Christianity and Mary’s Legacy: Jerusalem and the Dome of the Rock
Capitalizing Jerusalem - Mu'awiya's Urban Vision 638-680 - Beatrice St. Laurent
Beatrice St. Laurent [+ ]
Bridgewater State University
Beatrice St. Laurent is Professor of Art History at Bridgewater State University in Massachusetts.
Isam Awwad [+ ]
Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem
Isam Awwad is Associate Fellow, W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem, and was Chief Architect and Conservator of the Haram al-Sharif, Jerusalem, from 1972 to 2004.
Description
Chapters 7-13 focus on a revision of the dating, patronage and history of the Dome of the Rock to attribute the monument’s planning and initiation to Mu’awiya who perhaps left it incomplete at his death in 680. Connections to Byzantium and Yemen are explored as well as Biblical and Qur’anic linkages with the monument. The interpretation further posits that monument links the ahl al-kitab (People of the Book) and ‘others’ to the Dome. The implications are not only religious but political representing ties to a monument type symbolizing the legacy of the pre-Islamic Arab kings as it was passed on to the Umayyads.