Mea Shearim

Towards the end of the 19th century the Jewish Quarter, in which most of Jerusalem's Jews lived, had become overcrowded and unsanitary. The difficult living conditions forced a small group of devoutly religious Jews to begin building homes outside the Old City walls.

The district of Mea Shearim was founded in 1874, the second settlement outside the city walls, to the north-west of the Old City. It was originally settled by a hundred families of very religious Jews from the Old City and remains a strongly Orthodox area.

The name was taken from the account of Yitzchak in the Bible: 'Then Yitzchak sowed in that land and received in that same year an hundredfold (Hebrew: mea shearim) and the Lord blessed him.' ( Genesis ch.26 v. 12)