Jerusalem Old City

The walls around Jerusalem have been torn down,built up, and moved many times.In AD 70,they were destroyed by the Romans, and in 1033 by an earthquake. The walls as we see them today were built in the 1500s. Viewed from above, they look like a rough parallelogram sloping from northeast to southwest. These are the gates around Old city jerusalem now.

Herods Gate: (AKA Flowers Gate): 

Near the east corner of the north wall. Right outside the gate is a cemetery. No one wanted to live in an area known for a cemetery,so they changed the Arabic for “cemetery”_ Sahirah _ to Zahirah, which means “flowers.

Damascus gate:

The center of the north wall.The busiest gate on weekends as shoppers come into Jerusalem. In its current form,the gate was built in 1537 under the rule of Suleiman the Magnificent the sultan of the Ottoman Empire. Beneath the current gate, the remains of an earlier gate can be seen, dating back to at least the time of the Roman Emperor Hadrian in the 2nd century CE. In front of this gate stood a Roman victory column topped with the Emperor Hadrian`s image. This historical detail is preserved in the current gate`s Arabic name, Bad el-Amud, meaning “gate of the column. Hadrian had significantly expanded the gate which served as the main entrance to the city form at least as early as the 1st century CE. One of the main entrances to the Old city of Jerusalem. It is located in the wall on the city`s northwest side and connects to a highway leading out to Nablus, which in the Hebrew Bible was called Shechem or Sichem, and from there, in times past, to the capital of Syria, Damascus.

New Gate:

The northwest corner of the Old city. The current New Gate was made in 1887 when Christians demanded the Turkish sultan give them direct access to their quarter of the city.It was built in 1889 to provide direct access between the Christian Quarter and the new neighborhoods then going up outside the walls . The arched gate is decorated with crenelated stonework.The new Gate was built at the highest point of the present wall, at 790 metres (2,590 ft) above sea level. It was built at the request of the French Consul to provide access to the Old City from the Notre Dame Hospice that was completed in 1886, and to provide Russian Christian pilgrims living at the Russian compound (outside the Old City walls ) direct access to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the Christian Quarter.The New Gate was the name used by the Ottoman administration. Itwas also known as Bab es sultan Abd ul Hamid by the Arab workforce for the Ottoman Sultan Abdel Hamid ll who allowed the building.

Jaffa Gate:

The center of the western wall near where Herods palace was. Currently one of the main gates into Jerusalem.

ZION GATE:

Near the west corner of the southern wall. Connects king Davids tomb and the Upper Room to the Jewish Quarter of the Old City.Situated on the southern part of the ramparts, the Zion Gate is the main entrance to the Jewish Quarter. It is so named because it faces Mount Zion. You can see the bullet holes from the 1948 War of Independence which is why the gate is also known as “the weeping Gate” and “the Wounded Gate”. Look up at the little balcony on the gate. It is called a neck-breaker and from there boiling oil or water was thrown down on the enemy. soldiers from the IDF engineering crops entered the Old City through this gate in the 6-Day War in 1967.

The Golden Gate:

This is one of the most important gates due to its special significance for the three major religions.

The lions Gate:

Situated in the eastern part of the walls,the Lions Gate leads onto Via Dolorosa.The gate gets its name from the two lions that decorate either side of the gates facade. Suleiman the Magnificent built the gate because he dreamed that he would be devoured by lions if he did not build walls around Jerusalem to protect its inhabitants.

Dung Gate:

location: 

The gate is situated near the southeast corner of the old city southwest of the Temple Mount. The gate is the closest to the Western Wall and is a main passage for vehicles coming out of the Old City and for buses headed to the Western Wall.

history:

It was originally much smaller but was enlarged in 1952 after the Old City came under Jordanian control in 1948. After its capture by Israel in 1967 architect Shlomo Aronson was commissioned to renovate this gate. Directly behind the gate lies the entrance to the Western Wall compound.

reason for the name:

The unusual name of this gate stems from the belief that this was the gate through which the garbage from the Temple was brought out of the city. The gate leads towards Wailing Wall.