Browse Items (103 total)

This plan shows what Jerusalem looked like after the Roman emperor Hadrian (117-138 CE) ordered the establishment of a colony named Aelia Capitolina in 130-132 CE. Some scholars believe that a temple to Jupiter was erected on the site where the…

This stone, with an inscription in Hebrew that reads, 'To the place of trumpeting to an(nounce)…,' was found in excavations at the base of the southwest corner of the Temple Mount (where many things were found that had been thrown off of the Temple…

These three doorways, which were blocked up after the Crusader period, led from the monumental steps on the south side of the Temple Mount into the Temple Mount and the area called Solomon's Stables. They were built into the base of the Temple Mount…

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]…

This bronze coin was minted in 131 CE and commemorates the rededication of Jerusalem as Aelia Capitolina (the inscription is in Latin and reads 'COL[onia] AEL[ia] KAP[itolina]'). The picture in the middle of the coin is the façade of the temple to…

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…

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]…

This photograph shows Phasael's Tower, one of three towers built by King Herod the Great (37-4 BCE) as part of his defensive wall system on the western side of the city of Jerusalem. Herod named the tower after his brother, who was killed by the…

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…

This plan shows what Jerusalem looked like in the Byzantine period. The Temple stood in ruins, as did the short-lived Temple of Jupiter that some scholars believe was erected in its place. Multiple churches were built during and after the reign of…

This plan shows what Jerusalem looked like in the late Second Temple period, prior to the Jewish revolt of 66-70 CE. The Jewish Temple occupied the Temple Mount and the upper-classes lived in the Upper City (known today as Mt. Zion), across the…

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…

This slide shows the ways and degrees in which the Temple Mount in Jerusalem was expanded in the Hasmonaean (blue area) and Herodian periods (purple area).

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…

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…

There are a few monumental tombs outside and below the southeast corner of the Old City of Jerusalem, in the Jehoshaphat Valley. The one in this picture is known anachronistically as the Tomb of Absalom (Absalom was the biblical son of David who…

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…

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,…

After the decree of the Persian King Cyrus the Great allowed Jews to return to Jerusalem from Babylon (ca. 538 BCE), they began to rebuild the city. Seen here are a few of the remains of that building project, which was executed over the following…

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…

This aerial photograph of Jerusalem, looking north, shows the hilly character of the area. The Old City, including the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, can be seen in the center of the picture, and the skyscrapers of the New City are in the…

This aerial photograph shows the City of David and the Temple Mount above it. Notice the ridge upon which the City of David was built (to the right of the road running from the upper center to the bottom of the photograph). The place of the Temple…

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…

This photograph of the Temple Mount was taken from its southeast corner (i.e., it is looking northwest). The Temple Mount is visible in the center of the photograph, as is the Al Aqsa Mosque (on the left) and both the Old City and New City of…

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 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…

In this aerial view of the Old City of Jerusalem, which is looking east toward the Mount of Olives and Mount Scopus and the Judaean Desert beyond them, the outline of the Old City walls is clearly visible, as is the Temple Mount and the Dome of the…

This photograph shows the excavation of the so-called 'sloping tunnel' that led from the entrance to the Warren's Shaft complex to the vertical shaft. It was clearly carved to allow many people to walk through it simultaneously.

In this view of the Temple Mount, looking west, one can clearly see the Dome of the Chain (between the five arches and the Dome of the Rock), and the Al Aqsa Mosque (the large building complex on the left). The Dome of the Chain is one of the oldest…

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…

This photograph of the Old City of Jerusalem shows the Temple Mount and Dome of the Rock in the background and the Western Wall Plaza in the center of the picture. The Western Wall (also called the Wailing Wall) is the western side of the Temple…

In this photograph of the Old City of Jerusalem after a winter snow, the Temple Mount and Dome of the Rock are visible in the distance (to the east), as is the Mount of Olives in the background. The grey dome at the bottom of the photograph is the…

This slide, fairly self-explanatory, shows the size and population of Jerusalem between 1,000 BCE and 565 CE. One can see the gradual rise in the city's population and geographical scope, as well as the topographical trajectory of its development:…

This aerial view of the Temple Mount, looking west, shows not just the massive Temple Mount complex and the Dome of the Rock, but also the Al Aqsa Mosque, to the left (this is the southern end of the Temple Mount complex). The Old City wall is…

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…

This photograph shows the exit of the Siloam Tunnel. The small pool in the foreground was, up until 2004, thought to be the Pool of Siloam. However, in that year a larger, lower pool that dates to the Second Temple Period was found just below this…

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…

This photograph shows the inside of the Siloam Tunnel at the 'place of the join' - that is, midway through the tunnel's length, where the Siloam Tunnel Inscription says that two teams, each cutting from opposite ends, met. The pick marks on the walls…

This cross-section drawing shows the shaft by which inhabitants of Jerusalem obtained water from the Gihon Spring. In the drawing, 7 is the Gihon Spring, 8 is the city wall, and 1 is the entrance into the tunnel system from inside the city. Water…

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…

This photograph shows the actual vertical shaft through which people would have lowered buckets from the so-called 'sloping shaft' into the water below. It is unknown when this shaft was created, or even if it was man-made or natural, but it was…

This map shows the plan of the Siloam Tunnel (also known as Hezekiah's Tunnel), which was carved around 701 BCE to reroute the water of the Gihon Spring so that it was accessible to the people living inside Jerusalem's city walls and inaccessible to…

This inscription, which was found carved into the wall at the end of the Siloam Tunnel (also known as [King] Hezekiah's Tunnel), tells the story of the carving of the tunnel. It reads, '…the tunneling. And this was how the tunneling was completed: As…

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…

This photograph shows the inside of the Siloam Tunnel. The water level is higher in the winter than in the summer, this photograph probably having been taken in the winter. The carved ceiling corners and pick marks are clearly visible. The tunnel…

This relief map shows the Coastal Plain, Central Hill, and Jordan Valley in the central part of the country. Jerusalem is just off the map to the south, and Megiddo, on the edge of Galilee, is at the northern edge. In the period before the Israelite…

This relief map shows the southern coastal plain from Jerusalem (in the east) to the coast (in the west), and from Joppa (the area of modern Tel Aviv - in the north) down to Gaza (in the south). In the period preceding the Israelite monarchies, this…

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…

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…

This aerial view towards Jerusalem from the east shows just how arid the Central Hill becomes as one passes the watershed line from west to east into the rain shadow on its east side. This is the beginning of the Judaean Desert.