173 Wilson’s Arch: 150 Years of Archaeological and Historical Exploration Tehillah Lieberman, Avi Solomon and Joe Uziel Introduction Wilson’s Arch is a monumental stone vault, the last in a series of arches making up a large bridge that crossed the Tyropoeon Valley ending at the foot of the Temple Mount. The bridge led from the Western Hill—the area of the Upper City of the Second Temple period— eastward to one of the known entrances to the Temple Mount. Besides an aqueduct, which crossed the valley upon the bridge, supply- ing the Temple Mount with water—the bridge carried a pedestrian road that led priests, pil- grims and visitors from the residential quarter towards the Temple. Today, the arches carry the Street of the Chain toward the Gate of the Chain access to the Temple Mount from the west. Buildings from later periods were con- structed alongside the bridge, creating a closed system of passages known as the Western Wall Tunnels. The easternmost arch attaching the bridge to the western wall of the Temple Mount is called Wilson’s Arch. Over the past two centuries, great interest in the archaeology and history of Jerusalem led to extensive exploration of the city’s remains. The large, monumental arch, its proximity to the public center of the Second Temple period and its relation to nearby monumental struc- tures led to a great deal of research on Wilson’s Arch and the ancient structures around it. Var- ious aspects of its construction and develop- ment have been studied by several researchers, initially debating its historical and architectur- al characteristics. In this article the main finds from recent excavations beneath Wilson’s Arch will be discussed and compared with the de- scriptions and conclusions proposed by C. Warren some 150 years ago. Warren’s excavations Wilson’s Arch was noted by scholars during the 19th century, such as T. Tobler and E.-M. de Vogüé, although the first to identify its im- portance was C. Wilson during his visit to Jeru- salem in 1864. Several years later, in 1867, War- ren did research work in Jerusalem focusing upon areas surrounding the Temple Mount. Consequently, he commenced excavation of two shafts underneath Wilson’s Arch: one on the east—alongside the western wall, and an- other on the west—adjacent to the western pier of the arch. He described the remains that he found in the shaft that he excavated next to the wall of the Temple Mount as follows: The bottom of this pool is 3.5 feet below the springing of the arch, and is composed to a depth of 3 feet 6 inches of very hard concrete, formed of stones about 3 inches cube, set in dark cement. Below this we found black soil, and at 24 feet came in contact with a mass of masonry, apparently the voussoirs and drafted stones of a fallen arch and wall… the stones passed through appeared to be similar to those in the Sanctuary wall, and the mass of them together is about 8 feet deep. Con- tinuing down, 44 feet below the springing of arch we came on water… the water had dis- appeared from the bottom of the shaft and we were able to get down 7 feet lower, when we came on water again and soft rock at 51 feet 9 inches below the springing of the arch. The bottom course of the Sanctuary wall is here let into the rock, and we sunk down 2 feet 10 inches until we could see it resting upon the hard mezzeh, which seems gener-