The Grandmother of Jeddah: In Search of Eve’s Lost Tomb
In the heart of Jeddah, the ancient port city known as the Bride of the Red Sea, lies a story whispered on the salt-laced winds. It is a tale older than the city itself, a foundational myth that has shaped its identity for millennia. This is the story of a grave, but not just any grave. It is the final resting place, legend holds, of Hawwa—Eve, the mother of all humanity. To seek it today is not to find a monument of stone and mortar, but to embark on a journey through layers of history, faith, and memory, peeling back the skin of a modern metropolis to find the phantom limb of a sacred past.
The very name of the city is entwined with this maternal genesis. While scholars debate its origins, popular etymology insists that Jeddah derives from Jaddah, the Arabic word for “grandmother.” For centuries, this was not a mere linguistic curiosity but a statement of fact. Eve, cast from paradise, was said to have descended from the heavens to this very spot on the Arabian coast, while Adam landed in Serendib, or modern-day Sri Lanka. It was here, in the arid coastal plain of the Hejaz, that she lived, died, and was buried, lending the land a profound, primordial sanctity.
Echoes of a Monumental Past
For over a thousand years, Eve’s tomb was one of the most remarkable landmarks in Arabia. Its existence was not a matter of whispered folklore but a documented reality for countless travelers, scholars, and pilgrims. The great 10th-century historian and geographer Al-Masudi was among the first to write of it, confirming that the tradition of Eve’s burial in Jeddah was an established belief in his time. Two centuries later, the Andalusian traveler Ibn Jubayr visited during his pilgrimage to Mecca and described seeing a tomb of “great length and breadth,” surmounted by an ancient dome. He spoke of a place that inspired awe, a physical testament to the dawn of humankind.
Perhaps the most famous account comes from the globe-trotting 14th-century scholar Ibn Battuta, who marveled at the tomb’s colossal proportions. Historical descriptions, often varying in their exactitude, consistently paint a picture of an immense structure. It was said to be over 120 paces long and several wide, its epic scale reflecting the Islamic belief in the magnificent stature of the first humans. The grave was marked by two great stones, one at the head and one at the feet, with a domed structure, possibly a small mosque or shrine, rising over its center. For centuries, this was a site of active veneration. Pilgrims on their way to perform the Hajj in nearby Mecca would make a customary stop in Jeddah, not just as a port of entry, but as a spiritual station to pay homage to the universal grandmother.
The tomb’s importance was further cemented under the patronage of regional rulers. Emirs and Mamluk sultans, and later the Ottomans, saw to its upkeep, embellishing the site and reinforcing its significance. It became a focal point of Jeddah’s old city, a place where the sacred and the secular met. Around it, a cemetery grew—Maqbarat Ummuna Hawwa, the Cemetery of Our Mother Eve—where generations of Jeddawis sought to be buried in the blessed proximity of humanity’s matriarch.
The Great Disappearance
The story takes a dramatic and irrevocable turn in the early 20th century. The rise of the House of Saud and the founding of the modern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia brought with it a profound theological shift. Guided by the strict interpretations of Wahhabi Islam, which viewed the veneration of tombs and shrines as a form of idolatry, or shirk, the new authorities began a campaign to purify religious practice across the land. In 1928, on the orders of King Abdulaziz Ibn Saud, the Tomb of Eve was dismantled and leveled. The domes were torn down, the markers removed, and the sacred ground was rendered indistinguishable from the earth around it.
It was a quiet vanishing. There was no grand explosion, no public ceremony of destruction. A monument that had stood for well over a millennium, that had been a fixed point in the maps and minds of travelers from Morocco to China, was simply erased. The site was absorbed back into the Maqbarat Ummuna Hawwa, and over time, the city grew up and around it. The cemetery, a sprawling, historic burial ground in the heart of the Al-Balad district, Jeddah’s beautiful old town, was eventually walled off and, in recent decades, closed to public visitors.
Today, to stand outside its high, unadorned walls is a surreal experience. The cacophony of modern Jeddah hums all around. You are in the Al-Amariyah neighborhood, a stone’s throw from the glittering gold souqs and the ancient caravan route of Gabel Street, now a bustling pedestrian thoroughfare where vendors sell fragrant perfumes and rich textiles. The air is thick with the scent of cardamom-laced coffee and roasting nuts. The historic roshan windows, intricate wooden lattices that adorn the old coral-stone merchant houses of Al-Balad, look down upon the scene. Yet, behind that silent wall lies the ground that millions once believed held the origins of their own existence.
Finding Eve in Modern Jeddah
The physical tomb may be gone, but its spirit is woven into the fabric of the city. The search for Eve’s grave is no longer a physical pilgrimage but an imaginative one. It begins in Al-Balad, a UNESCO World Heritage site, where the past refuses to be silenced. Walking its narrow alleyways, past historic mosques and beautifully decaying houses like the Naseef House, where King Abdulaziz stayed after conquering the city, you are treading on layers of history. The very ground feels charged with stories.
The modern traveler’s quest will lead them to the perimeter of the cemetery. You cannot enter, but you can circumambulate its walls, a journey of nearly a mile. On one side, you’ll find bustling markets where life continues with vibrant intensity. Here, shops overflowing with dates, spices, and frankincense stand where pilgrims once trod. The ancient Bab Makkah, the gate that led travelers out of Jeddah and onto the road to Mecca, still stands nearby, a silent witness to the countless souls who passed through, their journey encompassing both the mother of humanity and the house of God.
The absence of the tomb is, in its own way, as powerful as its presence once was. It forces you to look beyond the tangible. The treasure is not a monument to be photographed, but a narrative to be uncovered. You find it in conversations with older Jeddawis, some of whom will still point authoritatively toward the cemetery and say, “Our grandmother is there.” You feel it in the enduring name of the city itself. And you understand it when you realize that the quest for Eve’s Tomb is a metaphor for Jeddah itself: a city that has masterfully built a gleaming, cosmopolitan future upon foundations of myth and deep, sacred history. To visit this place is to stand at the intersection of legend and reality, and to feel the profound, enduring power of a story that refuses to be buried.
