Antiquity

During the second half of the second millennium B.C, the area of the Hala Sultan Tekke was used as a cemetery by the people who lived in an archaeological site known as Dromolaxia Vizatzia,^[6] a large Late Bronze Age town a few hundred metres to the West. Originally identified as an archaeological site following looting in the 1890s, numerous tombs of Late Bronze Age date (around 1650-1100 BC) with rich contents were excavated by the British Museum in 1897-1898 directed by Henry Beauchamp Walters and then John Winter Crowfoot; the finds were divided between the British Museum and the Cyprus Museum.^[7] The contemporary settlement was identified by Swedish archaeologist Arne Furumark in 1947 and some preliminary excavations conducted by the Department of Antiquities.^[8] A part of this town was excavated from the 1970s onward by a Swedish archaeological mission led by Professor Paul Åström, and proved to be a major urban centre of Late Bronze Age Cyprus^[9]

The most recent excavations at Hala Sultan Tekke, The New Swedish Cyprus Expedition have been carried out by Professor Peter M. Fischer from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden (2010-2012- ...); see www.fischerarchaeology.se. The results of the excavations have been published annually in the journal Opuscula. Annual of the Swedish Institutes at Athens and Rome.^{[10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19]} In 2018, Fischer uncovered several tombs at the site that are being explored carefully. The tombs date to 1500 and 1350 BC and contained artifacts of the Bronze Age that demonstrate the extensive trade of goods existing at the time.^[20]

Radar surveys (2010-2012) have demonstrated that the city was one of the largest in the Late Bronze Age (roughly 1600-1100 BC), maybe as large as 50 ha.^[10][12] Another archaeological investigation conducted by the Department of Antiquities under the women's quarter of Hala Sultan Tekke have revealed building remains dated to the late Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic periods (sixth - first century BC). Several finds indicate that the site might have been used as a sanctuary but the limited scale of the investigations precludes definite conclusions about its use. ^{[citation needed]}

Ottoman era

Most accounts establish a connection between the site and the death of Umm Haram during the first Arab conquest of Cyprus under the Caliph Muawiyah between 647 and 649, which were later pursued throughout the Umayyad and the Abbasid periods. According to these accounts, Umm Haram, being of very old age, had fallen from her mule and had died during a siege of Larnaca. She was later buried where she died. According to Shia belief, her grave lies within Jannatul Baqi cemetery in Madinah, Saudi Arabia.^[21]

During the Ottoman administration of Cyprus, a mosque complex was built in stages around the tomb. The tomb was discovered in the 18th century by the dervish called Sheikh Hasan, who also built the first structure here. Dervish Hasan managed to convince the administrative and religious authorities of the site's sacred nature and with the permission he received, he built the shrine around the tomb in 1760 and had it decorated. The wooden fences around the tomb would have been built by the 19th-century Ottoman governor in Cyprus, Seyyid Elhac Mehmed Agha, which were replaced by fences in bronze and two doors by his successor Acem Ali Agha.

In another account, Giovanni Mariti, who visited Cyprus between 1760 and 1767, wrote that the shrine was built by the Cyprus governor he names as Ali Agha. According to Mariti, until 1760 they used the stones of a standing church in a ruined village nearby as construction materials.^[22] In another source, it is mentioned that the construction of the mosque was initiated by the Cyprus governor Seyyid Mehmed Emin Efendi in classical Ottoman style, and it was completed in November 1817.

The ancillary buildings have been repaired in 2004, and the mosque and the minaret are currently being restored. Both of these initiatives have been carried out with support from the Bi-communal Development Programme, which is funded from USAID and UNDP, and implemented through UNOPS.^[23]