This article lists the gates of the

Old City of Jerusalem The Old City of Jerusalem ( he, הָעִיר הָעַתִּיקָה, translit=ha-ir ha-atiqah; ar, البلدة القديمة, translit=al-Balda al-Qadimah; ) is a walled area in East Jerusalem. The Old City is traditionally divided into ...

. The gates are visible on most

old maps of Jerusalem The cartography of Jerusalem is the creation, editing, processing and printing of maps of Jerusalem from ancient times until the rise of modern surveying techniques. Almost all extant maps known to scholars from the pre-modern era were prepared by ...

over the last 1,500 years. During different periods, the city walls followed different outlines and had a varying number of gates. During the era of the crusader

Kingdom of Jerusalem The Kingdom of Jerusalem ( la, Regnum Hierosolymitanum; fro, Roiaume de Jherusalem), officially known as the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem or the Frankish Kingdom of Palestine,Example (title of works): was a Crusader state that was establishe ...

(1099-1291), Jerusalem had four gates, one on each side. The current walls of the Old City of Jerusalem were built between 1533 and 1540 on orders of Ottoman

Sultan Sultan (; ar, سلطان ', ) is a position with several historical meanings. Originally, it was an Arabic abstract noun meaning "strength", "authority", "rulership", derived from the verbal noun ', meaning "authority" or "power". Later, it ...

Suleiman the Magnificent Suleiman I ( ota, سليمان اول, Süleyman-ı Evvel; tr, I. Süleyman; 6 November 14946 September 1566), commonly known as Suleiman the Magnificent in the West and Suleiman the Lawgiver ( ota, قانونى سلطان سليمان, Ḳ� ...

, who provided them with seven gates: six new gates were built, and the older and previously sealed Golden Gate was reopened (only to be re-sealed again after a few years). The seven gates at the time of Suleiman were: the

Damascus Gate The Damascus Gate is one of the main Gates of 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 the ...

;

Golden Gate The Golden Gate is a strait on the west coast of North America that connects San Francisco Bay to the Pacific Ocean. It is defined by the headlands of the San Francisco Peninsula and the Marin Peninsula, and, since 1937, has been spanned by th ...

;

Herod's Gate Herod's Gate ( ar, باب الزاهرة, Bab az-Zahra, ) is one of the seven open Gates of the Old City of Jerusalem. It connects the Muslim Quarter inside of the old city to the eponymic Palestinian neighbourhood of Bab az-Zahra, situated ju ...

;

Jaffa Gate Jaffa Gate ( he, שער יפו, Sha'ar Yafo; ar, باب الخليل, Bāb al-Khalīl, "Hebron Gate") is one of the seven main open Gates of the Old City of Jerusalem. The name Jaffa Gate is currently used for both the historical Ottoman gate ...

;

Lions' Gate Lions' Gate ( he, שער האריות, Sha'ar ha-Arayot, Lions' Gate, ar, باب الأسباط, Bab al-Asbat, Gate of the Tribes), also St Stephen's Gate, is one of the seven open Gates of the Old City of Jerusalem. It leads into the Muslim Qu ...

; Silwan Gate (also known as Mughrabi Gate, and now as Dung Gate); and

Zion Gate Zion Gate ( he, שער ציון, ''Sha'ar Zion'', ar, باب صهيون, ''Bab Sahyun''), also known in Arabic as Bab Harat al-Yahud ("Jewish Quarter Gate") or Bab an-Nabi Dawud ("Prophet David Gate"), is one of the seven historic Gates of the Ol ...

. With the re-sealing of the Golden Gate, the number of operational gates was brought back to seven with the addition of the

New Gate The New Gate ( ar, باب الجديد ''Bāb ij-Jdïd'') ( he, השער החדש ''HaSha'ar HeChadash'') is the newest of the gates of the Old City of Jerusalem. It was built in 1889 to provide direct access between the Christian Quarter and the ...

in 1887. Until 1887, each gate was closed before sunset and opened at sunrise.

List

The seven gates at the time of Suleiman were:

;

; Silwan Gate (also known as Mughrabi Gate, and now as Dung Gate); and

. With the re-sealing of the Golden Gate, the number of operational gates was brought back to seven with the addition of the

in 1887.

Previous gates

A smaller entrance, popularly known as the Tanners' Gate, has been opened for visitors after being discovered and unsealed during excavations in the 1990s. Sealed historic gates, other than the Golden Gate, comprise three that are at least partially preserved (the Single, Triple, and Double Gates in the southern wall), with several other gates discovered by archaeologists of which only traces remain (the so-called Gate of the Essenes on

Mount Zion Mount Zion ( he, הַר צִיּוֹן, ''Har Ṣīyyōn''; ar, جبل صهيون, ''Jabal Sahyoun'') is a hill in Jerusalem, located just outside the walls of the Old City (Jerusalem), Old City. The term Mount Zion has been used in the Hebrew ...

, the gate of Herod's royal palace south of the

citadel A citadel is the core fortified area of a town or city. It may be a castle, fortress, or fortified center. The term is a diminutive of "city", meaning "little city", because it is a smaller part of the city of which it is the defensive core. In ...

, and the vague remains of what 19th-century explorers identified as the Gate of the Funerals (Bab al-Jana'iz) or of al-Buraq (Bab al-Buraq) south of the Golden Gate).

References

{{Old City (Jerusalem)

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

List

Previous gates

See also

References