From Pagan Aelia Capitolina to Christian Jerusalem: A Reassessment of the Archaeological Data in the Context of the Urban Transformation

Two centuries of pagan Aelia Capitolina’s urban transformation remain one of the most mysterious periods in history of Jerusalem and Roman Palestine. Despite scarcity of sources, historians and archaeologists used to create numerous interpretations of Aelia’s shape, often lacking sufficient evidence. This article presents an original solution to the question of Aelia’s layout, using a wide scope of archaeological material and inscriptions. In my opinion the southeastern district of Aelia played a significant role from at least the 3rdcentury, 200 years before the construction of the so-called Eudocia’s wall. The reconstruction of the street layout in this paper is based on assumption that the main cardo of pagan Aelia was the eastern, not the western one, thus creating an approximately symmetrical grid together with the alleged central decumanus. This paper is skeptical as to soundness of basing the reconstruction of the shape of pagan Aelia on the Madaba Map.