Image Details

Palestine Exploration Fund, courtesy of curator Felicity Cobbing

The Dome of the Rock dominates the Temple Mount platform in a photo taken by the British Ordnance Survey of Jerusalem in 1864, one of the earliest photographs taken of Jerusalem’s holy sites. The view is toward the southwest, with the al-Aqsa mosque at far left.

The question of what stood atop the Temple Mount in ancient times was the subject of a bitter controversy in mid-19th-century England. Charles Warren , one of Jerusalem’s greatest explorers, believed Solomon’s Temple originally stood where the Dome of the Rock is today. That point was vigorously contested by James Fergusson , a specialist in world architecture who was convinced that the Dome of the Rock was the original rotunda of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Warren’s career is the subject of David Jacobson’s accompanying article.