The Broad Wall () is an ancient defensive wall, located in the Jewish Quarter of

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

's Old City. The wall was unearthed in the 1970s by

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

i archaeologist Nahman Avigad. Originally dated to the reign of King Hezekiah (late 8th century BCE), it has been attributed in 2024, based on carbon-dating, to the reign of King Uzziah, several decades earlier.New carbon-dating techniques enable 'absolute chronology' of First Temple-era Jerusalem
Gavriel Fiske for ''The Times of Israel'', 30 April 2024. Accessed 6 July 2024. The Broad Wall is a massive defensive structure, seven meters thick. The unbroken length of wall uncovered by Avigad's dig runs long and is preserved in places to a height of .Jewish Quarter Excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem: The finds from areas A, W and X-2 : final report. Volume 2 of Jewish Quarter Excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem: Conducted by Nahman Avigad, 1969–1982, Nahman Avigad, Hillel Geva, Israel Exploration Society, 2000. It was long believed that the city in this period was confined to the fortified, narrow hill running to the south of the

Temple Mount The Temple Mount (), also known as the Noble Sanctuary (Arabic: الحرم الشريف, 'Haram al-Sharif'), and sometimes as Jerusalem's holy esplanade, is a hill in the Old City of Jerusalem, Old City of Jerusalem that has been venerated as a ...

known as the City of David. Avigad's dig demonstrated that by the late eighth century the city had expanded to include the hill to the west of the Temple Mount. As long as the wall was attributed to Hezekiah, the motivation for building it was believed to have been

Sennacherib Sennacherib ( or , meaning "Sin (mythology), Sîn has replaced the brothers") was the king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire from 705BC until his assassination in 681BC. The second king of the Sargonid dynasty, Sennacherib is one of the most famous A ...

's campaign in Judah, and the presumption was that it might be referred to in and . Uzziah's motivation, however, was to rebuild the city after the damage brought about by a strong earthquake.

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{{Commons category-inline
The Broad Wall: photos, illustrations and archaeological information
Buildings and structures completed in the 8th century BC Ancient sites in Jerusalem

Hezekiah Jewish Quarter (Jerusalem)

See also

References

External links