It now remains for me to say a few words about the present condition of these buildings. The Plan[449] shews the positions of the Hospital of S. John, of S. Mary the Great, and S. Mary the Less, with reference to the Church of the Resurrection. All three in the present day are but heaps of ruins; only a few walls remain standing, the greater number being so completely buried under a mass of earth and rubbish, that little or nothing can be ascertained about their ancient arrangement. We will however examine their exterior and interior. On the north side, towards the north-west corner, are some regular Arab cottages; and going eastward from them, we come to a minaret, built in the fifteenth century, in memory of the spot whereon Omar offered up prayer, instead of entering the Church of the Resurrection. Before the erection of the minaret, Khahab-ed-Din, nephew of Saladin, built a mosque called Derkah[450] on an adjoining plot of land; this had so completely fallen to decay, that but a few fragments of its foundations were remaining in 1855; over which the Mohammedans, actuated rather by fanaticism than religious feeling, built the slight octagonal monument called the Mosque of Omar. Opposite to the Church of the Resurrection is the Greek convent of Gethsemane; in the lower part of its walls are some fragments of ancient work. After this all along the little street (except at the decorated entrance) are small ill-built shops, covered with a great heap of earth, which often slips down during the rainy season. Inside these shops a careful search will discover some poor fragments of antiquity; such as mutilated capitals, broken bases, and carefully worked stones, built into rough Arab masonry. The east side exhibits similar cottages from the north-east corner as far as the door leading into the bazaar, which, together with the others near it on the east (though all are in the most neglected and ruinous condition), shews signs of antiquity in the walls and vaulting. I consider them to be the work of the Amalfi merchants, restored at a later period by the Crusaders. In the shops occupied by the braziers, on the west side of the bazaar bounding this plot of land, are some old passages which communicated with the interior of the hospital; but now many of them are walled up or obstructed with ruins. I managed however to get through certain of them, after some trouble, in order to reach the building near them on the west. At the eastern end of the south side are small houses and Arab shops; which however soon give place to the building now called from its use the Corn Bazaar; which in its well-laid walls, pointed arches, and solid vaults, shews plainly the work of the Hospitalers. I endeavoured to enter by the north side, where at the present time the stalls are placed, but was prevented by the accumulated earth; however I was able to ascertain that piers and vaulted roofs still remain in the northern part of the bazaar. The sentence of death is executed on criminals in this place. Going thence up the street westward, we see on the north side a row of fine columns, supporting grand pointed arches, now closed with Arab masonry. In the wall are doors opening into vaulted chambers like those in the bazaar. These were formerly the storehouses of the hospital; they now belong to different owners, the Greek convent possessing the largest share. The arcade towards the west is broken by a very high common Arab wall, enclosing the south side of the Greek convent of S. John Baptist; the entrance to which is in the Christian bazaar, which bounds the Hospital on the east. All the interior of the convent is modern Arab masonry, but some debased Corinthian capitals are built irregularly into the façade of the church; some more are to be seen in other parts, placed upon ancient bases of columns. These were discovered when the convent was enlarged towards the east. The crypt of the church, reached by an external staircase on the south side, is an uninjured building of the Hospitalers; in its east wall is a doorway with a pointed arch, closed to prevent the earth falling in. The rock lies about two feet below the pavement, and was discovered nearly at the same depth to the south of the convent, when the Prussian hospital was built; so that the correspondence of these levels proves the nonexistence of Dr Robinson's Tyropœon. Going northward along the Christian bazaar, we come to a Turkish bath on the east side, supplied during a large portion of the year from the pool commonly called the Pool of Hezekiah[451]. The refuse water is carried off by a conduit, emptying itself into that which runs along the Street of David. I have examined it at the two ends, and also in the interior of the convent, through the kindness of the Greek Prior. Its lower part is hewn in the rock; but the side walls and vaulting belong to the period of the Crusaders; it is too narrow to be traversed. From the bath up to the north-west corner are storehouses and wretched buildings, all of the commonest Arab work.
The present entrance into the precincts of the Hospital is near the western end of the northern side. Within, a spacious plateau meets the eye, formed by the earth which has accumulated at different periods; in the north-east corner is a very ruinous building; on the east it is bounded by the vaults of the bazaars below; these are very dilapidated and covered by a luxuriant vegetation of creeping plants, which daily makes the ruin worse; on the south are the fallen terrace-roofs of the ancient halls mentioned above; in the south-west corner stand the walls of the Convent of S. John; on the west, the low walls dividing it from the little gardens, terraces, and Mohammedan houses; and on the north, what we have already described. The plateau itself, on which there are no houses, belongs to the Greek Convent of S. Constantine; the building on the north-east is the property of the Governor, and in 1858 would have been sold to the Greeks or the Armenians, if M. Edmond de Barrère, the French Consul, had not actively interposed to prevent it, in the hope that it might one day be restored, if not to the knights of Malta, at least to France. Let us then enter it.
Its plan is that of a poor convent with an inner court, round which still runs a cloister on the level of the ground; though it has been transformed by the tanners, who have made the space between each pair of pillars into shops. The upper floor of the cloister is perfect, with the cells within. Opening into it on the south side is a long hall, little injured, which was probably the refectory; and parallel to this are two smaller chambers, in a tottering condition[452]. On the north of the convent[453] are some ruins of a church, sufficiently perfect to give us an idea of its ancient form. It had three apses at the east end; the southern of these is still standing; the fragments of the others are nearly covered by heaps of earth, as are portions of the side walls. We can ascertain its original length from a part of the west wall, which is still standing, though enclosed in a mass of Arab cottages, against which are the remains of two piers with their bases perfect. From these ruins I can infer that the church was divided into a nave with two side aisles. I consider the remains, both of the convent and of the church, to be the work of the Amalfi merchants. Their architecture, proportions, and masonry are too contracted and insignificant to be of the period of the Crusaders, who however undoubtedly built the great entrance gateway, and perhaps restored the church; this latter point, however, cannot easily be determined, as the building is in such a ruined condition. Close to the apse still standing is a door, leading into a long dark chamber, which is exhibited as the prison in which S. Peter was confined by Herod Agrippa I. The tradition is worthless, and not so old as the time of the Crusaders; who, on their entry into Jerusalem, found on Mount Sion a church dedicated to the imprisonment of S. Peter, standing on the supposed site of the prison. The place may be considered to be the sacristy of the ancient church, which communicated with the convent. At the present time there are some richly ornamented capitals within it of excellent workmanship, together with some cornices; all however are out of their proper places, being either built into the walls or lying on the ground.
These ruins belong to the church of S. Mary the Great. All authors previous to the fifteenth century are unanimous on this point. John of Würtzburg[454], who visited Jerusalem in the second half of the twelfth century, states that "near the Church of the Hospital of S. John is a nunnery in honour of the Virgin, almost close to the end of the church; it is called S. Mary the Great." This, formerly the monastery, was now inhabited by the Sisters Hospitaler under the charge of an Abbess, and was a dependency of the Grand Master of the Order. Agnes was the foundress, as I have already said; and she was succeeded by other ladies of rank: two of whom are mentioned by William of Tyre[455], one called Sibylla, the other Stephania, a daughter of Jocelin (Senior) Count of Edessa. The ruins of S. Mary the Great have been preserved because Saladin founded a hospital there, which he richly endowed; but its revenues are now exhausted. It is not fifty years, since a philanthropic Mohammedan of Jerusalem endeavoured to re-establish the charitable foundations of Saladin, but the managers have again squandered the property. It is now quite deserted and has become a receptacle of filth, waiting every day to be applied to some other purpose.
Let us now look for the position of the Hospital, which is well defined[456]. It occupied a piece of land bounded on the north by the court in front of the door of the Holy Sepulchre and by Palmers Street[457], formerly the Tan-yard Street; on the west by Patriarch Street, or the Christian bazaar; and on the east and south by a small street which, beginning from Palmers Street, opposite to the Sepulchre, ran southward between the convent of S. Mary the Great and the Hospital, and turning to the west led into Patriarch Street[458]. The principal buildings, with the church, were erected between A.D. 1130 and 1140, under the superintendence of Raymond of Puy, Grand Master of the Hospital. William of Tyre relates that they were so large, especially those opposite to the door of the Church of the Sepulchre, that they surpassed it in magnificence; besides which they had a large peal of bells, whose sound drowned the voice of the Patriarch when he was preaching on the Calvary. No part of these splendid buildings now remains perfect; all are a mass of ruins, or covered with earth and Arab cottages. Sir John Maundeville, who visited Jerusalem A.D. 1322, found the hospital still standing, and states that it was supported by 124 columns of stone and 54 pilasters built into the wall[459]. I was therefore very anxious to examine the ground in the hope of finding some remains of these. I carried on excavations for many days in various directions: I forced my way with great difficulty from vault to vault; but found neither fragments of columns nor capitals, only very many pilasters. I discovered a large crypt by chance; for the ground gave way under my feet, and I fell into it; but it was so filled with earth that I could not explore it. When the Greeks remove the ruins in order to build upon this site, it may be possible to discover some remains of the ancient walls, and perhaps to make out something about its arrangement.
FOOTNOTES:
[374] S. Luke xxiii. 27.
[375] S. John xix. 31.