Al-Ram (), also transcribed as Al-Ramm, El-Ram, Er-Ram, and A-Ram, is a

Palestinian Palestinians () are an Arab ethnonational group native to the Levantine region of Palestine. *: "Palestine was part of the first wave of conquest following Muhammad's death in 632 CE; Jerusalem fell to the Caliph Umar in 638. The indigenous p ...

town which lies northeast 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 ...

, just outside the city's municipal border. The village is part of the built-up urban area of Jerusalem, the

Atarot Atarot ( ) was a moshav in Mandatory Palestine, north of Jerusalem along the highway to Ramallah. It was named after the biblical Atarot mentioned in , which is believed to have been situated nearby. The moshav was captured and destroyed by ...

industrial zone and

Beit Hanina Beit Hanina ( ,) is an Arab Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem. It is on the road to Ramallah, eight kilometers north of central Jerusalem, at an elevation of 780 meters above sea level. Beit Hanina is bordered by Pisgat Ze'ev and H ...

lie to the west, and

Neve Yaakov Neve Yaakov (; also ''Neve Ya'aqov'', lit. Jacob's Oasis) is an Israeli settlement in East Jerusalem, part of the Israeli-occupied territories, north of the settlement of Pisgat Ze'ev and south of the Palestinian locality of al-Ram. Establishe ...

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; ) is the official statistical institution of Palestine. Its main task is to provide credible statistical figures at the national and international levels. It is a state institution that provid ...

, a-Ram had a population of 15,814 in 2017. The head of A-Ram's village council estimates that 58,000 people live there, more than half of them holding

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 identity cards.

History

Al-Ram identified with

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. Ramah ha ...

, a town mentioned multiple times in the

Bible The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally writt ...

.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 historical Metal Ages, after the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age. It has also been considered as the final age of the three-age division starting with prehistory (before recorded history) and progre ...

, declined during the

Persian period The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire, also known as the Persian Empire or First Persian Empire (; , , ), was an Iranian peoples, Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid dynasty in 550 BC. Based in modern-day Iran, i ...

, and later revived during the

Hellenistic period In classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Greek history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC, which was followed by the ascendancy of the R ...

Classical period

Ossuaries An ossuary is a chest, box, building, well, or site made to serve as the final resting place of human skeletal remains. They are frequently used where burial space is scarce. A body is first buried in a temporary grave, then after some years th ...

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

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

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

Crusader period

Crusader Crusader or Crusaders may refer to: Military * Crusader, a participant in one of the Crusades * Convair NB-36H Crusader, an experimental nuclear-powered bomber * Crusader tank, a British cruiser tank of World War II * Crusaders (guerrilla), a C ...

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 (; ; ; ; 1060 – 18 July 1100) was a preeminent leader of the First Crusade, and the first ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem from 1099 to 1100. Although initially reluctant to take the title of king, he agreed to rule as pri ...

(r. 1099–1100) as a

fief A fief (; ) 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 of feudal alle ...

to the

Church of the Holy Sepulchre The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, also known as the Church of the Resurrection, is a fourth-century church in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, Old City of Jerusalem. The church is the seat of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchat ...

.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 (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...

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

Nahiya A nāḥiyah ( , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiyeh, 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 divisi ...

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

Al-Quds Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the oldest cities in the world, and is considered holy to the three major Abrahamic religions—Jud ...

. The population was 28 households, all

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

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

wheat Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, whe ...

barley Barley (), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains; it was domesticated in the Fertile Crescent around 9000 BC, giving it nonshattering spikele ...

olive The olive, botanical name ''Olea europaea'' ("European olive"), is a species of Subtropics, subtropical evergreen tree in the Family (biology), family Oleaceae. Originating in Anatolia, Asia Minor, it is abundant throughout the Mediterranean ...

trees and

vineyard A vineyard ( , ) is a plantation of grape-bearing vines. Many vineyards exist for winemaking; others for the production of raisins, table grapes, and non-alcoholic grape juice. The science, practice and study of vineyard production is kno ...

s, in addition to occasional revenues,

goat The goat or domestic goat (''Capra hircus'') is a species of Caprinae, goat-antelope that is mostly 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 ...

s and

beehive A beehive is an enclosed structure which houses honey bees, subgenus '' Apis.'' Honey bees live in the beehive, raising their young and producing honey as part of their seasonal cycle. Though the word ''beehive'' is used to describe the nest of ...

s; a total of 4700

akçe The ''akçe'' or ''akça'' (anglicized as ''akche'', ''akcheh'' or ''aqcha''; ; , , in Europe known as '' asper'') was a silver coin mainly known for being the chief monetary unit of the Ottoman Empire. It was also used in other states includi ...

. 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 September 1890) was a French people, French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included ...

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 The PEF Survey of Palestine was a series of surveys carried out by the Palestine Exploration Fund (PEF) between 1872 and 1877 for the completed Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) and in 1880 for the soon abandoned Survey of Eastern Palestine. The ...

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 on the earth 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 Vault may refer to: * Jumping, the act of propelling oneself upwards Architecture * Vault (architecture), an arched form above an enclosed space * Bank vault, a reinforced room or compartment where valuables are stored * Burial vault (enclosur ...

; lower down the hill a pillar-shaft broken in two, probably from the church. On the hill are

cistern A cistern (; , ; ) is a waterproof receptacle for holding liquids, usually water. Cisterns are often built to catch and store rainwater. To prevent leakage, the interior of the cistern is often lined with hydraulic plaster. Cisterns are disti ...

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 mining, open-pit mine in which dimension stone, rock (geology), rock, construction aggregate, riprap, sand, gravel, or slate is excavated from the ground. The operation of quarries is regulated in some juri ...

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

Khan Khan may refer to: * 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 various ethnicities Art and entertainment * Khan (band), an English progressiv ...

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: ; ; ; ), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area analogous in role (but not equal) to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amo ...

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

In the wake of the

1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 Arab–Israeli War, also known as the First Arab–Israeli War, followed the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, civil war in Mandatory Palestine as the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. The civil war becam ...

, 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, also known as the June War, 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab world, Arab states, primarily United Arab Republic, Egypt, Syria, and Jordan from 5 to 10June ...

in 1967, Al-Ram has been under

Israeli occupation Israel has occupied the Golan Heights of Syria and the Palestinian territories since the Six-Day War of 1967. It has previously occupied the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt and southern Lebanon as well. Prior to 1967, control of the Palestinian terr ...

. 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 land, while the remaining 66.8% (~4,482 dunums) was defined as

Area C Area C (; ) is the fully Israeli-controlled territory in the West Bank, defined as the whole area outside the Palestinian enclaves (Areas A and B). Area C constitutes about 61 percent of the West Bank territory, containing most Israeli settle ...

. Israel has confiscated land from Al-Ram in order to build two

Israeli settlement Israeli settlements, also called Israeli colonies, are the civilian communities built by Israel throughout the Israeli-occupied territories. They are populated by Israeli citizens, almost exclusively of Israeli Jews, Jewish identity or ethni ...

/Industrial parks: *315 dunums were taken for Neve Ya'akov,Ar Ram Town Profile
ARIJ, 2012, p. 19 *56 dunums were taken for the industrial

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 ''

'' 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 Type site, typed by British archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon ...

period have been discovered in the

Southern Levant The Southern Levant is a geographical region that corresponds approximately to present-day Israel, Palestine, and Jordan; some definitions also include southern Lebanon, southern Syria and the Sinai Peninsula. As a strictly geographical descript ...

, 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 by Royal Engineers of the War Department. The Fund is the oldest known organization i ...

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 British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

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

, as the

grange Grange may refer to: Buildings * Grange House, Scotland, built in 1564, and demolished in 1906 * Grange Estate, Pennsylvania, built in 1682 * The Grange (Toronto), Toronto, Ontario, built in 1817 * Monastic grange, a farming estate belonging to ...

of a

Frankish Frankish may refer to: * Franks, a Germanic tribe and their culture ** Frankish language or its modern descendants, Franconian languages, a group of Low Germanic languages also commonly referred to as "Frankish" varieties * Francia, a post-Roman ...

new town founded by 1160.

Former Crusader church

The former (old)

mosque A mosque ( ), also called a masjid ( ), is a place of worship for Muslims. The term usually refers to a covered building, but can be any place where Salah, Islamic prayers are performed; such as an outdoor courtyard. Originally, mosques were si ...

of Al-Ram was once a Crusader parish

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

. 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 (Greek Basiliké) was a large public building with multiple functions that was typically built alongside the town's forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek Eas ...

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

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

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, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column is a compression member ...

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-type ...

, 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 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, ; ) is a Subdivisions of Belgrade, municipality in the city of Belgrade, Serbia. 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 ...

Serbia , image_flag = Flag of Serbia.svg , national_motto = , image_coat = Coat of arms of Serbia.svg , national_anthem = () , image_map = , map_caption = Location of Serbia (gree ...

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. Name The name Bondy was recorded for the first time around AD 600 as ''Bonitiacum'', meaning " ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

– 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 The Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem (ARIJ; ) is a Palestinian NGO founded in 1990 with its main office in Bethlehem in the West Bank. ARIJ is actively working on research projects in the fields of management of natural resources, water m ...

(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 Palestine