Jerusalem
Jerusalem comes up so often in this blog that it has its own category. The posts here range across the city’s layers, from the Iron Age remains of the City of David and Second Temple-period archaeology through Crusader and Mamluk Jerusalem, the European-power buildings ringing the Old City from the late 19th century, the British Mandate years, and the divisions that shape the modern city. Specific sites (the Western Wall, the Holy Sepulchre, Ammunition Hill, Yad Vashem) sit alongside more reflective pieces about what it’s like to guide people here.
22 articles
22 articles
The Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem
A walk through the modern history of the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem's Old City, visiting the Ramban, the Four Sephardi Synagogues, Tiferet Yisrael, the Karaite Centre and the Hurva, and closing at the memorial for those who fell in 1948.
Yad Vashem and Mt Herzl
A sombre day at Yad Vashem and the Holocaust History Museum, the surrounding memorials including the Valley of the Communities and the Children's Memorial, before heading up the hill to Mt Herzl cemetery and the Herzl Museum.
Jerusalem Institutions
A field trip around the institutions of Givat Ram in west Jerusalem: the Knesset menorah, the Knesset itself, the Supreme Court and a whistle-stop tour of the Israel Museum's archaeology wing.
Jerusalem: a miscellany
A miscellany day in Jerusalem covering sites that don't fit a single theme: the Church of St Etienne, the École Biblique, the Armenian Ceramics Workshop, St George's Cathedral, and Hezekiah's Tunnel in the City of David.
Crusader Jerusalem
A walk through the Old City focused on the Crusader century: the Cenacle on Mount Zion, the Nea Church, the German Knights' hospice, the Crusader market, the Church of the Redeemer and the Holy Sepulchre.
Christianity in the Judean Hills
The final of five field trips on Christian sites: Abu Ghosh, Ein Kerem and Beit Jamal. Crusader churches, the birthplace of John the Baptist and a Salesian monastery on the way home.
Muslim Jerusalem
Exploring Muslim Jerusalem: a morning on the Temple Mount platform with the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa, then through the Muslim Quarter learning to read Mamluk architecture, with a stop at Abu Shukri and the Little Western Wall.
Jerusalem in the Second Temple period
A field trip through Jerusalem's Second Temple period sites: the City of David, the Tyropoeon valley drainage channel, the Davidson Centre, the Burnt House, the Wohl Museum of Archaeology, and the excavations beneath the Western and southern walls of the Temple Mount.
The Via Dolorosa
Walking the Via Dolorosa, station by station from the Antonia fortress to the aedicule in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. With a morning stop at the Garden Tomb, the Church of St Anne and the Pool of Bethesda.
Christianity on the Mount of Olives and Mount Zion
A walking tour of the Christian sites surrounding the final days of Jesus: from the Chapel of the Ascension on the Mount of Olives, down through Gethsemane, and up to the Last Supper room and St Peter in Gallicantu on Mount Zion.
If you are going to Israel, you would be mad not to give him a call.
Amol Rajan, BBC presenter and broadcaster
Having been on trips in Israel with seven different tour guides, Samuel stood above all the rest.
Seasoned Israel traveller
Samuel is one part walking encyclopedia, one part storyteller, one part stand-up comedian.
Berkeley Haas Business School student