-7th century BCE walls and a Jebusite wall (immediately below the modern terrace walls that are to the right of the diagonal path), a tower in the eastern wall of the city that was built in the time of Nehemiah (at the crest of the hill, above the terrace walls, casting a triangular shadow), and the modern walls of the Old City of Jerusalem, which were built in the 16th century CE (at the top of the photograph).
Jerusalem: City of David - expansion in the 9th-7th centuries BCE
This map shows the City of David, the City of Solomon (north/up the hill), and the expansion of the city to the west, which occurred between the 9th and 7th centuries BCE. It also shows the path of the Siloam Tunnel from the Spring of the Gihon outside the city walls to the pool of Siloam within the city. Topographically one can see how the two tributaries of the Kidron valley embrace the city from the east and south, and as such define its borders.
This topographical map of Jerusalem shows the present Old City of Jerusalem in dark blue (the walls of which were built by the Ottoman Turks in the 16th century CE) and the Temple Mount in the southeastern corner of the Old City. The City of David is outlined in light blue, at the south (and lower) end of the Hill of Ophel. During Solomon's reign the city was expanded northward (up the hill), and the Temple was built at the highest point on the hill (the red square within Solomon's city).
Jerusalem: City of David - the Stepped Structure
The 50-foot-high stepped structure on the right in this photo was probably built in the pre-Davidic Jebusite period (i.e., prior to the 10th century BCE). The square-cornered tower immediately beyond the stepped structure was part of the east wall of the city in the Second Temple period and the walls and steps in the lower left of the photo belong to a house from the 8th or 7th centuries BCE.
Jerusalem: Coin of 'Jonathan the King' (Alexander Jannaeus)
A typical coin struck by the Hasmonaean (Maccabean) king Alexander Jannaeus (ruled from 103-76 BCE). The symbol on the left is an anchor and the symbol on the right is a lily flower, which was a symbol for Jerusalem. The inscription around the anchor is in Greek, whereas the inscription on the other side, around the flower is in Hebrew, written in the ancient Iron Age script. Jannaeus is referring to himself with the title "King." All of the other Hasmonaean rulers called themselves 'High Priest' instead of "King." The coin reflects both the process of hellenization and the effort of the Hasmonaeans to maintain strong ties with the ancient ethos of Israel.
Money was invented in the Persian Period, and this particular coin bears the official name of the district in which the Jews lived: 'Yehud' (spelled out by the three letters to the right of the bird). The script is ancient Hebrew and the name is the Persian version of the biblical name Judah.
This photograph shows the current day Damascus Gate (one of the northern entrances into the Old City of Jerusalem) and a lower, earlier doorway of the Roman gate of the city. Above the lower arch is a worn inscription that reads 'Colonia Ae[lia] Cap[itolina]' - The Colony of Aelia Capitolina, indicating that it was built in the time of Hadrian (early 2nd century CE). Inside the doorway is a guard room and a stairwell that ascends within the eastern gateway tower to the present day parapet above the city wall.
This photograph shows the Damascus Gate (one of the northern entrances into the Old City of Jerusalem) and a lower, earlier doorway of the Roman gate that stood at the same place. Above the arch is a worn inscription that reads 'Colonia Ae[lia] Cap[itolina]' - The Colony of Aelia Capitolina, indicating that it was built in the time of Hadrian (early 2nd century CE). Inside the doorway is a guard room and a stairwell that ascends within the eastern gateway tower to the present day parapet above the city wall.
A look from the north at the Damascus Gate, which is one of the northern gates into the Old City of Jerusalem. The gate that you see at the center of the photograph, as well as the walls to its right and left, are Ottoman in date, built by Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-1566). To the left and below that gate you can also see a lower entrance into the Old City wall (in the shadow of the bridge coming out of the Damascus Gate). That gate is the Roman-period gate into the Old City, built during the time of Hadrian (117-138 CE). Beyond the walls are the buildings of the Muslim Quarter in the Old City of Jerusalem.
Jerusalem
This photograph shows the Dome of the Rock (Arabic: "Kubbat as Sakhra") looking east. For centuries it was misnamed the Mosque of Omar. Omar did erect a simple wooden mosque at the site, but that was replaced by his successor Caliph Abd al-Malik, who commissioned the present octagonal shrine, which was begun in 687 CE and completed in 691 CE. In the background, to the right, you can see the Mount of Olives with its ancient Jewish cemetery on the slopes. The distant bell tower is from the Russian Monastery of the Ascension and the onion-shaped domes just to the left of the Dome of the Rock belong to the Russian Church of St. Mary Magdalene, built in the 19th century. In the forefront are houses of the Old City of Jerusalem.
This close-up of the Dome of the Rock shows the beauty and riches of its present decoration. It was commissioned by Abd al-Malik in 687 CE and completed in 691 CE. Suleiman the Magnificent carried out extensive restorations of the building in the 16th century, but the gold sheathing had not survived the Middle Ages. An unattractive lead dome crowned the shrine until modern restorations began in 1958, when the building received its present golden-colored roof of bronze-aluminum alloy.
This photograph of the Dome of the Rock shows its octagonal structure and its golden dome. Beneath the dome, at the center of the structure is the bedrock called the Sakhra. For centuries it was misnamed the Mosque of Omar. Omar did erect a simple wooden mosque at the site, but that was replaced by his successor Caliph Abd al-Malik, who commissioned the present octagonal shrine, which was begun in 687 CE and completed in 691 CE.
Jerusalem: Dome of the Rock - fish-eye view of the interior
This fish-eye photograph was taken inside the Dome of the Rock. Above you can see the intricate artistic styling that decorates the underside of the dome; below you can see the section of bedrock around which the building was built. Muslims believe that this rock was the place from which the Prophet Muhammad left on his Night Journey.
Jerusalem: Dome of the Rock - interior view
This is a photograph of the interior of the dome that sits on the Dome of the Rock. It was planned as a deliberate imitation of the vault over the Anastasis of the Holy Sepulchre; even the size of this hemisphere is within a few feet of the Sepulchre's dome. It was the caliph's intention to raise a building that would be in the architectural tradition established by Constantine but would far outshine its Christian predecessor.
This photograph of the interior of the Dome of the Rock shows the symmetry of the architectural plan and the lavish geometric decoration adorning the walls and arches. Beneath the dome, at the center of the structure (just on the other side of the brown wooden barrier) is the bedrock called the Sakhra. In Islamic tradition and belief, this is the last place that the Prophet Muhammad touched the earth before he was taken on his Night Journey. Much of the artistry of the 7th-century Byzantine craftsmen is preserved here from the original building period, with major supplements and restorations by the Crusaders in the 12th century and Suleiman the Magnificent in the 16th century. For centuries the Dome of the Rock was misnamed the Mosque of Omar. Omar did erect a simple wooden mosque at the site, but that was replaced by his successor Caliph Abd al-Malik, who commissioned the present octagonal shrine, which was begun in 687 CE and completed in 691 CE.
Jerusalem: Dome of the Rock and the Dome of the Spirits
This photograph, taken from the top of the Temple Mount platform, shows the Dome of the Rock in the background and the Dome of the Spirits in the foreground. The Dome of the Spirits is one of several lesser shrines that dot the top of the Temple Mount platform. According to Muslim accounts this small cupola marks the place where Mohammad conversed with the earlier Hebrew and Christian prophets. It is commonly called the Dome of the Spirits because this is also where Mohammad will summon the souls of the faithful on Judgment Day. There is an intriguing alternative interpretation of this smaller dome. It has another name: Dome of the Tablets, and it sits due west of the Golden Gate (the eastern entrance into the Second Temple's courts). This name and location has led some to suggest that it memorializes the site of the Holy of Holies in the Second Temple.
Jerusalem: Eastern Terra Sigillata Juglet
This jug, which was found in the Jewish Quarter excavations in Jerusalem, is made of a type of pottery called Eastern Terra Sigillata 'A', or ESA. Its red, lustrous slip is one of the hallmarks of this kind of pottery and is partially the result of the amount of oxygen in the kiln when the jug was fired. ESA was first produced around 140 BCE in the eastern Mediterranean, probably on the island of Crete and/or along the coast of the northern Levant, but it became very popular and by the 1st century CE was exported all over the Mediterranean. It is one of the types of pottery that can be closely dated and helps archaeologists to better date the soil in which it is found.
This picture shows the Ecce Homo arch, which was the large central arch of Hadrian's east forum. It stands over the Via Dolorosa in the Old City of Jerusalem outside the Sisters of Zion Convent. Note how more modern buildings have been built around and on top of it and have incorporated the arch into their architecture.
After the Dead Sea Scrolls from Cave 1 were found by the Bedouin and taken to Bethlehem, they ended up in front of Eleazar Sukenik, a professor and archaeologist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, who is the man in this picture. He was the first scholar to see them, and he did so across a barbed wire barricade separating Jewish and Arab sectors in the Old City during the last days of the British mandate over Palestine in 1948. He immediately recognized their importance and was able to procure three scrolls -the War Scroll, the Thanksgiving Psalms Scroll, and the second of two Isaiah scrolls (aka "1QIsaiah B").
This photograph shows the British General Edmund Allenby entering Jerusalem after the British took the city in World War I. He dismounted and walked into the city out of respect for it and in contradistinction to the German Emperor Wilhelm II's entry into the city on horseback in 1898. He is entering the city through the Jaffa gate, seen at the back. To the left one can see the clock tower that was built by the Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II in 1908; the British knocked it down in 1922 and it was never rebuilt.
This photograph shows the modern entrance steps that lead down to the Gihon spring, which was the water source for the city of Jerusalem in antiquity. When Sennacherib, King of Assyria, came to besiege Jerusalem in 701 BCE, the Judahite king Hezekiah had a tunnel built that would reroute the water so that it was within the city walls and therefore inaccessible to the besieging troops. The steps and the arch seen in the photograph were probably built in the medieval period.
This photograph shows the modern entrance to the Gihon Spring (the steps leading down in the background), from the inside of the tunnel. This prolific spring provided water for the inhabitants of Jerusalem in antiquity even in the driest summer months. It was accessed via Warren's Shaft in the early Israelite period and rerouted in 701 BCE when the Siloam Tunnel was cut.
Jerusalem: Gold Ring Depicting the Holy Sepulchre
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 would have been found prior to the 12th century CE). It might represent one of the many souvenirs that Christian pilgrims bought in Jerusalem.
The Great Isaiah Scroll is one of the largest and best-preserved scrolls from the Dead Sea Scrolls and was probably produced around 100 BCE. The entire cache of Dead Sea Scrolls, which were initially found by some Bedouin in caves near the Dead Sea in 1947, were probably hidden by people living in the settlement of Qumran during the Jewish War against the Romans around 70 CE. This particular scroll preserves the text of the biblical book of Isaiah and is one long scroll that was constructed of 17 sheets of carefully prepared leather sewn together with linen thread. It measures 23.5 feet in length. The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls was one of the most important discoveries ever, not least because it is roughly 1,000 years older than any previously-known Hebrew text of Isaiah.
This photograph shows the walls of the western side of the Old City of Jerusalem. The prominent portion of this wall was built by the Ottomans in the 16th century; however, significant parts of the wall, especially the lower layers, are from the days of the Jewish King Herod (1st century BCE). Several courses of a substantial stone wall built on bedrock and running beneath the walls of the Herodian and later periods dates to the days of the Hasmonaean kings (late 2nd-early 1st centuries BCE). This lower wall, in conjunction with information from other excavations, confirms that the city walls extended to their present western limits at least by the time of the Hasmonaean kings.
Jerusalem: Herod's enlarged Temple Mount
This aerial photograph of the modern Temple Mount, looking toward the northeast (with the Dome of the Rock roughly in its center and the gray dome of the Al-Aqsa Mosque at its southern end), one can see just how large and well-built King Herod's expansion of the Jewish Temple complex was. The resulting complex was 36 acres in size and the southern extents soared impressively above the surrounding landscape. The southeastern corner is 130 feet above bedrock and more than twice that height above the Kidron Valley floor. It is truly one of the great architectural feats of the Hellenistic or Roman periods. In the center background you can see the water tower and buildings of the Hebrew University campus on Mount Scopus. Further on the horizon are the hills of the Central Hill.
This photograph shows the detail of extra-long blocks that King Herod's engineers used to bind the existing exterior walls of the Temple Mount compound to the southern addition that he was building. Some of these blocks measure 39 feet long and weigh more than 100 tons.
This pool, just north of Jaffa Gate, on the west side of the Old City of Jerusalem, is one of several large reservoirs constructed to provide water for the expanding population of Jerusalem during the reign of King Herod the Great (37-4 BCE). It and other reservoirs were fed by aqueducts that brought fresh water to Jerusalem from as far away as 12 miles to the south. Note the black dome of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the background and the tower and buildings of the Hebrew University campus on Mount Scopus in the far background.
Jerusalem: Inscription from the Tomb of Matthias
This inscription was discovered in a tomb in a northern suburb of modern Jerusalem. It is written in Aramaic, a common language of the Second Temple period, but the script, called Paleo-Hebrew, is like the one that was used hundreds of years earlier, which is very unusual. The inscription reads, 'I Abba, son of the priest E/leazar, son of Aaron the high [priest], I, / Abba, the oppressed and the persec/uted, who was born in Jerusalem,/ and went into exile in Babylonia and brought [back to Jerusalem] Mattath/iah son of Juda[h], and I buried him in the c/ave, which I acquired by writ.' The remains of an old woman who had been beheaded were buried in the ossuary.
The pottery shown here is typical of Israelite pottery from the Iron II period (10th-7th centuries BCE). The folded shapes in the foreground are folded lamps. Oil would be placed in the bowl-like part and a wick would be placed in the narrow portion (note that soot is still visible there).
The photographed image (on the right) and line drawing (on the left) are of one of two Ketef Hinnom amulets. It is a small (1.0 x 3.75 inches), thin sheet of silver on which an inscription was lightly inscribed. It is important because they date to ca. 600 BCE and the inscription preserves part of the Priestly Blessing that is known from the Bible (Numbers 6:24-26), which makes the two amulets the oldest evidence for a biblical text. The sheets were found rolled up and had possibly been worn around the neck (after a string was passed through the center of the roll). They were found in a tomb across the Hinnom Valley from the southwestern corner of the Old City of Jerusalem.
Jerusalem: Lithograph of the Ecce Homo Arch
This 19th century lithograph shows two of three arches (there would have been another small arch on the right side of the large arch), which is typical of arches built during Hadrian's time. Arches built during Herod's time were typically double arches. In addition, the northern pier of the arch was found to sit on bedrock, with pavement running up against it (so the pavement must have been laid after the arch was built) and the pavement was found to have also lie directly over a huge cistern that Josephus said was open at the time of the siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE. So the arch must have been built afterwards. The conclusion? This lithograph depicts the arch that Hadrian built; some scholars believe it led to the east forum of the city.
Jerusalem: map of the period between the Jebusites and Hezekiah
This map shows the borders of city of Jerusalem from the time of the Jebusites, the settlers of the city prior to the 10th century BCE, to the time of the Judaean king Hezekiah (686 BCE). The current Old City walls (built in the 16th century CE) and the Temple Mount complex (built by Herod the Great between the 1st century BCE and the 1st century CE) are in red. The Canaanite, Jebusite, and Davidic city (i.e., the city prior to the time of king Solomon) is outlined in purple; the Solomonic expansion is outlined in green; and the 8th century BCE expansion of the city is in yellow. Water systems (e.g., the Siloam Tunnel, the Pool of Siloam, and the Gihon Spring) are in blue.
The first of the Dead Sea Scrolls were found by Bedouin in 1947 in the Judaean Desert, who took them to an antiquities dealer in Bethlehem named Kando. Kando took four of the scrolls to St. Mark's Monastery in the Old City of Jerusalem, where he showed them to the spiritual leader of the Jacobite Syrian Christians in Jerusalem, Metropolitan (Archbishop) Mar Athanasius Yeshue Samuel, who is the man in this picture. Metropolitan Samuel purchased the scrolls from Kando for about $97.
Jerusalem: Model of Herod's Western Fortress
This scale model of Second Temple Jerusalem resides at the Israel Museum in modern Jerusalem. This particular photograph shows the towers that were part of a defense system of Jerusalem constructed by Herod the Great at its western border to guard both the entrance to the city and the palace that he built just to the south. This model is based partly on the description of the fortress by the Jewish historian Josephus and partly on the results of excavations in the later Citadel (known as the Tower of David), which was built over Herod's fort. Josephus tells us that Herod named the towers after three of his closest associates – his wife Miriam, his brother Phasael, and his close friend Hippicus.
Jerusalem: Model of the Antonia Fortress
This scale model of Second Temple Jerusalem resides at the Israel Museum in modern Jerusalem. This particular photograph is looking from north to south at the Antonia Fortress, which sat at the north edge of the Temple Mount complex (the Temple building of which can be seen behind it). The Antonia Fortress was a military barracks that was built by King Herod the Great and was used to garrison Roman troops when Judaea was ruled by a Roman procurator.
This scale model of Second Temple Jerusalem resides at the Israel Museum in modern Jerusalem. This particular photograph is looking from north to south at the Antonia Fortress, which sat at the north edge of the Temple Mount complex (the Temple building of which can be seen behind it). The Antonia Fortress was a military barracks that was built by King Herod and was used to garrison Roman troops when Judaea was ruled by a Roman procurator.
This scale model of Second Temple Jerusalem resides at the Israel Museum in modern Jerusalem. This particular photograph is looking west and shows a reconstruction of the Second Temple itself (after King Herod the Great's renovations). The Holy of Holies would have been at the far west of the main Temple building, behind the large doorway. The open-air altar stood in the inner court, between the large entrance door and the steps that are visible at the lower center of the photo. The walls in the immediate foreground (at the bottom of the photo) would have separated the Court of the Gentiles (where anybody was allowed) from the Court of the Women (where only Jews were allowed, and women could not go beyond).
This scale model of Second Temple Jerusalem resides at the Israel Museum in modern Jerusalem. This particular photograph is looking west and shows a reconstruction of the Second Temple itself (after King Herod's renovations). The Holy of Holies would have been at the far west of the main Temple building, behind the large doorway. The open-air altar stood in the inner court, between the large gate (known as the Gate of Nikanor) and the steps that are visible at the lower center of the photo. The walls in the immediate foreground (at the bottom of the photo) would have separated the Court of the Gentiles (where anybody was allowed) from the Court of the Women (where only Jews were allowed).
This view, looking east toward the Mt. of Olives, shows the modern Seven Arches Hotel on its summit and the Jewish cemetery that has been built on its western slope. At the base of the Mt. of Olives is the steep Kidron Valley, which cuts dramatically between the Temple Mount (and the Old City to the west) and the Mt. of Olives (to the east).