Editing Western Wall (section)

===Late Roman and Byzantine periods (135–638)===
During much of the 2nd–5th centuries of the [[Common Era]], after the Roman defeat of the [[Bar Kokhba revolt]] in 135 CE, Jews were banned from Jerusalem. There is some evidence that Roman emperors in the 2nd and 3rd centuries did permit them to visit the city to worship on the [[Mount of Olives]] and sometimes on the Temple Mount itself.<ref name=UJT>{{cite book |last=Neusner |first=Jacob |title=Understanding Jewish Theology |year=2001 |location=Global Academic Publishing |isbn=1-58684-090-8 |page=79 |chapter=Judaism and the Land of Israel |url=https://archive.org/details/understandingjew0000unse/page/}}</ref> When the empire started becoming Christian under [[Constantine I]], they were given permission to enter the city once a year, on the [[Tisha B'Av]], to lament the loss of the Temple at the wall.<ref>{{cite book |last=Harman |first=Graham |title=A History of Palestine |year=2008 |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |isbn=978-0-691-11897-0 |page=24 |chapter=The Holiness of the "Holy Land" |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofpalesti00krea/page/}}</ref> The [[Itinerarium Burdigalense|Bordeaux Pilgrim]], who wrote in 333 CE, suggests that it was probably to the [[Foundation Stone|perforated stone]] or the Rock of Moriah, "to which the Jews come every year and anoint it, bewail themselves with groans, rend their garments, and so depart".This was because an imperial decree from Rome barred Jews from living in Jerusalem. Just once per year they were permitted to return and bitterly grieve about the fate of their people. Comparable accounts survive, including those by the Church Father, [[Gregory of Nazianzus]] (c. 329–390) and by [[Jerome]] in his commentary to [[Book of Zephaniah|Zephaniah]] written in 392 CE. In the 4th century, Christian sources reveal that the Jews encountered great difficulty in buying the right to pray near the Western Wall, at least on the 9th of Av.<ref name=UJT/> In 425 CE, the Jews of the Galilee wrote to Byzantine empress [[Aelia Eudocia]] seeking permission to pray by the ruins of the Temple. Permission was granted and they were officially permitted to resettle in Jerusalem.<ref>{{cite book |last=Gold |first=Dore |author-link=Dore Gold |title=The Fight for Jerusalem |year=2007 |publisher=Regnery |isbn=978-1-59698-029-7 |page=56 |url=https://archive.org/details/fightforjerusale00gold/page/}}</ref>

====Archaeology====
Discovery of underground rooms that could have been used as food storage carved out of the bedrock under the 1,400-year-old mosaic floor of Byzantine structure was announced by [[Israel Antiquities Authority]] in May in 2020.

"At first we were very disappointed because we found we hit the bedrock, meaning that the material culture, the human activity here in Jerusalem ended. What we found here was a rock-cut system—three rooms, all hewn in the bedrock of ancient Jerusalem" said co-director of the excavation Barak Monnickendam-Givon.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Researchers find ancient rooms under Jerusalem's Western Wall|url=https://www.thejakartapost.com/life/2020/05/20/researchers-find-ancient-rooms-under-jerusalems-western-wall.html|website=The Jakarta Post|language=en|access-date=2020-05-24}}</ref>