Image Details

Garo Nalbandian

PILGRIM’S GUIDE. This sixth-century C.E. mosaic depiction of Jerusalem from the famous Madaba Map gives a colorful schematic rendering of the most significant sites in the Holy City during the Byzantine period, including the Nea Church. Inside the towering Damascus Gate, shown on the left side of the map, is an oval-shaped forum with a lofty Roman column that probably once supported a statue, now long gone. Centrally located along Jerusalem’s colonnaded main thoroughfare, the cardo maximus, is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Like all churches in the Madaba Map, it has a red roof. It is beautifully depicted as a basilica, behind which is the golden-domed rotunda that stood over Jesus’ tomb. At the far end of the cardo is the red-roofed Nea. In fact, two red-roofed churches appear at the end of the cardo. The upper one, interrupting the columns, is the Nea. The lower one is a church on Mt. Zion.