Pre-Israelitic Jerusalem (§ 1).
Davidic and Solomonic Jerusalem (§ 2).
From Solomon to the Exile (§ 3).
From the Exile to Herod (§ 4).
From Herod to the Destruction, 70 A.D. (§ 5).
Until Constantine the Great (§ 6).
From Constantine to the Capture by the Arabs (§ 7).
Under the Arabs to the Crusades (§ 8).
During the Crusades (§ 9).
From 1187 to the Present (§ 10).
The principal valley is that of the Kidron, rising north of the city, bending east and then south, and dividing the city from the Mount of Olives, all the time deepening rapidly. At present, parts of this valley bear different names. Of tributary valleys may be mentioned one which in early times emptied opposite the Garden of Gethsemane of the Latins immediately below the Golden Gate of the present east wall of the Harem al-Sharif; it is now practically filled up. Formerly it was formed of two branches which served to divide the city , as is shown by the researches of Warren and Wilson. Another tributary valley used to empty immediately north of the Virgin's Fount, opposite the upper part of the village of Silwan, but is now completely filled. A third empties below the Pool of Siloam, opposite the lower part of the village of Silwan, and rises in two hollows above the Damascus Gate. It runs first southeast, then south and then again southeast, being joined about the middle of its course by a valley coming from the west. Both
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The old city was built upon the naked rock. The situation is altogether unfavorable to the formation of vegetable soil and to the retention of any which may be artificially created, since the heavy rainfall of winter washes it into the crevices of the rocks or sweeps it into the valleys. Disintegration of the rock produces a rich loamy soil which adheres well to the rocky substratum where the lie of the land permits it. The rock is a crystalline chalk of the middle cretaceous period, and of dark gray color. Varieties distinguished at the present are: a pure hippuritic chalkstone, granular, not hard, esteemed for building, not blemished by cracks, when quarried generally pure white, and hardening with exposure to the atmosphere; a second variety, of three kinds, either gray or marked with red and gray veins and not found in such large masses as the first variety; a variety which laminates and does not break in the fire; a fourth variety, so soft as to receive and retain the imprint of the fingers, sometimes, however, hard and worked with the saw, reddened often through infiltration of iron, and generally used for the little sarcophagi so numerous in the neighborhood.
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With the capture of the Jebusite fortress Jerusalem fell into David's hands, and this may have been while he was still king of Hebron. He was thus placed in contact with the northern tribes and in command of the roads, while the stronghold became the capital of his kingdom, a place be longing neither to Judah nor to the northern tribes, and therefore neutral. But because of David's relationship to Judah, it is sometimes ascribed to Judah, while elsewhere it is called Benjamin's territory because of its situation. David did not exterminate the Jebusites, but left them life and property (II Sam. xxiv. 18); he forced them, however, to evacuate Zion, whence they went to the southwest elevation, while he and his following occupied "the city of David." The old fortress was completely transformed, being built up by David, and a palace erected there (II Sam. v. 9, 11; cf. Neh. xii. 37) upon one of the western levels of the hill, while the tombs were hewn out still lower; the fortification was completed by walls and towers, the remains of which have been traced. In this part of the city was the tabernacle-sanctuary (II Sam. vi. 17), and here were the residences for the people of the court, as well as a great number of cisterns for water supply. Solomon extended the building toward the north and built the Millo for protection, though as yet the exact location of this defensive work is not determined and the same is true as to its exact character--whether it was a wall or a tower. Solomon's palace and temple were to the north and on higher ground, the temple on Moriah and the palace on Ophell, the latter surrounded by defensive walls, probably pierced with great gates on the south, where were the principal approaches. The arrangement included three parts, a greater court with an inner court containing the temple, and a second or middle court (I Kings vii. 8, 12; II Kings xx. 4), the temple thus being the farthest north, while these separate parts were probably upon different levels. In the great court to the south were the house of Lebanon, the hall of pillars, and the throne hall. The middle court contained Solomon's palace and the palace of his Egyptian queen. To Solomon is ascribed the building of the wall which surrounded Jerusalem (I Kings iii. 1 ix. 15). The question of the extent of the city in those times and therefore of the extent and course of this wall is much debated. It must be borne in mind that a distinction was made between
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The successors of Solomon, according to the Old
Testament, often added to the fortifications of the
city, and probably all the additions
made are not mentioned in the records.
Of special importance is the report that
Hezekiah built "the other wall"
(
The capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar, 587-586 B.C., resulted in the burning of the temple, the royal palace, and the larger dwellings of the city; the encircling wall was also thrown down. The remnant of inhabitants left by the conqueror in the city was too poor and dispirited to think of rebuilding. Gedaliah had his residence in Mizpah, which indicates the unfitness of Jerusalem as a capital. From Haggai (i. 4) is first heard the story of rebuilding in the year 519 B.C. and of the rebuilding of the temple 519-15 B.C., though the
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For the next period Josephus is the authority, and he distinguishes between the upper city, or the upper market, the lower city, the temple or the temple hill, the proasteion, and the new city or Bezetha, but never uses the name Zion. The upper city lay opposite the temple and the lower city; the latter was the Akra, south of the temple and situated on the lowest level within the walls; the proasteion coincided with the new city enclosed within the so-called second wall of the post-Solomonic kings; the new city of Josephus arose in the decade after Herod to the north of the temple and westward about the wall to the tower of Hippicus. Still farther, Josephus distinguishes between Bezetha, the new city, and the wood market; Bezetha lay north of the temple and Antonia and east of the street leading from the gate by the Women's Tower to Antonia. His account can not be followed without a knowledge of the earlier arrangement of the city. Through Herod's building operations the city took on something of the splendor of a Grecian city. Besides the temple he erected a stately tower, which he named Antonia in honor of the Roman triumvir, and the palace of Herod (located by its three great towers, Hippicus, Phasael, and Mariamne) which commanded the city as the Antonia commanded the temple hill. The three towers served as a protection for the city as well as for the palace (cf. for description of towers and palace Josephus, War, V., iv. 3-4). The palace was occupied later by Archelaus and Agrippa I.; when the Romans appointed a procurator over Judea, it was ceded to him and his guard. Gessius Florus and Pontius Pilate are said to have had their judgment seat in front of the structure, hence here must be sought the pretorium. In the upper city was the hippodrome, and Herod is said to have built a theater in Jerusalem and an amphitheater in the plain (the latter probably discovered in 1887 by Dr. Schick above Bir Eyyub). Finally, Herod took care for the water supply of the city. Schick has shown that the lower of the two conduits from the pools south of the city near Artas is of Herod's building. It begins immediately below the lowest of the three pools and is carried in a winding course past Bethlehem to Jerusalem as a masonry or hewn canal covered with flat stones, only twice taking the character of a tunnel. It has been repaired or improved several times-by Pontius Pilate, again in the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries and in 1865. The third wall to the north of Jerusalem protects the "new city" of Josephus. Agrippa I. began to build it, but ceased because of the distrust of the Romans. At the outbreak of the Jewish war it was again undertaken and speedily finished. It was pierced by many gates, the names of which are unknown; one, protected by the so-called Women's Tower, was probably where the Damascus date now is. Its course was approximately that of the present north wall. The inhabitants of Jerusalem at this time, including the guests at the Passover, are reckoned by Josephus at 2,700,000 (War, VI., ix. 3; cf. II., xiv. 3); Schick would place the normal population at the beginning of the Christian era at from 200,000 to 250,000. In the reign of the Emperor Claudius (41-54 A.D.), Queen Helena of Adiabene on the upper Tigris, her son Izates, and other members of her family became converts to Judaism and built residences for themselves in the lower city (Josephus, War, IV., ix. 11, V., vi. 1). Agrippa I. had the streets of the city paved to give occupation to the great number of laborers left without work (Josephus, Ant., XX., ix. 7), The Amygdalon pool mentioned in War, V., xi. 4 is doubtless the pool of Hezekiah; the name is a Greek form of the Hebrew mighdal, "tower," and the
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The city suffered greatly during the siege and
gradual capture under Titus. His express command
to destroy the city received willing
obedience from the embittered Roman
soldiery. Titus regarded only the three
towers of the palace as worth preserving,
and he spared the western part of
the city wall, as it guarded the camp
of the garrison on the southwest hill in the upper
city. The investment of the city began at the
Passover, when there was present a vast number of
visitors, so that the count of Josephus (War, VI.,
ix., x.) is not improbable. The place where the
faith of the Jews had received so severe a blow was
naturally avoided by them and Jabne (Jamnia)
became the center of Jewish life in Palestine. The
young Christian community, which before the investment
by Titus withdrew to Pella, east of the
Jordan, had as headquarters the house of John Mark
and his mother Mary (Acts xii. 12-17 ). Probably
there was the great upper chamber (Mark xiv. 15)
in which Jesus celebrated the last supper and also
the chamber mentioned in
The heathen character of the city did not prevent Christians from visiting or settling there; pilgrimages began in the third century and were numerous in the fourth. Helena, the mother of Constantine, came there in 326-327 and had churches built on the sites of the birth and ascension of Christ, in Bethlehem, and on the Mount of Olives (for Constantine's building see HOLY SEPULCHER). Constantine relaxed the harsh laws against the Jews, Julian gave them permission to restore their temple, but after Julian the earlier prohibitions against the Jews seem to have been renewed. In the second half of the fourth century eremites and monks from Egypt and Syria began to crowd into Palestine, in the 'fifth and sixth centuries causing bloody feuds through dogmatic strife. The first monastery in Jerusalem seems to have been built in the fifth century. The coming of the Empress Eudocia, consort of Theodosius II., in 438 had great consequences for the city. To her is ascribed the renewal of the old wall to the south, and various sacred sites were joined to the city. She built the Church of St. Stephen (possibly included in the present possessions of the Dominicans). The Emperor Justinian had the architect Georgios of Constantinople erect a great basilica (that of the Theotokos) in connection with a pilgrims' house and a hospital in the middle of the city, perhaps south of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. The capture of the city by the Persians under Chosroes II. (614) resulted in the destruction of most of the ecclesiastical structures, in the restoration of which the abbot Modestus showed great zeal, though when the Emperor Heraclius marched in (638), much of the city was in ruins. In 638 the Caliph Omar took Jerusalem.
The stipulations of the surrender to the effect that civic and ecclesiastical protection should be given and that the churches were not to be used as dwellings were observed with comparative good faith. The Arabs named the city Bait al-Mukaddas or al-Makdis, "Place of the Sanctuary," shortened to al-Kuds, but made Lydda their first military capital in Palestine. Only occasionally had the pilgrims cause to complain of hard usage, the relations between the East and the West being good under the friendship of Charlemagne and Harun al-Raschid. In the tenth century
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When Godfrey of Bouillon captured the city,
July 15, 1099, only two churches were found uninjured,
that of the Holy Sepulcher and
that of the Italian merchants, for the
latter of which tribute was paid. During
the continuance of the kingdom of
Jerusalem great zeal was displayed in
building. The principal gates of thin period were
David's gate (Jaffa gate), Stephen's (Damascus),
Jehoshaphat's, and Zion gate in the south. Near
David's gate was David's tower (the present citadel,
often repaired from the ruins of Herod's palace),
hence the later location of the "city of David."
Extensive building operations went on within the
grounds of the Amalfi merchants; the Benedictines
built a hospital in honor of Johannes Eleemon
(q.v.) in connection with which a community
dressed in black robes with a white cross came into
being--the beginning of the Knights of St. John.
The Hospitalers under the patronage of John the
Baptist took over the woman's guest-house. Since
the Latins located the pretorium north of the Zion
Church, later northwest of the temple square, the
direction of the Via Dolorosa was placed accordingly.
The pool of Bethesda (
Jerusalem opened its gates to the victorious Saladin Oct. 2, 1187. Most of the Latin Christians departed; the Greeks remained. The Christian and Occidental character which the city had assumed during the crusades soon changed as Christian churches and cloisters became mosques or Mohammedan schools. Salaldin had the walls renewed when Richard the Lion-hearted threatened a siege in 1191-92, but the Sultan Malik al-Muazzam of Damascus ordered them destroyed that they might not become a protection to the Christians (1219-20). A treaty between the German Frederick II. and the Egyptian Sultan al-Kamil secured the city for the Christians (except the Harem al-Sharif) for about ten years and a half from Feb. 1, 1229, after which Nasir Daud, prince of Kerak, took the city and destroyed the walls. The Egyptian Sultan Eyyub took it in 1244, in 1517 it fell under the power of the Turks under Selim I., and his successor Solyman in 1542 gave to the walls of the pity their present form. Syria was in the possession of Mehemet Ali of Egypt 1831-40. In 1219 the Franciscans gained a footing in the city, in the thirteenth century held firmans under the Egyptian sultans, in 1333 came into possession of the Zion Church and perhaps of other sacred places, some of which they had to yield to Solyman in 1523 and 1551; their present location, northwest of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, was obtained in 1559. Since the conquest of Jerusalem by the Turks the Christian powers, with France in the lead, have protected the Roman Catholic Christians in Palestine, Russia has cared for the Greek Christians. A revolution in the situation at Jerusalem was brought about by the English (1826) and American (1821) missionaries; an English consulate was established there in 1839, a Prussian in 1842. England and Prussia had the Evangelical bishopric of St. James created (see JERUSALEM, ANGLICAN-GERMAN BISHOPRIC IN). Other Christian powers thus had their attention drawn to the situation. The Greek patriarch Cyril transferred his seat from Constantinople to Jerusalem in 1845, and Rome reestablished the Latin patriarchate in 1847. Pilgrim-houses, hospitals, churches, schools and monasteries have been erected, and these mark the character of the peaceful crusade of the nineteenth century, with the result that Jerusalem is no more an Oriental city. Of its 60,000 inhabitants, 41,000 are Jews, 12,800 are Christians, 7,000 are Mohammedans. Of the Christians, 6,000 are Greeks, 4,000 Latins, 1,400 Protestants, 800 Armenians, 200 Uniate Greeks, 150 Copts, 100 Abyssinians, 100 Syrians, and 50 Uniate Armenians. The Jews are poverty-stricken and do not exert an influence corresponding to their numbers.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Lists of literature are the Bibliotheca geographica
Palentinae, by R. Röhricht, Berlin, 1890, and by
T. Tobler, Leipsic, 1867. Indispensable for following recent
investigations are the Quarterly Statements of the
PEF, also the files of ZDPV, the Mitteilungen und Nachrichten of the Deutscher Palästina-Verein, the files of
ZDMG, Recueil d'archéologie orientale, and JBL. Valuable
as summaries are the articles in DB, ii. 584-601; EB, ii.
2407-2432; JE, vii. 118-157; DCG, i. 849-859.
For excavations and topographical details consult:
C. Warren, C. R. Conder, Survey of Western Palestine,
Jerusalem, London, 1884: E. G. Schultz, Jerusalem, Berlin, 1845; W. Krafft, Die Topographie Jerusalems, Bonn,
1846; T. Tobler, Die Siloahquelle und der Oelberg, St. Gall,
1852; idem, Zwei Bücher Topographie von Jerusalem, ib.
1853-54; E. Pierotti, Jerusalem Explored, 2 vols., London,
1864; C. J. M. de Vogüé, Le Temple de Jerusalem, Paris,
1864; C. W. Wilson, Ordnance Survey of Jerusalem, 2 vols.,
Southampton, 1867-70; C. Wilson and C. Warren, Recovery
of Jerusalem, London, 1871; P. Wolff, Jerusalem,
Leipsic, 1872; C. Warren, Underground Jerusalem, London, 1876; H. Guthe, Ausgrabungen bei Jerusalem, Leipsic,
1883; C. Wilson, Jerusalem the Holy City, London, 1888;
F. J. Bliss, Excavations at Jerusalem, 1894-97, London,
1898: C. Mommert, Topographie des alten Jerusalem, 4
vols., Leipsic, 1902-08; S. Merrill, Ancient Jerusalem, New
York, 1908; G. A. Smith, The Topography, Economics and
History of Jerusalem to 70 A.D., 2 vols., London, 1908;
Robinson, Researches, and Later Researches. On the question of the Akra consult C. E. Caspari in TSK, 1864, pp.
309-328; G. Gatt, in TQ, lxvi (1884), 34-84 lxxi (1889),
77-125; idem, Die Hügel von Jerusalem, Freiburg, 1897.
For descriptions of the city consult: J. F. Thrupp,
Ancient Jerusalem, London 1855; A. B: MacGrigor, Index
of Passages . . . upon the Topography of Jerusalem. Glasgow
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1876; C. Zimmermann, Karten und Pläns zur Topographic
des alten Jerusalem, Basel, 1876; G. Williams,
The Holy City, 2 vols., London, 1849; C. Ritter, Comparative Geography of Palestine, iv. 1-212, Edinburgh, 1866;
W. M. Thomson, The Land and the Book, vol. i., New York,
1880; F. Spiees, Das Jerusalem des Josephus, Berlin. 1881;
H. Nicole, Plan topographique de Jerusalem et ses environs,
Paris, 1886-87; J. H. Lewis, The Holy Places of Jerusalem,
London, 1888; G. R. Lees, Jerusalem Illustrated, ib. 1894;
G. A. Smith, Historical Geography of the Holy Land,
passim, ib. 1897; F. Diekamp, Hippolytus von Theben,
pp. 96 sqq., Münster, 1898; W. Sanday, Sacred Sites of
the Gospels, Oxford, 1903; Miss A. Goodrich Freer, Inner
Jerusalem, London, 1904 (an excellent description of the
present city); Baedeker's Handbook on Syria and Palestine,
6th Germ. ed., Leipsic, 1904, 4th Eng. ed., 1906.
Pictorial productions are G. Ebers and H. Guthe, Palästina
in Bild und Wort, vol, i., Stuttgart, 1883; Hartmann-Bensinger, Palästina, Hamburg, 1889; and the views
published by the PEF.
On the history of the city in the Biblical period consult:
L. B. Paton, Jerusalem in Bible Times, Chicago, 1908;
E. Bevan, Jerusalem under the High Priests, London, 1904;
and the works on the history of Israel cited under AHAB.
For later periods consult: C. J. M. de Vogüé, Les Énglises
de la terre sainte, Paris, 1860; T. Levin, Siege of Jerusalem
by Titus, London, 1863; V. Guérin, La Terre sainte, 2
parts, Paris, 1884; J. Guy le Strange, Palestine under the
Moslems, London, 1890; G. Dodu, Hist. des institutions
monarchiques dans le royaume latin de Jerusalem, Paris,
1894; Jerusalem et ses principaux sanctuaires, ib. 1895;
C. A. Couret, La Priss de Jerusalem . . . en 614; trois
documents, ib. 1896; C. R. Conder, The Latin Kingdom of
Jerusalem, 1099-1291, London, 1897; S. Lane Poole,
Saladin and the Fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, New
York, 1898; R. Röhricht, Geschichte des Königreichs
Jerusalem, Berlin, 1898; W. Besant and E. H. Palmer,
Jerusalem, the City of Herod and Saladin, London, 1899;
A. Achleitner, Jerusalem, Mainz, 1905; W. S. Caldecott,
The Second Temple in Jerusalem, London, 1908; and the
publications of the Palestine Pilgrim Text Society.
Maps of value are the Plan of Jerusalem prepared by the
PEF, and Karte der Materialen zur Topographie des Alten
Jerusalem, accompanied by Materialen zur Topographie
des Alten Jerusalem, both by A. Kümmel, Halle, 1904-06.
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