[26]. Milman, iii. 238.
What little we have to say on the vexata quæstio of the topography of Jerusalem will be found further on (see Appendix); but on leaving this, the second period of our history, one remark must be made, which may help to explain the uncertainty which rests upon the sites of the city. The destruction of the buildings, first under Titus, and next under Chosroes, appears to have been thorough and complete. Pillars may have remained standing with portions of walls; foundations, of course, remained, these being covered up and buried in the débris of roofs, walls, and decorations. On these foundations the Christians would rebuild, imitating, as far as possible, the structures that had been destroyed; in many cases they would have the very pillars to set up again, in all cases they would have the same foundations. But there was no time between the conquest by Heraclius and that by Omar to repair and restore the whole, and perhaps nothing was actually built except a church over the site of the Holy Sepulchre, formed of the materials which remained of the Basilica of the Martyrium. This theory would partly account for the silence about Justinian’s Basilica, and for the apparent discrepancy between the statement made by Eusebius of decorations only having been set round the Sepulchre itself, contrasted with his admiration of the splendid Church of the Martyrium.
However all this may be, Jerusalem presents in history three totally distinct and utterly unlike appearances. It has one under Herod; one under Justinian; and one under Saladin. Under the first it possesses one building splendid enough to excite the admiration of the whole world; under the second it has its clustered churches as splendid as the art of the time would admit; under the third it has its two great buildings, the Dome of the Rock, and the Church of the Sepulchre, standing over against each other, two enemies bound by mutual expediency to peace.
Only one of these buildings is ancient; but somewhere in the ruins and rubbish in which the whole city is buried lie the foundations of those which have been destroyed.
CHAPTER IV.
THE MOHAMMEDAN CONQUEST. A.D. 632-1104.
Πάψετε τὸ Χερουβικό, κἰ ἂς χαμηλώσουν τ’ Ἅγια!
Παπάδες πάρτε τὰ ἱερα, καὶ σεῖς κεριὰ σβυστῆτε,
Γιατὶ εἶναι θέλημα Θεοῦ ἡ Πόλι νὰ τουρκέψη.
To the Arab wanderer on the barren and sun-stricken plains of the Hejjáz the well-watered, fertile land of Syria had always been an object of admiration and envy. As Mohammed the camel-driver sat on the hill which overlooks Damascus, and gazed upon the rich verdure of that garden of the East, his religious phrenzy, his visionary schemes for the unity and regeneration of his race had well-nigh yielded to the voluptuous fascination of the scene. But enthusiasm and ambition triumphed: his eyes filled with tears, and exclaiming, “Man can enter Paradise but once,” he turned sorrowfully back, and in that moment changed the fortunes of the world.
When Abu Bekr, Mohammed’s first successor, had quelled the disturbances which threatened the Muslim power, and found himself the acknowledged head of an immense confederation of restless and enthusiastic warriors, thoughts of conquest naturally presented themselves to his mind, and Syria was, as naturally, the first quarter to which he turned.