• 1 Historical research on the history of the Order has a long tradition and is now extremely extensive (...)
• 2 The state of research on the medieval building stock is presented monographically in PRINGLE, Denys (...)

3Compared to historical research on the origin of the Order of St. John1, field research has always lagged behind in terms of archaeology, building archaeology, and art history, even though there is already a considerable amount of foundational research2. The aim of our project is, therefore, less oriented towards the history of the Order, and more towards the history, architecture and development of a central area in the heart of the holy city. With this in mind, the project seeks to answer the following questions: What did the site look like before the establishment of the Order of Saint John? In ancient times, it is generally assumed that the forum of the Roman-Byzantine city Aelia Capitolina was located here. What happened here in the 11^th and 12^th centuries, and how were the buildings used, abandoned or modified after 1187? Numerous questions follow here.

• 3 The core team of the project consists of Dorothee HEINZELMANN (Building archaeology – LVR-Amt für D (...)
• 4 The most recent excavations in the Muristan have been published: RE’EM, Amit, el. al. – “Crusader R (...)
• 5 Building investigations are made extremely difficult by the different ownership and religious affil (...)
• 6 BRUSCHKE, Jonas; CAMIN, Johannes; HEINZELMANN, Michael – “3D-Rekonstruktion des mittelalterlichen J (...)
• 7 HEINZELMANN, Dorothee, et. al.– “Der Muristan in Jerusalem: Vom hadrianischen Forum zum Hospital de (...)

4Some years ago, a team was formed to deal with these questions and to examine the area of the Muristan in its development from antiquity to the 19th century from an archaeological and architectural point of view3. The focus of the project is on the re-evaluation of previous excavations and the investigation of the existing building remains, developing a catalogue of the building sculpture to be assigned to the Muristan, and the compilation and re-evaluation of all archival, historical, drawing and photographic sources4. New excavations are not possible within the framework of the project, but building surveys of the medieval building remains will be carried out as far as possible5. Based on the existing plans, a computer-aided 3D model of various time periods was also created6. The aim of the project is to compile and reassess all available materials, also as a basis for further research. The work is largely completed, and the first interim results have been published7. The final publication of the project is in preparation. In this article, some selected observations on the medieval building remains are being presented, regarding the reliability of Conrad Schick's plans, some results of our recent investigations of the preserved architecture and the identification of buildings and functions within the area.

• 8 KRÜGER, Jürgen – “Der Muristan von 1187 bis zum Ersten Weltkrieg” … .

6The most important sources for the investigation of the building remains are plan drawings made in the last third of the 19^th and at the beginning of the 20^th century. Until then, the inner area of the quarter was completely covered with rubble and earth. (Fig. 1) On the periphery there were shops and workshops along David Street, the Suq Streets and the Christian Quarter Road. The monastery of Santa Maria Latina was in ruins, the vaults had largely collapsed, and it had not been inhabited for a long time. The church of Santa Maria Maior, whose existence was known from archival sources, had completely disappeared. Only the church of St. John remained in function as a church over all centuries8.

• 9 SCHICK, Conrad – “The Muristan, or the Site of the Hospital of St. John at Jerusalem”. Palestine Ex (...)

9In 1900, following the clearing and rebuilding of the Prussian and Greek parts of the Muristan, Schick prepared a general plan of the entire area on the basis of his observations collected up to that time. It consists of floor plans in two heights and ten section drawings and is now kept in the archive of the Palestine Exploration Fund. (Figs. 2, 3) Of this series of plans, only one - greatly simplified - ground plan was published in 19029.

• 10 Cf. for example: PRINGLE, Denys – The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem. A Corpus. Vol. (...)

11Although the plan published in 1902, i.e. the simplified general plan, is not exact in various areas, it has nevertheless repeatedly served as a source for further research and as a basis for mapping for over 100 years. This plan has been used to mark halls that are said to have served as hospital, in addition to marking paths mentioned in documents of the 12^th century10. To what extent this is compatible with the actual findings has not always been sufficiently taken into account.

• 11 The archaeological investigations in Acre and their publication have not yet been completed. Cf. fo (...)

16Characteristic for the large hall buildings in Muristan, specifically, is a modular design consisting of piers and vault architecture above transverse arches, into which internal walls could be inserted flexibly and as required. Nevertheless, original partition walls usually integrate into piers and outer walls. Deep wall piers, e.g. in the range of the facades along David Street, are particularly characteristic on the outside of buildings, forming an abutment in the form of buttresses. Inside the courtyard, e.g. on the inner façade of the south-eastern hall, such deep wall piers probably served as supports for flights of stairs and galleries on the upper floor, similar to what is preserved in the area of the Hospitallers in Acre and other crusader castles11.

• 12 Cfr. LUTTRELL, Anthony – “The Hospitallers early Statutes”. Revue Mabillon 14 (2003), pp. 9-22.
• 13 BURGTORF, Jochen – The Central Convent of Hospitallers and Templars …, pp. 50-61.
• 14 BURGTORF, Jochen – The Central Convent of Hospitallers and Templars ..., pp. 50-61, 59.

19The Order's headquarters, comparable to that of the Knights Templar on the Temple Mount, took over an increasing number of central functions of the young Order, although these were not always precisely named in the sources. Conclusions can be drawn from the statutes of the Order,12 which, however, always record a state of affairs that had often developed many years earlier13. The individual court officials are named very early on in the documents. They allow us to estimate the size and importance of the central Convent. With Senechal (since 1141), Constable (since 1126), Marshal (since 1165), Butler (since 1141), Chamberlain or Treasurer (since 1135) and Chancellor (since 1126), the Knights of St John had the same court officials as the Templars, but also as the Patriarch or the King of Jerusalem14. Even though the other courts are not known architecturally or archaeologically, the mere fact that the central convent was on a par with the royal or patriarchal palace as far as the court offices are concerned suggests a prominent architecture. It is possible that the expansion of the convent took place roughly parallel to the increase of the court offices, i.e. in the middle of the 12^th century.

• 15 The most important text on the hospital regulations, which was previously considered to be younger (...)
• 16 The most convincing attempt so far to identify the hospital on the basis of written sources in the (...)

20A similar process can be observed in the field of the hospital, which developed from a pilgrims' hospice at the beginning of the 12^th century to a modern hospital for medical care. This function can be seen at the latest around 1170/80; it required a large number of different facilities. In the written sources, numerous functions of the hospital are listed, and the daily routine is described in a very detailed manner15. We read about infirmaries, a clothing store, a church and an altar, a kitchen area, toilets, storerooms and stables. So far, none of these functions could be located with certainty in a specific building or area within the Muristan16. A re-evaluation of the archival documents and the pilgrim's reports in relation to the building remains leads to the following picture: The main access to the hospital was in the north, opposite the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. A side entrance led into the quarter from the west, from the Patriarchs' Street. The original hospital wing, which housed the hospital rooms, is supposed to have been located to the west. However, since there were a large number of units within the hospital, it is possible that the wards were expanded over time and the hospital function extended to various buildings.

• 17 HEINZELMANN, Dorothee, et. al. – “The Hospital of St. John in Jerusalem (…)” …, pp. 170-174.

21To the west there was a building with piers and vaults in several aisles and at least two storeys high, but it was obviously different from what Conrad Schick presented in his general plan. In total, it consisted of five aisles in the northern part and probably extended to the Christian Quarter Road in the west. This could only recently be found out after the Omar Mosque was enlarged and further medieval vaults became visible, which had previously been filled with earth and were not accessible. This finding, however, shows in an exemplary way that Conrad Schick here, as in some other areas, represented buildings as they seemed likely to him, but which he did not (or only partially) know from his own observation and could not have surveyed himself17 (Fig. 8, 9). This north-western building, shown in the plan as a continuous hall, was divided into several smaller compartments, at least in the northern part.

• 18 PRINGLE, Denys – “The Investigation of a Medieval Pit in the Muristan, Jerusalem, by Fr Charles Coü (...)

23In the east of the Muristan area, within another spacious hall, there is a large two-aisled cistern in addition to former oven installations. Here probably were located a kitchen and service rooms. Different heights of floors and vaults indicate that the building was not a uniformly continuous spatial unit. Latrines in the northeast corner of this wing suggest a latrine tower similar to the latrines of the Hospitallers complex in Akko18. Another large latrine and basin complex to the west of it probably belonged to bath houses.

• 19 Photogrammetric surveying was carried out in 2007 by Alexander Grünig and Matthias Zuckschwerdt, Be (...)

24In the southern part of the area, along David Street, an extended, three-aisled hall has been preserved, which opened in big arches towards the street. Even though the arches and the rooms behind them were later provided with different installations and modified for use as shops, the whole basic features of the architecture with piers made of large sized stone blocks and accurately-built groin vaults are almost completely preserved from the time of the crusaders. A building survey of the entire façade along David Street could have been produced on the basis of photogrammetry19 (Fig. 10, 11).

• 20 So the assumption of BERKOVICH, Ilya; RE’EM, Amit – “The Location of the Crusader Hospital in the M (...)

25The wide arches could likely have been closed by inserted wooden walls and gates. Nevertheless, the open and flexible form of the street-side façade more likely indicates that this was the site of warehouses, stables and utility rooms, not of hospital rooms20. Due to the proximity to St. John's Church, to which there may have been a direct access, we assume the dormitories of the brothers of the Order on the upper floor of the south wing, which in case of necessity could also have been converted into rooms of hospital purpose, as reported in sources.

• 21 HUMBERT, Jean-Baptiste – “Excavations at Saint John Prodromos, Jerusalem”. New studies in the archa (...)

26To the southwest is St. John's Church, which, together with the surrounding buildings, now forms a closed district within the Muristan. Investigations by the École Biblique in recent years have shown that the original building of St. John's Church, an irregular triconch structure with a corridor to the west, probably goes back to a pagan building of Late Antiquity, which was erected on the edge of the Roman forum21. It is not yet possible to determine the period from which this building was used as a church. But probably it had been in use as such from the time before the arrival of the crusaders at the latest, since citizens from Amalfi had already operated a facility for accommodating pilgrims at this site under the patronage of St. John. At that time, or very shortly after the arrival of the crusaders, the building was renovated and an upper floor was added, so that the building had two-storeys. Both floors were only accessible separately, there was no internal communication. The upper floor is accessible from the west via a forecourt from the Christian Quarter Road. In the basement there was a pre-existing entrance from the south, which was later blocked from the outside by a cistern, but may have still been in use during the Crusader period. At that time, an entrance from the northeast was newly built, leading down from the area inside the Hospitaller buildings, which probably formed a courtyard. This opening thus provided a direct access for the Knights of St. John. We assume that St. John's Church was the church from which the Order took its name (Fig. 12).