Al-Ram ( ar, الرّام), also transcribed as Al-Ramm, El-Ram, Er-Ram, and A-Ram, is a Palestinian town which lies northeast of

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

, just outside the city's municipal border. The village is part of the built-up urban area of Jerusalem, the Atarot industrial zone and Beit Hanina lie to the west, and Neve Yaakov borders it on the south, with a built-up area of 3,289 dunums. According to the

Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS; ar, الجهاز المركزي للإحصاء الفلسطيني) is the official statistical institution of the State of Palestine. Its main task is to provide credible statistical figures a ...

, a-Ram had a population of 25,595 in 2006. The head of A-Ram's village council estimates that 58,000 people live there, more than half of them holding

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

i identity cards.

History

Ancient Israel

Al-Ram is thought to be the site of the biblical city of

Ramah in Benjamin Ramah (from Hebrew: "height") was, according to the Hebrew Bible, a city in ancient Israel in the land allocated to the tribe of Benjamin. It was located near Gibeon and Mizpah to the West, Gibeah to the South, and Geba to the East. It has b ...

.Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 2, pp
315
317 Archeological evidence shows that the town was heavily populated during the

Iron Age II The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly ...

, declined during the Persian period, and later revived during the

Hellenistic period In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in ...

Classical period

Ossuaries dated to the first century BC and CE were discovered at Al-Ram bearing

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

inscriptions with names such as ''Miriam'', ''Yehohanan'', and ''Shimon ben Zekhariya''.

Crusader period

In Crusader sources, Al-Ram was named ''Aram, Haram, Rama, Ramatha, Ramitta,'' or ''Ramathes''.Pringle, 1998, p
179
/ref> Al-Ram was one of 21 villages given by

Godfrey of Bouillon Godfrey of Bouillon (, , , ; 18 September 1060 – 18 July 1100) was a French nobleman and pre-eminent leader of the First Crusade. First ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem from 1099 to 1100, he avoided the title of king, preferring that of princ ...

(r. 1099–1100) as a

fief A fief (; la, feudum) was a central element in medieval contracts based on feudal law. It consisted of a form of property holding or other rights granted by an overlord to a vassal, who held it in fealty or "in fee" in return for a form ...

to the

Church of the Holy Sepulchre The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, hy, Սուրբ Հարության տաճար, la, Ecclesia Sancti Sepulchri, am, የቅዱስ መቃብር ቤተክርስቲያን, he, כנסיית הקבר, ar, كنيسة القيامة is a church i ...

.Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p
11
/ref> All the inhabitants of the village who were mentioned in Crusader sources between 1152 and 1160 had names which imply they were Christian.Pringle, 1998, p
180
/ref> The village was mentioned around 1161, when a dispute about a land boundary was settled.

Ottoman period

In 1517, the village became part of the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University ...

along with the rest of Palestine. In the 1596 tax records, it appeared as ''Rama'', located in the ''

Nahiya A nāḥiyah ( ar, , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiya or nahia, is a regional or local type of administrative division that usually consists of a number of villages or sometimes smaller towns. In Tajikistan, it is a second-level division w ...

'' of Jabal Quds of the '' Liwa'' of

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

. The population was 28 households, all

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

. They paid a fixed tax-rate of 33,3% on agricultural products, including

wheat Wheat is a grass widely cultivated for its seed, a cereal grain that is a worldwide staple food. The many species of wheat together make up the genus ''Triticum'' ; the most widely grown is common wheat (''T. aestivum''). The archaeologi ...

barley Barley (''Hordeum vulgare''), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains, particularly in Eurasia as early as 10,000 years ago. Globally 70% of barley p ...

olive The olive, botanical name ''Olea europaea'', meaning 'European olive' in Latin, is a species of small tree or shrub in the family Oleaceae, found traditionally in the Mediterranean Basin. When in shrub form, it is known as ''Olea europaea'' ' ...

trees and

vineyard A vineyard (; also ) is a plantation of grape-bearing vines, grown mainly for winemaking, but also raisins, table grapes and non-alcoholic grape juice. The science, practice and study of vineyard production is known as viticulture. Vineyard ...

s, in addition to occasional revenues,

goat The goat or domestic goat (''Capra hircus'') is a domesticated species of goat-antelope typically kept as livestock. It was domesticated from the wild goat (''C. aegagrus'') of Southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the a ...

s and

beehive A beehive is an enclosed structure in which some honey bee species of the subgenus '' Apis'' live and raise their young. Though the word ''beehive'' is commonly used to describe the nest of any bee colony, scientific and professional literature ...

s; a total of 4700

akçe The ''akçe'' or ''akça'' (also spelled ''akche'', ''akcheh''; ota, آقچه; ) refers to a silver coin which was the chief monetary unit of the Ottoman Empire. The word itself evolved from the word "silver or silver money", this word is der ...

. In 1838, Edward Robinson found the village to be very poor and small, but large stones and scattered columns indicated that it had previously been an important place. In 1870 the French explorer

Victor Guérin Victor Guérin (15 September 1821 – 21 Septembe 1890) was a French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included Greece, Asia Min ...

found the village to have 200 inhabitants,Guérin, 1874, p
199
ff while an Ottoman village list of about the same year showed that Er-Ram had 32 houses and a population of 120, though the population count included men only.Socin, 1879, p
158
/ref> In 1883, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described Er-Ram as a "small village in a conspicuous position on the top of a white hill, with olives. It has a

well A well is an excavation or structure created in the ground by digging, driving, or drilling to access liquid resources, usually water. The oldest and most common kind of well is a water well, to access groundwater in underground aquifers. The ...

to the south. .The houses are of stone, partly built of old material". "West of the village is a good birkeh with a pointed vault; lower down the hill a pillar-shaft broken in two, probably from the church. On the hill are

cistern A cistern (Middle English ', from Latin ', from ', "box", from Greek ', "basket") is a waterproof receptacle for holding liquids, usually water. Cisterns are often built to catch and store rainwater. Cisterns are distinguished from wells by ...

s. Drafted stones are used up in the village walls. At Khan-er-Ram, by the main road, is a

quarry A quarry is a type of open-pit mine in which dimension stone, rock, construction aggregate, riprap, sand, gravel, or slate is excavated from the ground. The operation of quarries is regulated in some jurisdictions to reduce their envir ...

with half-finished blocks still in it, and two cisterns. The

Khan Khan may refer to: *Khan (inn), from Persian, a caravanserai or resting-place for a travelling caravan *Khan (surname), including a list of people with the name *Khan (title), a royal title for a ruler in Mongol and Turkic languages and used by ...

appears to be quite modern, and is in ruins. There are extensive quarries on the hill-sides near it."Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p
155
/ref> In 1896, the population of Er-Ram was estimated to be about 240 persons.

British Mandate period

In the

1922 census of Palestine The 1922 census of Palestine was the first census carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine, on 23 October 1922. The reported population was 757,182, including the military and persons of foreign nationality. The divis ...

conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Al-Ram had a population of 208, all Muslims.Barron, 1923, Table V, , , Sub-district of Jerusalem, p
14
/ref> This had increased in the 1931 census to 262, still all Muslim, in 51 houses.Mills, 1932, p
42
/ref> Al-Ram suffered badly in the 1927 earthquake, with old walls collapsing. In a survey in 1945, Al-Ram had a population of 350, all Muslims, and a total land area of 5,598

dunam A dunam ( Ottoman Turkish, Arabic: ; tr, dönüm; he, דונם), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area equivalent to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amou ...

s.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p
58
441 dunams were designated for plantations and irrigable land, 2,291 for cereals, while 14 dunams were built-up area.

Jordanian period

East Jerusalem by Mujaddara - panoramio (3434)

In the wake of the

1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 (or First) Arab–Israeli War was the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. It formally began following the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight on 14 May 1948; the Israeli Declaration of Independence had ...

, and after the

1949 Armistice Agreements The 1949 Armistice Agreements were signed between Israel and Egypt,Jordanian rule. In 1961, the population of Al-Ram was 769.

Post-1967

Since the

Six-Day War The Six-Day War (, ; ar, النكسة, , or ) or June War, also known as the 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab states (primarily Egypt, Syria, and Jordan) from 5 to 10 ...

in 1967, Al-Ram has been under

Israeli occupation Israeli-occupied territories are the lands that were captured and occupied by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967. While the term is currently applied to the Palestinian territories and the Golan Heights, it has also been used to refer t ...

. The population in a 1967 census conducted by the Israeli authorities was 860, 86 of whom originated from the Israeli territory. According to ARIJ, after the 1995 accords, 33.2% (or about ~2,226 dunums) of Al-Ram's land is classified as

Area B The Palestinian enclaves are areas in the West Bank designated for Palestinians under a variety of U.S. and Israeli-led proposals to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The enclaves are often compared to the nominally self-governing black ...

land, while the remaining 66.8% (~4,482 dunums) was defined as Area C. Israel has confiscated land from Al-Ram in order to build two

Israeli settlement Israeli settlements, or Israeli colonies, are civilian communities inhabited by Israeli citizens, overwhelmingly of Jewish ethnicity, built on lands occupied by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War. The international community considers Israeli se ...

/Industrial parks: *315 dunums were taken for

Neve Ya'akov Neve Yaakov also Neve Ya'aqov, ( he, נווה יעקב; lit. Jacob's Oasis), is an Israeli settlement and neighborhood located in East Jerusalem, north of Pisgat Ze'ev and south of al-Ram. Established in 1924 during the period of the British M ...

,Ar Ram Town Profile
ARIJ, 2012, p. 19 *56 dunums were taken for the industrial Atarot site. In 2006, the Israeli High Court rejected three petitions objecting to the construction of a security barrier separating Al-Ram from Jerusalem. The route of the fence planned to encircle northern Jerusalem has been revised several times. The latest plan, effectively implemented, called for a "minimalist" route following the municipal boundary at a distance of several hundred meters. This has left the town of Al-Ram almost entirely outside of the fence, with the exception of the southern part of the town, called Dahiyat al-Barid.

Archaeology

Neolithic mask

The '' Survey of Western Palestine'' mentions that Dr. Chaplin, who had visited er-Ram with an interest for archaeological remains, had "a very curious stone mask... in his possession, obtained from the village. It represents a human face without hair or beard, the nose well-cut, the eyes and mouth very feebly designed. The mask is hollowed out behind, and has two deep holes at the back as if to fix it to a wall. It is over a foot in longer diameter, and curiously resembles some of the faces of the Moabite collection of Mr. Shapira. There cannot well be any question of its genuine character, and nothing like it has been found, so far as I know, in Palestine."Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p
438
/ref> By 2018, a total of 15 such stone masks from the

Pre-Pottery Neolithic B Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) is part of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic, a Neolithic culture centered in upper Mesopotamia and the Levant, dating to years ago, that is, 8800–6500 BC. It was typed by British archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon durin ...

period have been discovered in the Southern Levant, one known to have had been bought in the late 19th century from villagers in Er-Ram and now kept at the

Palestine Exploration Fund The Palestine Exploration Fund is a British society based in London. It was founded in 1865, shortly after the completion of the Ordnance Survey of Jerusalem, and is the oldest known organization in the world created specifically for the stud ...

in London. Dr Thomas J. Chaplin (1830–1904) was the director of the

London Society for Promoting Christianity Amongst the Jews The Church's Ministry Among Jewish People (CMJ) (formerly the London Jews' Society and the London Society for Promoting Christianity Amongst the Jews) is an Anglican missionary society founded in 1809. History The society began in the early 19th ...

' own British Hospital for the Jews in Jerusalem for some 25 years.

Crusader remains

Two Crusader structures have been identified in the town.

Tower

Archaeologists have identified the ruins of a Crusader courtyard building developed from an initial

tower A tower is a tall structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting structures. Towers are specific ...

, as the

grange Grange may refer to: Buildings * Grange House, Scotland, built in 1564, and demolished in 1906 * Grange Estate, Pennsylvania, built in 1682 * Monastic grange, a farming estate belonging to a monastery Geography Australia * Grange, South Austr ...

of a Frankish new town founded by 1160.

Former Crusader church

The former (old)

mosque A mosque (; from ar, مَسْجِد, masjid, ; literally "place of ritual prostration"), also called masjid, is a place of prayer for Muslims. Mosques are usually covered buildings, but can be any place where prayers ( sujud) are performed, ...

of Al-Ram was once a Crusader parish

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * Chri ...

. In 1838, Robinson noted that "A small mosk with columns seems once to have been a church". In 1870, Guérin described "a mosque, replacing a former Christian church, of which it occupies the choir; the inhabitants venerate there the memory of Shaykh Hasen. The columns of this sanctuary come from the church."Guérin, 1874, p
200
as translated in Pringle, 1998, p
180
/ref> In 1881, Lieutenant Conder reported: "At the shrine which is so conspicuous near this village are remains of a former chapel. The lintel stone (as it would seem), with a bas-relief of rosettes, has been found by Dr. Chaplin within the building." In 1883, SWP noted that "west of the village is the Mukam of Sheik Hasein, once a small Christian

basilica In Ancient Roman architecture, a basilica is a large public building with multiple functions, typically built alongside the town's forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek East. The building gave its nam ...

". It further described it as "The remains of the north

aisle An aisle is, in general, a space for walking with rows of non-walking spaces on both sides. Aisles with seating on both sides can be seen in airplanes, certain types of buildings, such as churches, cathedrals, synagogues, meeting halls, pa ...

6 feet 8 inches wide, are marked by four

column A column or pillar in architecture and structural engineering is a structural element that transmits, through compression (physical), compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column i ...

s 2 feet in diameter. The chamber of the saint's tomb occupies part of the

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-typ ...

, and into its north wall the

lintel A lintel or lintol is a type of beam (a horizontal structural element) that spans openings such as portals, doors, windows and fireplaces. It can be a decorative architectural element, or a combined ornamented structural item. In the case of ...

of the old door is built, a stone 10 feet long, half of which is visible, with designs as shown. In the courtyard east of this chamber is an old well of good water and a fine mulberry-tree. In the west wall of the Mukam other stones, with discs in low relief, are built in."

Sister cities

Zemun Zemun ( sr-cyrl, Земун, ; hu, Zimony) is a municipality in the city of Belgrade. Zemun was a separate town that was absorbed into Belgrade in 1934. It lies on the right bank of the Danube river, upstream from downtown Belgrade. The developme ...

Serbia Serbia (, ; Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia ( Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin and the Balkans. It shares land borders with Hu ...

Bondy Bondy () is a commune in the northeastern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the centre of Paris, in the Seine-Saint-Denis department. In 2019, it had a population of 54,587. Name The name Bondy was recorded for the first time arou ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

- in progress since 2010

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ( pp
108114141
* (Index: p
491
Aram (Haram), p
504
Rama, Ramatha ) * (Index: p
129
Aram #74; p
134
er Ram #74; Rama #30a; (Rame? #512) * * * * *

External links

Al-Ramm
Welcome to Palestine *Survey of Western Palestine, Map 17
IAAWikimedia commons

Al-Ram Town (Fact Sheet)
Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem (ARIJ)
Ar Ram Town Profile
ARIJ
Ar Ram aerial photo
ARIJ
Locality Development Priorities and Needs in Ar Ram
ARIJ * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ram, ar Cities in the West Bank Jerusalem Governorate Municipalities of the State of Palestine