Western Wall Museum Threatens Roman Road

[JGolomb]

Western Wall Heritage Center a threat to Jerusalem's Roman History?

One of Israel's leading archaeologists has publicly condemned the Israel Antiquities Authority's failure to object to a plan to construct a part of the Western Wall Heritage Center over a site where a well-preserved ancient Roman road was recently excavated. The construction area has been designated for religious purposes since Israel took control of the Western Wall in 1967. The building would include a 4,800-square meter, three-story museum and educational institute that would display the Roman road on the ground floor, but Yoram Tsafir told Haaretz.com even the most amazing architect will not be able to avoid damaging the find and visitors need to be able to see the entire road - not just a fragment - to appreciate it.

 

The street known as the Eastern Cardo or the Valley Cardo appears on the Madaba Map - dated to 565Ad one of the oldest detailed cartographic documents in the world - and began at the Damascus Gate in the north and led south, running the lenght of the channel in the Tyropoeon Valley. Excavated in 2007, the colonnaded street was paved with large flagstones that were set in place diagonally, in the customary method of the Roman world, which was probably meant to prevent wagons from slipping. A drainage system was installed below the flagstones.