• If you look for a great place in Damascus, you will find it in old city.

• If you search about the old culture in Damascus, you will find in old city.

•This Great Mosque stands at the heart of the Old city at the end of Souq Al-Hamidiyeh. It was built by the

Omayyad Caliph al-Walid ibn Abdul Malek in 705 A.D. when Damascus was the capital of the Arab Islamic

Empire. It was constructed on the site of what has always been a place of worship: first, a temple for

Hadad, the Aramean god of the ancient Syrians three thousand years ago; then, a pagan temple (the temple of

Jupiter the Damascene) during the Roman era. It was later turned into a church called John the Baptist when Christianity spread in the fourth century. Following the

Islamic conquest in 635, Muslims and Christians agreed to partition it between them, and they began to perform

their rituals side by side.

•When al-Walid decided to erect an impressive mosque suited to the grandeur of the Arab state "whose like was

never built before, nor will ever be built after" as he is reported to have said he negotiated with the Christian

community of Damascus, and undertook to construct a new church for them (St. John's) and allot several pieces of land for other churches, if they relinquished their right

to their part of the Mosque. They agreed. It took ten years and eleven million gold dinars, as well as a huge

number of masons, artists, builders, carpenters, marble-layers, and painters to complete. It became an

architectural model for hundreds of mosques throughout the Islamic world.A prominent feature of it are the three

minarets built in different styles; the upper parts of which were renovated during the Ayoubite, Mamluk, and

Ottoman eras. The mosque has a large prayer hall  and an enormous courtyard. The interior walls are covered

with mosaic panels, made of coloured and gilded glass, portraying scenes from nature. The dome is greyich-blue, celebrated for its magnificence. The prayer hall

contains domed shrine venerated by both Christians and Muslims, the tomb of St. John the Baptist.

Nour aboazan

Best wishes