Umayyad Mosque

The Umayyad Mosque, or Great Mosque of Damascus, stands on a site sacred since the Iron Age: an Aramean temple of Hadad, then a Roman temple of Jupiter, then a Christian cathedral under Theodosius I. After the Muslim conquest of Damascus in 634 part of the cathedral served as a prayer house.

Between 706 and 715 the Umayyad caliph al-Walid I replaced the church with a mosque built by craftsmen from Byzantine lands and famed for its golden mosaics. Christians and Muslims venerate it as the resting place of the head of John the Baptist; its Minaret of Isa is named for the tradition that Jesus will descend there at the end of days.

Fire damaged the mosque in 1069 and 1479; the Mamluk sultan Qaitbay added his namesake minaret in 1488. The earthquake of 1759 ruined part of its northern arcade.