However, this tradition is based on the assumption that an area of Roman flagstones, discovered beneath the adjacent Church of the Condemnation and the Convent of the Sisters of Zion, was Gabbatha, or the pavement the Bible describes as the location of Pontius Pilate's judgment of Jesus (John 19:13).

A triple-arched gateway built by Hadrian as an entrance to the eastern forum of Aelia Capitolina was traditionally, but as archaeological investigation shows, mistakenly,[1][2] said to have been part of the gate of Herod's Antonia Fortress, which was alleged to be the location of Jesus' trial.

Archaeologists now therefore conclude that, in the first century, the Roman governors judged at the western hill, rather than the area around the Church of the Flagellation, on the diametrically opposite side of the city.

[citation needed] The whole complex was given to the Franciscans in 1838 by Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt,[6][7] who brought parts of Ottoman Syria under Egyptian rule between 1831 and 1841.

[citation needed] Some noteworthy points of interest include the three stained glass windows, each depicting a different aspect of the biblical narrative of the trial of Jesus by Pilate, and the inside of the mosaic-clad golden dome.