QMI-INS-014f · 65–86 AH
Milestone of ʿAbd al-Malik: 109 miles from Damascus, Khān al-Ḥathrūra
ميل عبد الملك: تسعة ومائة ميل من دمشق، خان الحثرورة
Khān al-Ḥathrūra, on the road from Jerusalem towards Jericho and Damascus; now Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts, Istanbul (inv. 2511)
- [... أمر بإصلاح]
- هذه الطريق و
- صنعة الأميال عبد
- الله عبد الملك أ
- مير المؤمنين رحمة الله
- عليه من دمشق إلى هذا
- الميل تسعة ومائة ميل
[... Has ordered the repair of] this road and the making of the milestones the servant of God ʿAbd al-Malik, Com- mander of the Faithful, may God’s mercy be upon him. From Damascus to this milestone (there are) one hundred and nine miles.
A marble slab from Khān al-Ḥathrūra, on the road from Jerusalem down to Jericho, with its text carved in relief; it is now in the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts in Istanbul. It is the most complete of the milestones counted from Damascus: one hundred and nine miles from the capital to this point. The milestone of Dayr al-Qalṭ, on the same road, gives a slightly smaller number (QMI-INS-014e).
Source: van Berchem, Max. Matériaux pour un Corpus Inscriptionum Arabicarum, II/3 (Cairo, 1920), pl. II:1; II/1, Jérusalem “Ville” (Cairo, 1922), no. 1, pp. 17–18, 21; Şahin, Seracettin. The Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts: Thirteen Centuries of Glory from the Umayyads to the Ottomans (New York, 2009), pp. 20, 26. Reproduced in Grohmann, Arabische Paläographie II (1971), p. 83.