Lions' Gate

The Lions' Gate is marked by four stone carvings of felines, two on each side of the arched portal. These figures, which represent the Mamluk Sultan Baybars, give the gate its name, though they are technically leopards rather than lions. Constructed around fifteen thirty-eight under the direction of the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, the gate is the only opening in the eastern wall of Jerusalem’s Old City. It stands facing the Kidron Valley and the Mount of Olives.