ABSTRACT
In much of the world’s imagination, the city of Jerusalem has a very specific urban form, derived from its traditional location at the centre of the cosmos. This status has been defined by the three monotheistic faiths that consider it holy – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – and to greater or lesser degree regard the earthly Jerusalem in some form of reciprocity with the heavenly or eschatological city. Representations of Jerusalem may show aspects of its actual and/or more idealised forms and the on-going tension between the two is very much part of the city’s significance and its intrigue. In image and in text Jerusalem is often rendered in symbolic ways, as a perfect circle or square, walled or somehow well-defined, as a high place or a mountain, often with a link to heaven.
