Solomon's Stables

**Solomon's Stables** (Hebrew: אורוות שלמה‎‎)
 was an underground vaulted space now used as a Muslim prayer hall, some
 600 square yards (500 square metres) in area, at the bottom of stairs
which lead down from the al-Aqsa Mosque, under the Temple Mount, to the base of the southern wall of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
 Solomon's Stables are located under the southeastern corner of the
Temple Mount, 12½ metres below the courtyard and feature twelve rows of
pillars and arches. In December 1996 the Waqf converted the area into a prayer hall by adding lights and floor tiles,[2] and renamed it the **Marwani Prayer Hall** (Arabic: المصلى المرواني‎‎).

## History:

The structure is most widely said to have been built by King Herod as part of his extension of the platform of the Temple Mount southward onto the Ophel.
 The Herodian engineers constructed the enormous platform as a series of
 vaulted arches in order to reduce pressure on the retaining walls. These vaults, "supported by eighty-eight pillars resting on massive Herodian blocks and divided into twelve rows of galleries",[4] were originally storage areas of the Second Temple.
 A great deal of the original interior survives in the area of the
Herodian staircases, although not in the area now renovated for use as a
 mosque. Visitors are rarely permitted to enter the areas with Herodian finishes.

The underground space for the most part remained empty except for the Crusaders period. The Crusaders converted it in 1099 into a stable for the cavalry. The
rings for tethering horses can still be seen on some of the pillars. The
 structure has been called Solomon's Stables since Crusader times as a historical composite. 'Solomon's' refers to the First Temple built on the site, while the 'stables' refers to the functional usage of the space by the Crusaders in the time of Baldwin II (King of Jerusalem 1118-1131 CE).

## Modern Construction Of The El-Marwani Mosque:

In the winter of 1996 the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf
 acquired a permit to use Solomon's Stables as an alternative place of
worship for occasional rainy days of the holy month of Ramadan. RIvjka
Gonen, however, suggested that the real reason was that Palestinians
feared that once a final arrangement with Israel is reached, Israel
would create there a place of prayer. Later the waqf declared that it
aimed to create a mosque for 10,000 worshippers, making it the largest
mosque in the country. This move was designed to strengthen the Muslim
claim over the Temple Mount.

The Southern Wall of the Temple Mount showing damaged area and criticized repair job as a bright white patch to right.

In gross violation of the status quo, the waqf began digging a huge
hole in the southeastern area of the Temple Mount, without a permit from
 the Jerusalem municipality or archeological supervision using tractors
and heavy vehicles.
 This action drew criticism from archaeologists, who said that
archaeological finds were being damaged in the process and the
excavations weakened the stability of the Southern Wall. The excavations
 are thought to have been responsible for creating a large, visible
bulge in the Southern Wall that threatened the structural integrity of the Temple Mount, necessitating major repairs.
 The repairs have been called "unsightly" because they appear as a
large, bright, white patch of smooth stones in a golden tan wall of
rusticated ashlar. In December 1996 the new mosque was officially inaugurated as El-Marwani Mosque.

## Alternative History of Solomon's Stables:

Jordanian scholar Raef Yusuf Najm suggests that the mosque was initially a water reservoir that had been built by the Roman Emperor Hadrian in the second century, along with the stone wall currently surrounding al-Aqsa Mosque.
 "Its overall structure closely resembles that of the Roman Ramla
reservoir with stone pillars and junctions. That the reservoir was built
 at the same time as the wall is evident since the southern and eastern
walls of the reservoir are a continuation of the wall surrounding al-Aqsa Mosque.
 Instead of an addition built long after the wall, the reservoir was
built at the same time, as can be inferred from the joining of the
stones. The reservoir was used to collect water flowing into it from
surrounding areas, through horizontal aqueducts made of stone and
feeding into vertical canals in the external walls of the reservoir. One
 of these vertical canals can still be seen today and is located at the
level of the main entrance of the Marwani mosque. It is semi-circular
and is lined with a Roman fuller of limestone mixed with ground clay and
 sand. The flooring of the reservoir is made of stone, but is covered
with layers of silt that have accumulated over the years."