History of Jerusalem during the Early Muslim period

An outdated and very inaccurate 1890 attempt by Le Strange to reconstruct the city plan of Jerusalem of 958–1052, by interpreting the descriptions of Arab geographers such as al-Muqaddasi.

The history of Jerusalem during the Early Muslim period covers the period between the capture of the city from the Byzantines by the Arab Muslim armies of the nascent Caliphate in 637–638 CE, and its conquest by the European Catholic armies of the First Crusade in 1099. Throughout this period, Jerusalem remained a largely Christian city with smaller Muslim and Jewish communities. It was successively part of several Muslim states, beginning with the Rashidun caliphs of Medina, the Umayyads of Syria, the Abbasids of Baghdad and their nominal Turkish vassals in Egypt, and the Fatimid caliphs of Cairo, who struggled over it with the Turkic Seljuks and different other regional powers, only to finally lose it to the Crusaders.

The second caliph, Umar (r. 634–644), secured Muslim control of the city from the Patriarch of Jerusalem. During his rule Muslim prayer was likely established on the Temple Mount and limited numbers of Jews were allowed to reside in the city after a several centuries-long ban by the Romans/Byzantines. Beginning with Caliph Mu'awiya I (r. 661–680), the early Umayyad caliphs devoted special attention to the city as a result of its sanctity and several obtained their oaths of allegiance there. The Umayyads Abd al-Malik (r. 685–705) and al-Walid I (r. 705–715) invested considerably in constructing Muslim edifices on the Temple Mount, namely the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque, as well other religious and administrative structures, gates, and roadworks. Their successor Sulayman (r. 715–717) likely resided in Jerusalem at the beginning of his reign, but his founding of the nearby city of Ramla came at the political and economic expense of Jerusalem in the long term.