Son and successor of `Abd al-Malik (705-715), he was the sixth caliph of the Umayyad dynasty. Al-Walid took up his father’s administrative reforms and set out to strengthen his power over Syria and North Africa. Al-Walid is known for his massive construction projects, among them the erection of the Great Mosque in Damascus in place of the Church of John the Baptist. According to the Arab historian Al-Masoudi, Al-Walid granted the Christians permission to erect four other churches instead in its place. Some scholars allude the building of the Umayyad ‘palaces’ to Al-Walid as well, based on the description in the Aphroditoi Papyri.