al-Ramla

Ramla is a city in the military province (jund) of Palestine. The book Futuh al-Buldan mentions that it did not exist before Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik, and that its site had been a sandy tract (ramla). ¹

Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik established the city when he was governor of the military districts for his brother al-Walid, and made it a garrison city (misr). He built his palace and the Dar al-Sabbaghin (the Dyers' House), with a cistern in its middle, and then the congregational mosque. He gave people permission to build, and dug the Qanat Barda and the wells. The Dar al-Sabbaghin came to the heirs of Salih ibn Ali ibn Abd Allah ibn al-Abbas, because it was seized along with the wealth of the Banu Umayya. ¹ See The founding of Ramla.

The book mentions that in Palestine there are estates with separate registers from the common kharaj, among them reductions and refunds. It relates that Harthama ibn A'yan returned to them the people of estates that had been rejected in the caliphate of al-Rashid, on condition of a reduction of the kharaj. ¹

Al-Muqaddasi, a son of the city, testified around the year 375 AH that there is nothing in Islam more splendid than its white congregational mosque, which Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik built. He related from his paternal uncle that Hisham required the Christians to reveal marble columns buried under the sand, which had been prepared for a church at Bal'a, or else he would demolish the church of Lydda. He described the city as in winter an island of mud, and in summer a heap of sand, and its wells deep and brackish. ²