Jerusalem - From the Jaffa Gate to the Western Wall (Wailing Wall)

Near the south end of Armenian Patriarchate Street in Jeruslaem, approached by a flight of steps, is the Museum of Armenian Art and History, with a collection of documents on the history of the Armenian people, cult objects and works of art (including the of the last Armenian king, dating from the 14th century, liturgical vestments, crowns, etc.). The museum also possesses some 4,000 illuminated manuscripts of the 10th-17th centuries.

Just beyond the Citadel in Jerusalem we come into Armenian Patriarchate Street, which runs south through the Armenian Quarter of the Old City. After passing a police station (on right) we turn left into St James Street and then left again into Ararat Street, which leads to the Syrian monastery of St Mark.

The "Burnt House" in Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans in A.D. 70. There are relatively few archeological finds to be seen here, but an audio-visual show which is presented several times daily gives a vivid picture of the history of the Jewish Quarter in the time of Herod and its destruction by the Romans.

Opposite the entrance to the Citadel in Jerusalem is Christ Church (Anglican), built in 1849.

Past the Gulbenkian Library in Jerusalem, through an arched gateway and turning right, we come to a chapel (1300) on the site of the house of Annas, father-in-law of the high priest Caiaphas, and the Convent of the Olive-Tree (Deir ez-Zeituni), where visitors are shown an olive-tree to which Christ is said to have been tied before appearing before the high priest.

From Armenian Patriarchate Street in Jeruslaem and continuing south, we come to the Monastery of the Armenian Patriarchate (on left), the largest monastic house in Jerusalem and the spiritual center of the Armenians, of whom there are several thousand in the city.

The Ramban Synagogue was the first to be built in the Old City of Jerusalem, founded in 1267 by Rabbi Moshe Ben Nahman Ramban (Nachmanides), who came to the Holy Land from Spain.

Opposite the Burnt House in Jeruslaem are the remains of the Tiferet Israel ("Glory of Israel") Synagogue, the principal Chassidic synagogue, and the Court of the Karaites, the Jewish sect which rejects the authority of the Talmud.

A vaulted passage at the northeast corner of the Western Wall in Jerusalem leads along the Herodian walls to Wilson's Arch (below the present Chain Gate), which spanned the Tyropoeon valley and gave access to the Temple. A square shaft cut down under the arch allows visitors to see the massive foundations of the walls, with fourteen courses of dressed stone below the present ground level.