Tariq Bab as-Silsila

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Street scene, Tariq Bab as-Silsila .

Tariq Bab as-Silsila , Arabic طريق باب السلسلة, DMG Ṭarīq Bāb as-Silsila , the "Chain Gate Street", is a street in the UNESCO World Heritage Site of the Old City of Jerusalem . The Hebrew street name is (synonymous) רחוב שער השלשלת Rechov Sha'ar haSchalschelet . It leads from the south end of the triple market hall (see: Suq Chan ez time ), the old intersection of Cardo and Decumanus , ⊙ to the east to the Haram ⊙ and thus connects the economic and religious center of the city since early Islamic times. It follows the course of the so-called "First Wall", which was built in the late Hasmonean period, but was only created as a road after the destruction of Jerusalem in the Jewish War , when the civil settlement of Colonia Aelia Capitolina was laid out in the time of Emperor Hadrian .

In line with its importance for the Islamic city, Kettentorstrasse was architecturally designed as a representative “path to prayer”. For the crusaders, too, this street was the main entrance to the Temple Mount, according to Ernoul it was named Rue del Temple around 1230 .

Architectural monuments along the road

Crusaders money exchange

Ernoul described a Latin money exchange office on the street corner in front of the beginning of the Rue del Temple . ⊙ The narrow groin-vaulted hall with seven chambers, in which the money changers used to sit, is now used as a men's room.

Caravanserai of the Crusaders.

Caravanserai of the Crusaders (Chan as-Sultan)

18 m behind the money exchange office, a vaulted passage branches off to the north, ⊙ which led to a caravanserai : a seven-bay longitudinal barrel vault with galleries on both sides. The divided rooms on the first floor were shops and warehouses, while the small chambers on the upper floor served as bedrooms. The central gate on the north side led into a courtyard where the pack animals were housed.

Shopping street

The further course of Kettentorstraße is lined with shops that were a little higher than street level, so that a bank was created in the entrance area where customers and dealers used to sit to check the goods and agree the price. These benches were removed during the mandate (they are preserved in Suq al-Qattanin ). The size of the shops shows which goods were once traded here, for example goldsmiths had small shops, carpet dealers big ones.

Hall from the time of the crusaders

15 m before the junction of a road that branches off to the right in the direction of the Western Wall ( Rechov Plugat haKotel ), there is a columned hall of the crusaders on the left, which may be the meat market mentioned by Ernoul. ⊙ On the facade you can see two pillars.

Mameluk building ensemble

al-Madrasa at-Tashtamuriyya : Bay window for reciting the Koran.

al-Madrasa at-Tashtamuriyya

According to the building inscription (dated 1382/83) Saif ad-Din Tashtamur al-ʿAlaʾi founded a law and theological college ( madrasa ) here. ⊙ A narrow corridor leads to a cross-shaped courtyard with an ornamental fountain in the middle. On each side there is a barrel-vaulted, half-open large room ( iwan ) in which the Koran was studied. The facade is splendidly decorated ( muqarnas , black and white palmette frieze ). To the right of the portal is the mausoleum for the son of the founder. From here a staircase led to a bay window , from where a Koran was once recited for passers-by in the alley. A public well room ( Sabil ) also belonged to the building ensemble.

Turbat al-Amir Berke Chan

Turbat al-Amir Berke Chan (Chalidi Library).

This mausoleum is just behind the junction of the road that leads to the Western Wall and houses the library of the Chalidi family. ⊙ She has valuable manuscripts. Here Berke Chan , the victor over the Crusaders, was honored in a family funeral by his brother after his murder in Damascus (1246). The building, which has been rebuilt several times, shows the influence of the architecture of the crusaders.

The Turba for Berke Khan is the oldest mausoleum that was built in the urban area and near the Haram. Against the criticism of religious authorities such as Ibn Taimiya , the construction of such grave monuments for prominent personalities became common in the Mameluke period, six of which are on Kettentorstrasse.

at-Turba al-Kilaniyya

Branch of the road to the Western Wall, right Muqarnas of Turba al-Kilaniyya .

This mausoleum on the opposite side of the street was created for himself after the will of Ibn as-Sahib Kilan (d. 1352), so a comparison of the two mausoleums shows the further development of the architecture within a century. The domed facade is axially symmetrical to the portal, with the two burial chambers on both sides of the entrance. ⊙ The room on the upper floor was not originally used.

Simpler buildings

al-Madrasa at-Taziyya

Madrasah al-Ṭazija

This is a comparatively simple university in Mameluke style, completed in 1362. ⊙

at-Turba al-Jaliqiyya

Detail, at-Turba al-Jaliqiyya.

The mausoleum for Mamluk Baibars al-Jaliq al-Salihi (d. 1307) is located directly in front of the stairs that lead down to Tariq al-Wad (valley road). ⊙

Sabil Daraj al-ʿAyn

The Ottoman "fountain of the water staircase" from 1713 is also located directly on this descent to Talstrasse. ⊙

Turbat Turkan Chatun

Architectural detail , Turbat Turkan Chatun.

The mausoleum on the north side of Kettentorstrasse was built in 1352/53 for Turkan Chatun , ⊙ a woman whose biography is not known except that she was the daughter of Amir Tuqtay ibn Saljuqay . It is a particularly high-quality building of the Mameluk style.

at-Turba as-Saʿdiyya

This mausoleum, dated 1311, is located directly on the corner of the forecourt of the chain gate; ⊙ Above the windows is a panel for a building inscription that has not been executed. There is an ornate niche portal with benches.

Double gate system and forecourt

Serpent column, architectural detail of the chain gate.

Bab as-Silsila and Bab as-Sakina

This is a double gate system, although the naming fluctuated somewhat and both gates have had different names only since the Mameluk period. It was named after the Omajjad "chain dome " ( Qubbat as-Silsila ) just east of the Dome of the Rock , where King David sat in court according to local Muslim tradition, as well as the "Inhabitation of God" (Arabic Sakina , cf. Hebrew Shechina ). In al-Muqadassi (around 985) this gate was called the Gate of David ( Bab Dawud ).

The current gate dates from the first years of the Ayyubids (1187–1198); however, the upper floor was not added until the Ottoman period. A special feature is the extensive use of spoils from Crusader-era buildings, for example the trumpets on the portico with a shell ornament. The material used here may have come from a workshop that worked in the Apulian tradition.

The northern gate, Bab as-Sakina , ⊙ is usually closed. The southern gate, Bab as-Silsila , ⊙ is the passage to the Haram for Muslims.

al-Madrasa at-Tankiziyya (police station), interior with mihrab and modern wall painting.
al-Madrasa at-Tankiziyya , chalice and benefactor's inscription.

al-Madrasa at-Tankiziyya

On the south side of the forecourt is the oldest surviving law and theological college in Jerusalem, ⊙ a magnificent building in the Mameluk style. The building inscription (dated 1328/29) contains the motif of a chalice and reminds us that the founder Saif ad-Din Tankiz an-Nasiri held the rank of cupbearer of the sultan. He rose to the rank of governor of Damascus, but was overthrown and executed. The construction plan follows the classic scheme for a madrasa : in the middle of the cross-shaped courtyard is an ornamental fountain, each cross arm ends in an iwan . A mihrab with marble incrustations and glass mosaics was added to the south of the complex .

Since 1967 this building has been the seat of the Israeli police station to control the temple square.

Ribat an-Nisaʾ

Opposite the madrasa there is a hospice for Muslim pilgrims, ⊙ an inconspicuous building on an L-shaped floor plan, also donated by Saif ad-Din Tankiz an-Nasiri in 1330.

al-Madrasah al-Baladiyya

The pilgrims' quarters conceal the madrasa behind it, ⊙ whose access is through a simple pointed arch portal east of the Ribat an-Nisaʾ. The visitor passes the mausoleum of the founder Mankali Bugha al-Ahmadi (d. 1380) and enters the cruciform inner courtyard of this largest madrasa in Jerusalem, which was later converted for residential purposes.

Sabil Bab as-Silsila .

Sabil al-Ashraf Qayitbay

This representative fountain from the late 15th century was located in front of the entrance to the madrasa until 1871; ⊙ A sarcophagus from Herodian times served as a fountain trough . Since such sarcophagi were not easy to obtain, it is assumed that the founder al-Ashraf Qayitbay had a Herodian tomb plundered, "possibly the tomb of Queen Helena of Adiabene ."

Sabil Bab as-Silsila

This is an Ottoman fountain on the west side of the forecourt. ⊙ It was built in 1537 as part of an urban renewal that also gave the Dome of the Rock its blue faience and is considered one of the most beautiful fountains in Jerusalem. The founder, Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent , referred to himself as the second Solomon in the building inscription . Spolia are incorporated into the fountain architecture, e.g. B. in the spandrels remains of tendril friezes, in the arched field a rose.

Archaeological investigations in the area of ​​the double gate system

Shaft excavation under Charles Warren (1884).

After the ruined area of ​​the Temple Mount had been sidelined for the late antique and Byzantine city, it was upgraded to the religious center of the Muslim city in the first years of Islamic rule.

So-called Masonic Hall . Later, a central column was added as a support.

Two large buildings from the Mameluk era on the forecourt of the chain gate, the Madrasa al-Tankiziyya and the Madrasa al-Baladiyya, go down to the level of the Second Temple with their foundations. In the Ottoman era, these substructures were only used as cisterns and sewers, around which some legends entwined. Titus Tobler was already exploring barrel-vaulted rooms in 1845, which he considered to be substructures from the time of Herod. In 1867 Charles William Wilson discovered the monumental arch that was named after him. In 1867 and 1870 Charles Warren dug two shafts on both sides of the arch and explored the rooms to the west, to which he gave the names still in use today: donkey barn, secret passage, bricklayer hall and "gigantic sidewalk" (= supporting structure of the chain gate street above).

From 1968 to 1985, Israeli archaeologists, led by Meir Ben-Dov, carried out a thorough study of the area on behalf of the Ministry of Religious Affairs. They removed the rubbish that had accumulated in it, restored the rooms and made them accessible to visitors as part of a tour.

The so-called bricklayer hall is of particular interest. Warren believed that here, near the area of ​​the former Solomonic Temple, Freemasons met for rituals in the 19th century ; therefore the name. Due to a preserved Corinthian capital in the northeast corner, this room is dated to the Hasmonean period and was perhaps part of the Hellenistic high school at that time. At the time of Herod it was part of an important public building, possibly the town hall, mentioned by Flavius ​​Josephus. It is a rectangular room with a footprint of 14 × 25.5 m. The walls are smoothed inside and decorated with pilasters ; one of the associated capitals is still present. On the outside, the walls show high-quality bushes . The vaulting of the ceiling does not come from ancient times, but is probably Umayyad .

literature

  • Klaus Bieberstein : The Road to the Gate of the Chain and the Inhabitation of God - An exemplary Islamic approach to the Haram . Pp. 207-220.
  • Meir Ben-Dov: Herod's Mighty Temple Mount . In: Biblical Archeology Review 12, 6/1986; on-line
  • Charles W. Wilson: Ordinance Survey of Jerusalem , 1886; on-line

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 208 .
  2. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road of the chain . S. 209 .
  3. ↑ a b c Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 210 .
  4. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 211 .
  5. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 212 .
  6. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 213 .
  7. ^ Katharina Galor, Hanswulf Bloedhorn: The Archeology of Jerusalem: From the Origins to the Ottomans . Yale University Press, 2013, pp. 229 .
  8. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 214-215 .
  9. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 215-216 .
  10. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 216 .
  11. ↑ Jerusalem / Temple Mount / Chain Gate. In: Kiel Image Database Middle East. Retrieved March 6, 2018 .
  12. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 218-219 .
  13. ↑ a b c Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 219 .
  14. ^ Klaus Bieberstein: The road to the gate of the chain . S. 220 .
  15. ↑ Max Küchler: Jerusalem . S. 163 .
  16. ↑ Max Küchler: Jerusalem . S. 162 .
  17. ↑ Max Küchler: Jerusalem . S. 164 .