Mosque Name: Sede Boker Mosque
Country: Negev
City: Rural, Negev Highlands
Year of construction (AD): 700-799
GPS: 30.881611 34.790761
Gibson Classification: Between
Rebuilt facing Mecca: never
Description:
Sede Boker. During the archaeological surveys conducted in the Central Negev Highlands in the 1960s (Cohen 1981; 1985), an open-type mosque was discovered on a hilltop west of Sede Boker Cohen 1985: 65-67). The structure consists of a rectangular room (5 x 12 m) with a curved mihrab niche in the middle of its southern wall, and a small, square room leading into a courtyard (9 x 10 m). The walls, preserved to a height of 0.6 to 0.8 m, are built of two rows of dressed stones with a filling of gravel. From the minimal rubble, it seems that the original height of the walls was 0.8 to 1 m, and that the building lacked a roof. Several hundred Arabic inscriptions were unearthed in the vicinity of the mosque (Nevo 1985: 3-4; Sharon 1981; 1985); some predated its construction (Nevo 1985: 4; Sharon 1990: 9-10). A settlement discovered near the mosque contains the remnants of dozens of structures scattered over an area of 0.5 km2 (Cohen 1981: 50-52, 67- 70; 1985: 63-65).4 Systematic excavations carried out by Nevo during the past years have exposed several dozens of structures; according to Nevo’s interpretation all of them were cult sites. The mosque was built several decades later, obliterating some of the inscriptions. Nevo suggests that Sede Boker was a ritual center for the nomads who inhabited the area during the seventh and eighth centuries C.E. (Nevo and Koren 1990: 26), and that evidence is offered here of a transitional stage between pre-Islamic religion and the emergence of Islam (Nevo 1985: 12-21).
The site was dated by a coine fron 775-785, and an inscription 781, Byzantineware, etc. The concluded date for this mosque was 781.
For a Link to the Qibla Tool Click Here
Five mosques, Negev Highlands
Chart showing mihrab directions in the Negev
References:
Cohen, Rudolf, 1985. Archaeological Survey of Israel, Map of Sde Boqer – West (167), Jerusalem: Department of Antiquities and Museums, 22*, 65-66. http://survey.antiquities.org.il/index.html#/MapSurvey/66/site/13324
Sharon, Moshe, 1985. “Appendix: Arabic Inscriptions from Sede-Boqer - Map 167”, in: Rudolph Cohen, Archaeological Survey of Israel, Map of Sde Boqer – West (167), Jerusalem: Department of Antiquities and Museums, 31-35, 94-106
Magness, Jodi, 2003. The Archaeology of the Early Islamic Settlement in Palestine, Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 138-139. https://archive.org/details/TheArchaeologyof_612
Avni, Gideon, 1994. “Early Mosques in the Negev Highlands: New Archaeological Evidence on Islamic Penetration of Southern Palestine”, Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 294: 83-100. https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.2307⁄1357155
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