The Date and Function of the Horizontal Gutter-Like Water Channels along the Walls of the Herodian Temple Mount

Elongated channels, some of which preserved traces of plaster, run across the upper courses of the western and southern walls of the Herodian Temple Mount. These were previously explained as gutters, cut and utilized during the Byzantine and Early Islamic periods (or later), or as the negatives of floors of a three-story building that had once stood adjacent to the western Temple Mount wall. This article challenges these interpretations, arguing that the channels were cut exclusively in the Herodian courses of the wall, with no evidence of continuation following later renovations. Based on similar channels carved into first-century CE high-standing walls in Jerusalem and its vicinity, which are known to have led into water installations, we consider that the gutter-like channels along the Temple Mount walls were constructed in the Second Temple period, probably prior to 70 CE, to collect vertical runoff water from the face of the wall to yet unknown water reservoirs or ritual baths.