QMI-INS-055aga · 96–126 AH
Foundation Inscription of al-Walīd, Khirbat al-Minya
نقش تأسيس الوليد، خربة المنية
Khirbat al-Minya, the Umayyad residence on the north-western shore of the Sea of Galilee, about 12 km from Tiberias. Found in 1936 in the excavations of A. M. Schneider; now in the Rockefeller Museum, Jerusalem (inv. 37.1126)
- بسـ[ـم اللـه الرحـمـ]ـن الرحيـ[ـم] …
- امر به عبـ[ـد الـ]ـله الوليد امير الـ[ـمومنين] …
- بيروت على يدى عبدالله بن …
In the na[me of God the Mos]t Mercif[ul] … It has ordered the servant of God, al-Walīd, commander of the [faithful] … Bayrūt, at the hands (under the supervision) of ʿAbd Allāh, son of …
A foundation inscription in the name of the caliph al-Walīd, from the Umayyad residence at Khirbat al-Minya by the Sea of Galilee. The stone was found in 1936, reused upside-down as the threshold of the outer gate in a post-Umayyad phase of the portal. Only the right half survives: the left part, which Ritter suggests held the object of the commission and the date, is lost.
Source: Ritter, Markus. “Umayyad Foundation Inscriptions and the Inscription of al-Walīd from Khirbat al-Minya: Text, Usage, Visual Form.” In Khirbat al-Minya: Der Umayyadenpalast am See Genezareth, ed. Hans-Peter Kuhnen, Orient-Archäologie 36 (Rahden, 2016), 59–83, esp. pp. 62–74, figs. 4–7 and 10. Earlier readings: Kühnel 1939; Grabar 1993.