Tombs of the Kings (Jerusalem)

The Tombs of the Kings (Hebrew: קברי המלכים Keveri HaMlakhim; Arabic: قبور السلاطين; French: Tombeau des Rois) are a special group of ancient rock-cut tombs in East Jerusalem. People believe these tombs might have been the burial place of Queen Helene of Adiabene, who lived long ago. Because of how grand and beautiful these tombs look, some thought they might have been for the kings of Judah, but today they are mostly linked to Queen Helene.

According to stories, Queen Helene picked this spot to bury her son Isates and other family members. Some newer studies by a French expert named Jean-Baptiste Humbert think the tombs were actually made for Herod Agrippa I, who was the grandson of the famous Herod the Great.

You can find the Tombs of the Kings east of where Nablus Road and Saladin Street meet. The entrance to the site has a sign that says "Tombeau des Rois", which is French for "Tomb of the Kings."

Public access

In 2009, the site was closed so workers could fix it up.

In May 2019, a group called Hekdesh hired a lawyer named Gilles-William Goldnadel. He took the French government to court, trying to show that Jews should still be allowed to visit the site. The site reopened to visitors in June 2019, but it had to close again because some people were upset and wanted to pray there. As of May 2024, the site is still being worked on.

General layout

From the street, a wide staircase leads down into a large carved courtyard. The courtyard is deep and has a special entrance with three steps. Above the entrance, there are beautiful carvings, including a design of grapes and leaves.

Inside the tomb, there is a maze of eight rooms with many places to lay people to rest. These places include both Jewish-style niches and Roman-style arched spaces.

History

The tombs were written about by the Roman-Jewish historian Josephus in the first century CE. He told the story of Helena, queen of Adiabene, a small kingdom from Mesopotamia (today part of northern Iraq). Helena and her family came to Jerusalem near the end of the Second Temple Period and converted to Judaism. They even built a palace in what we now call the City of David. Helena’s son Monobaz II had her and his brother buried "three stadia from Jerusalem." Later, people mistakenly thought these tombs belonged to the kings of Judah.

In 1847, a Turkish leader looked for treasures in the tomb but found nothing. In 1863, a French archaeologist named Félicien de Saulcy was allowed to dig at the site. A German architect named Conrad Schick made a map of the place. De Saulcy found stone boxes for holding bodies, including one with a Hebrew inscription that read "Queen Tzaddah." He thought it might have been for the wife of Zedekiah, the last king of Judah.

After bones were found, the Jewish community asked a leader named Sir Moses Montefiore to ask the Ottoman rulers to stop the digging. De Saulcy secretly took some items away, and they are now in the Louvre in Paris.

In 1864, a French-Jewish banker named Isaac Péreire tried to buy the site but couldn’t. In 1874, a French-Jewish woman named Berthe Amalie Bertrand bought the land for 30,000 francs. She made sure it was registered as French property. She built a wall and a guard post around it. In 1886, her family gave the site to the French government to protect it for science and for Jewish worship. It became part of the French national domain in the Holy Land.

Traditions

The Tomb of the Kings was once described by a Greek traveler as the second most beautiful tomb in the world. It was believed to have a special stone door that would only open at a certain time of the year.

A small stone house was later built on top of the tomb by a local family in Jerusalem.

Archaeological findings

From the house, a wide staircase with 23 steps leads to a courtyard. Rainwater collects in baths carved into the steps and flows to water wells. At the bottom of the stairs, there are ancient ritual baths and a stone wall with a gate to another courtyard carved from rock.

The tombs are entered through a rock-cut arch on the western side. This arch, once topped with three pyramids and decorated with grapes, leaves, and fruit, shows Greek style. Inside, the tombs have two levels around a central chamber. There are four rooms upstairs and three downstairs. The central chamber is reached through an antechamber that could be sealed with a large stone.

The tombs were once filled with stone boxes for holding bodies, called sarcophagi. These were taken to France by a French team led by Louis Felicien de Saulcy and are now shown at the Louvre Museum in Paris. One sarcophagus has inscriptions that scholars believe belong to Queen Helena of Adiabene. The tomb's design matches the style of the Seleucid period, supporting this idea.

Main article: Helena of Adiabene

• Sarcophagus of Helena of Adiabene

• Sarcophagus from the Tombs of the Kings

• The Sarcophagus in the Louvre