Archeological References

Map 1

The main problem when preparing a map of the Haram in the Umayyad period is that the majority of the Arabic sources are from later periods and mostly relate to those periods.

Another significant problem is that the names of constructions and their locations have changed in the course of time. The double danger arises, therefore, of mistakenly attributing anachronistic names and dates to buildings found in the Haram to-day but were built at the latest in the later Middle Ages.

On luckier occasions, an early tradition may have been traced relating some details on one monument or another in Jerusalem, of the Umayyad period, but even then it is usually impossible to determine the exact location.

Using the guide lines drawn up here, I was able to assert that the Gate of Repentance (Bab al-Tawba), during the Umayyad period, was in close proximity to Mihrab Maryam. However, the location of the latter place in the south-east corner of the Haram can only be attributed (with reservation) to the end of the 9th century and clearly so to the 10th and 11th centuries. Although the eastern Mihrab Dawud is mentioned by the early (7th-8th century) sources, I was unable to locate it.

The same considerations were important in locating the Dome of the Chain (Bab al-Silsila), the Gate of The Divine Presence (Bab al-Sakina), the Dome of Ascension (Qubbat al-Mi `raj) and other monuments on the Haram from the Umayyad period.

I only used the procedure just described when places or monuments were mentioned in a source that I estimated to date back to the Umayyad period. Not included in this map are monuments mentioned by late sources which allude to their existence during the Umayyad period, such as the mention by al-Muhallabi (mid-10th century) of the Dome of the Scale (Qubbat al-Mizan) and the Dome of the Gathering (Qubbat al-Mahshar). Still, al-Muhallabi does refer to the Dome of Ascension (Qubbat al-Mi `riij) and the Dome of the Prophet (Qubbat al-Nabi), which were both mentioned by much earlier sources in their account of the Umayyad period. Al-Muhallabi's description of the latter monuments may, therefore, serve as additional proof to earlier sources, that these indeed existed in the Umayyad period.