The neighborhoods that make up the Nachlaot district were established beginning in the late 1870s outside the walls of the Old City, which was becoming increasingly overcrowded and unsanitary. The first was Even Yisrael, built in 1875 as the sixth neighborhood outside of the walls of Jerusalem's Old City. Its name was derived from the biblical verse (Genesis 49:24): "But his bow abode firm, and the arms of his hands were made supple, by the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob, from thence, from the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel." The numerical value of stone ("Even" in Hebrew) also corresponds to the 53 homes first built there. Established that same year to the west of Even Yisrael, Mishkenot Yisrael is the second neighborhood of the Nachlaot. The name comes from a biblical verse (): "How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob/Thy dwellings, O Israel." Mazkeret Moshe was founded by Sir Moses Montefiore in 1882 as an Ashkenazi neighborhood. Ohel Moshe is a Sephardi neighborhood established alongside it.
