Solomon's Stables (, ) is an underground vaulted space now used as a Muslim prayer hall by the name of Al-Marwani Mosque, some 600 square yards (500 square metres) in area, at the bottom of stairs which lead down from the al-Aqsa Mosque, under the al-Aqsa Mosque, to the base of the southern wall of the enclave of al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. Al-Marwani Mosque is located under the southeastern corner of the al-Aqsa Mosque compound, below the courtyard, and feature twelve rows of pillars and arches. In December 1996 the Waqf converted the area into a prayer hall by adding lights and floor tiles, and renamed it the El-Marwani Prayer Hall (). History The structure is most widely said to have been built by the Ummayad Caliph Abd al-Malik and some claim it is from the time of King Herod (reigned 37–4 BCE) as part of his extension of the platform of the al-Aqsa Mosque southward onto the Ophel. The Herodian engineers constructed the enormous, almost rectangular platform above the slopes of the hill known as the Temple Mount, by building a substructure consisting of a series of vaulted arches in order to reduce pressure on the retaining walls. These vaults, "supported by eighty-eight pillars resting on massive Herodian blocks and divided into twelve rows of galleries", were originally storage areas of the Second Temple. A great deal of the original interior survives in the area of the Herodian staircases, although not in the area now renovated for use as a mosque. Visitors are rarely permitted to enter the areas with Herodian finishes. The underground space for the most part remained empty except during Crusader rule over Jerusalem. The Crusaders converted it into a stable for the cavalry. The rings for tethering horses can still be seen on some of the pillars. The structure has been called Solomon's Stables since the time of the Crusades as a historical composite: 'Solomon's' refers to the First Temple built on the site, while the 'stables' refers to the functional usage of the space by the Crusaders in the time of Baldwin II (King of Jerusalem 1118–1131 CE). Modern construction of the El-Marwani Mosque In the winter of 1996 the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf acquired a permit to use Solomon's Stables as an alternative place of worship for occasional rainy days of the holy month of Ramadan. Later the Waqf declared that it aimed to