Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods, Volume 1: Life, Culture, and Society 1451466749, 9781451466744

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This second of two volumes on Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic periods focuses on the site excavations of towns and villages and what these excavations may tell us about the history of settlement in that important time. Articles includes site plans, diagrams, maps, and photographs of artifacts and structures.

fiensy and Strange

An expansive view of Galilee from 100 BCE to 200 CE—

Praise for Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods, Volume 2

David A. Fiensy is professor of New Testament and dean of the Graduate School of Religion at Kentucky Christian University in Grayson, Kentucky. His publications include Jesus the Galilean (2007), The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (co-editor, 2013), and Christian Origins and the Ancient Economy (2014), and Galilee Volume 1 (co-editor, Fortress Press, 2014).

The Archaeologic al

Record from Cities,

Religion / Biblical Studies

Towns, and Vill ages

James Riley Strange is associate professor of religion at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama, and director of the Shikhin Excavation Project in Israel’s Lower Galilee. He has written The Emergence of the Christian Basilica in the Fourth Century (2000), The Moral World of James (2010), and Galilee Volume 1 (co-editor, Fortress Press, 2014).

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David A. Fiensy is professor of New Testament and dean of the Graduate School of Religion at Kentucky Christian University in Grayson, Kentucky. His publications include Jesus the Galilean (2007), The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (co-editor, 2013), Christian Origins and the Ancient Economy (2014), and Galilee Volume 1 (co-editor, Fortress Press, 2014).

Ga lilee

“This excellent volume on the archaeological sites in Galilee provides the underpinnings for the topically arranged Galilee Volume 1. A ‘who’s who’ of key archaeologists and other leading scholars take the reader through all the main Galilean sites for which welldocumented archaeological evidence is currently available. This book will be a basic resource for study of the context of Galilean Judaism and of the historical Jesus and his early followers.” Peter Oakes, The University of Manchester

in the L ate Second Temple a nd Mishna ic Per iods

“From ‘rural hinterland’ to a thriving, culturally diverse, and vibrant region! No other area of the Roman world, perhaps, has undergone such a deep transformation in scholarly assessment than Galilee. And rightly so: Despite all its special problems, Galilee in many ways is a model for understanding the relationship between indigenous and foreign cultures and internal social tensions and diversities in the Hellenistic and Roman East. With their unprecedented wealth of detail—literary as well as material—and thanks to ample maps, plans, and references, Galilee Volume 2 now provides the ideal supplement to Galilee Volume 1. Sites like Magdala, Capernaum, Tiberias, and many others are described and often reassessed according to the latest archaeological evidence. These two books truly mark a new era of Galilean studies! Nobody interested in the history and culture of ancient Judaism, early Christianity, archaeology, or ancient history can afford to miss these two books.” Jürgen K. Zangenberg, Leiden University

GALILEE in the late second temple and mishnaic periods Volume 2 The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages

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GALILEE in the late second temple and mishnaic periods Volume 2

The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange Editors

Fortress Press Minneapolis

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GALILEE IN THE LATE SECOND TEMPLE AND MISHNAIC PERIODS Volume 2: The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange, Editors Copyright © 2015 Fortress Press. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical articles and reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Visit http://www.augsburgfortress.org/copyrights/contact.asp or write to Permissions, Augsburg Fortress, Box 1209, Minneapolis, MN 55440. Cover images, clockwise from upper left: Geometric mosaic at Tiberias, Sky View, used with permission of the New Tiberias Excavation Project. Aerial view of Kedesh, Sky View, used with permission of Tel Kedesh Excavations. Sarcophagus at Kedesh, photo courtesy James Riley Strange. Mikveh at H|uqoq, photo courtesy of Jim Haberman. Theater at Sepphoris, photo courtesy Douglas Oakman. Cover design: Laurie Ingram Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is available ISBN: 918-1-4514-6742-0 eISBN: 918-1-5064-0195-9 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z329, 48-1984. Manufactured in the U.S.A.

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IN MEMORIAM Douglas Edwards

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Contents Archaeological Chronology Events and Rulers in Galilee and Judea in the Late Second Temple   through Mishnaic Periods Maps and Galilee Photo Gallery Preface to Volume 2

ix xi xvii

Introduction to Galilee: Volumes 1 and 2 David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange1 1. The Transformation from Galil Ha-Goyim to Jewish Galilee: The Archaeological Testimony of an Ethnic Change Mordechai Aviam

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2. Sepphoris A. The Jewel of the Galilee James F. Strange 22 B. Residential Area of the Western Summit Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon39 C. F  rom Galilean Town to Roman City, 100 bce–200 ce Zeev Weiss 53 D. The Sepphoris Aqueducts James F. Strange 76 3. Kefar Shikhin James Riley Strange88 4. Yodefat-Jotapata: A Jewish Galilean Town at the End of the Second Temple Period Mordechai Aviam

109

5. Khirbet Qana C. Thomas McCollough

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6. Karm er-Ras near Kafr Kanna Yardenna Alexandre146 7. Kafr Kanna (The Franciscan Church) F. Massimo Luca, OFM

158 vii

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Contents

 8. Nazareth James F. Strange

167

  9. Kefar H|ananya David Adan-Bayewitz

181

10. Tiberias, from Its Foundation to the End of the Early Islamic Period Katia Cytryn-Silverman

186

11. Hamath Tiberias Carl E. Savage

211

12. Capernaum, Village of Nah\um, from Hellenistic to Byzantine Times Sharon Lea Mattila

217

13. Bethsaida Rami Arav and Carl E. Savage

258

14. Magdala/Taricheae Stefano De Luca and Anna Lena

280

15. Khirbet Wadi H|amam in the Early and Middle Roman Periods Uzi Leibner

343

16. H|uqoq in the Late Hellenistic and Early Roman Periods Matthew J. Grey and Chad S. Spigel

362

17. Meiron in Upper Galilee Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers

379

18. Gush H|alav James F. Strange

389

19. Nabratein: Synagogue and Environs Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers

404

20. The Ancient Synagogue and Village at Khirbet Shema‘ Eric M. Meyers

414

21. Kedesh of the Upper Galilee Andrea M. Berlin and Sharon C. Herbert

424

Glossary443 Contributors449 Abbreviations451 455 Index of Ancient Sources Index of Subjects

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Archaeological Chronology* ARCHAEOLOGICAL PERIOD Iron I Iron II Persian Hellenistic I Hellenistic II Early Roman Middle Roman Late Roman Early Byzantine Late Byzantine Early Islamic Late Islamic

ABBREVIATION

DATES

I1 I2 P H1 H2 ER MR LR Byz 1 Byz 2 EI LI

1200–1000 bce 1000–586 bce 586–333 bce 333–152 bce 152–37 bce 37 bce–70 ce 70–250 ce 250–363 ce 363–451 ce 451–640 ce 640–950 ce 950–1291 ce

* This chronology is taken from James F. Strange, Thomas R.W. Longstaff, and Dennis E. Groh with revisions by James Riley Strange, The Excavations at Shikhin: Manual for Area Supervisors (unpublished manuscript). The archaeological periods are those seen at Sepphoris and Shikhin.

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Events and Rulers in Galilee and Judea in the Late Second Temple through Mishnaic Periods Key Events 110 bce? 104 bce 104 bce 63 bce 55 bce 47–37 bce 49/38 bce 4 bce 4 bce 20 ce 30–33 ce 66–70 ce 70–225 ce 80–140 ce 132–135 ce 140 ce 163 ce 193 ce 200–220 ce

John Hyrcanus conquers parts of Galilee? Aristobulus I annexes Galilee Ptolemy IX Lathyros attacks Sepphoris General Pompey of Rome conquers Judea Gabinius locates a regional Sanhedrin at Sepphoris Herod the Great governs the Galilee Herod makes Sepphoris his northern headquarters Death of Herod; Sepphoris revolts; Roman legions destroy it Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee and Perea, rebuilds Sepphoris as his Galilean ­capital Antipas builds Tiberias as his new capital Jesus’ ministry First Jewish Revolt: Vespasian invades Galilee; destruction of Yodefat, ­Magdala, and Gamla; destruction of Jerusalem and the temple; migration of Judeans to Galilee Era of the Tannaim Sanhedrin moves to Usha Bar Kokhba Revolt; expulsion of Jews from Judea; migration to Galilee Sanhedrin moves to Shefar‘am Sanhedrin moves to Beit She‘arim, then to Sepphoris Sanhedrin moves to Tiberias Rabbi Judah the Prince completes the codification of the Mishnah at ­Sepphoris

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Events and Rulers Rulers of Judea from Hellenistic Times**

Hellenistic Dynasties Alexander III of Macedon

Dates of Reign 333–323 bce

Ptolemy I Soter (“Savior”)

300–282 bce

Ptolemy II Philadelphus (“Brother-loving”)

285–246 bce

Ptolemy III Euergetes (“Benefactor”)

246–221 bce

Ptolemy IV Philopator (“Father-loving”)

221–204 bce

Ptolemy V Epiphanes (“[God] Manifest”)

204–180 bce

Antiochus III (“The Great”)

223–187 bce (takes control of Palestine in 198)

Seleucus IV Philopator

218–175 bce

Antiochus IV Epiphanes

175–164 bce

Hasmonean Dynasty Mattathias

Dates of Control d. 166 bce

Judas, son of Mattathias

165–160 bce

Jonathan, son of Mattathias

160–142 bce

Simon, son of Mattathias

142–135 bce

John Hyrcanus I, son of Simon

135–104 bce

Judah Aristobulus I, son of John Hyrcanus I

104–103 bce

Alexander Jannaeus, son of John Hyrcanus I

103–76 bce

Salome Alexandra, wife of Alexander Jannaeus

76–67 bce

Aristobulus II, son of Alexander Jannaeus and  Alexandra

67–63 bce

John Hyrcanus II, son of Alexander Jannaeus and  Alexandra

63–40 bce (high priest)

Mattathias Antigonus II, son of Aristobulus II

40–37 bce (Parthian rule)

**  Information compiled and expanded from Michael D. Coogan, ed., New Oxford Annotated Bible: New Revised Standard Version with the Apocrypha, 4th ed. (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 2260– 61; John Roberts, ed., Oxford Dictionary of the Classical World (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 848.

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Events and Rulers Herodian Dynasty Herod the Great   governor of the Galilee   king of the Jews

xiii Dates of Reign 47–37 bce 37–4 bce

Archelaus, son of Herod, ethnarch (“ruler of a people”) of Judea, Samaria, Idumea

4 bce–6 ce1

Antipas, son of Herod, tetrarch (“ruler of a fourth”) of Galilee and Perea

4 bce–39 ce

Philip, son of Herod, tetrarch of Batanea, ­Trachonitis, Auranitis

4 bce–34 ce

Agrippa I, grandson of Herod and son of ­Aristobulus IV and Berenice   king of Batanea, ­Trachonitis, Aurantis,   and of Judea, Galilee, and Perea

37–44 ce 41–44 ce

Herod Agrippa II, son of Herod Agrippa I,   king of Chalcis (north of Judea),   king of Batanea, Trachonitis, Auranitis, Galilee,   and Perea

50–53 ce 53–ca. 93 ce

1.  In 6 ce Herod Archelaus was deposed and Judea, Samaria, and Idumea became the Roman province Judaea with its capital at Caesarea.

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xiv

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Events and Rulers Roman Emperors Octavian (Augustus) Tiberius Gaius Caligula Claudius Nero Galba Otho Vitellius Vespasian Titus Domitian Nerva Trajan Hadrian Antoninus Pius Marcus Aurelius Lucius Verus Commodus Pertinax Didius Julianus Septimius Servus Aurelius Antoninus (Caracalla) Geta Macrinus Diadumenius Elagabalus Aurelius Severus Alexander

Dates of Reign 27 bce–14 ce 14–37 ce 37–41 ce 41–54 ce 54–68 ce 68–69 ce 69 ce 69 ce 69–79 ce 79–81 ce 81–96 ce 96–98 ce 98–117 ce 117–138 ce 138–161 ce 161–180 ce 161–166 ce 180–192 ce 192–193 ce 193 ce 193–211 ce 198–217 ce 211 ce 217–218 ce 218 ce 218–222 ce 222–235 ce

Roman Governors of Judea Coponius M. Ambivius Annius Rufus Valerius Gratus Pontius Pilate Marcellus

Dates of Governorship 6–8 ce 9–12 ce 12–15 ce 15–26 ce 26–36 ce 36–37 ce

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Events and Rulers

Marullus Cuspius Fadus Tiberius Julius Alexander Ventidius Cumanus M. Antonius Felix Porcius Festus Clodius Albinus Cessuis Florus Vettulenes Cerialis M. Salvienus Pompeius Longinus Lusius Quietus Tineius Rufus

xv 37–41 ce2 44–46 ce 46–48 ce 48–52 ce 52–60 ce 60–62 ce 62–64 ce 64–66 ce 70–72 ce 75–86 ce 86 ce 117 ce 130–132 ce

2.  Herod Agrippa I ruled Judea as part of his kingdom beginning in 41. Judea became a Roman province again after Agrippa’s death in 44. Emperor Hadrian renamed the province Syria Palaestina after the Bar Kokhba revolt (132–135), and he renamed Jerusalem Aelia Capitolina after his clan name (Aelius) combined with Jupiter Capitolinus.

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Map 1

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Map 2

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Map 3

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Composite map of Galilee adapted for use by RiddleMaps.com from original maps by James F. Strange.

Map 4A: Galilee, NW

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Map 4B: Galilee, NE

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Map 4C: Galilee, SW

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Map 4D: Galilee, SE

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Yodefat: Mansion-style house with floor “frescoed” with black and red tiles. Photo by Mordechai Aviam. Used with permission.

Kedesh: Façade of the monumental temple. Photo courtesy of James Riley Strange. G-1

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Tiberias: Mosque plan. Covered hall of the early Islamic mosque. Wall marked in pink is the second century ce Roman wall. Seventh–early-eighth-century remains marked in dark green; eighth-century remains (monumental Umayyad mosque) marked in orange; foundations in dark-blue related to post-749 earthquake repairs; remodeling of the eleventh century in turquoise. Plan by The New Tiberias Excavation Project. G-2

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Bethsaida: An ancient anchor stone. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

Bethsaida: Excavation of a wineseller’s house. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

Bethsaida: View of the Sea of Galilee from Bethsaida ­excavation site. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

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Kafr Kanna: Byzantine stone jar in the basement of the Greek Orthodox Church in Kafr Kanna. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

Nazareth: Grotto in the church of the ­Annunciation in Nazareth. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

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Capernaum: Aerial view looking southeast, with the Franciscan side in the ­foreground and the Greek Orthodox side in the background. Photo copyright © Abraham Graicer. Used by permission of Stefano De Luca.

Capernaum: Looking southwest over Sea of Galilee. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission. G-5

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Capernaum: Looking north from RC church built over Peter’s house. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

Capernaum: The fifth-century octagonal church over the traditional site of Peter’s house. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission. G-6

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Sepphoris: Mikveh in the ­Western Domestic Quarter. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by ­permission.

Sepphoris: Looking northwest along the Decumanus. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

Sepphoris: Looking northeast along Cardo Maximus. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

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Sepphoris: Looking southeast along the Decumanus with ­excavations of basilical ­building in foreground. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

Sepphoris: Stage, orchestra, and cavea of the Roman ­theater. Copyright © Mark G. V. ­Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

Sepphoris: Water system aqueduct. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

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Sepphoris: Looking northwest over the excavations of the Western Domestic Quarter. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission.

Hamath Tiberias: Hot springs and remains of Roman bath. Copyright © Mark G. V. Hoffman. Reprinted by permission. G-9

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Preface to Volume 2 No literary work takes places without a context. The three decades that span 1980–2010 witnessed three series of publications that provide the backdrop for this two-volume project. These publications took place in the fields of New Testament studies, Jewish studies, and Galilean studies. The first of these developments was the ongoing quest of the historical Jesus. The current quest has manifested itself in three movements: the Jesus Seminar, the Context Group, and the Third Quest. Although they operate under different assumptions and use different methodologies, participants in these three groups have one thing in common. Few of them—there are exceptions—betray any knowledge of the archaeology of Galilee. We offer the current volume to the Jesus quest as a collection of data that scholars can easily access and use in their research. The second development was the advances in the study of early Judaism that occurred during these decades. First, a new collection of Pseudepigrapha was offered in the mid-1980s. Second, all of the remaining Qumran Scrolls were released in the early 1990s. Third, the translations of much of the rabbinic literature by Jacob Neusner and his students and colleagues, published intermittently during these three decades, have made the monumental Jewish materials much more available to the English-speaking general public. Although these publication events have allowed greater access to the Jewish literature and have sparked renewed interest in Jewish studies, the material culture of Jewish sites has remained largely unknown. The third development that has led to this project is the rise of the Galileans, both the historians and the archaeologists. Beginning with Seán Freyne (to whom volume 1 is dedicated in memoriam) several historians have scoured the literature—mostly Josephus—for information about Roman Galilee. In a few instances, these historians also benefited from some of the new archaeological finds and insights that were available at that time. But archaeological work continues in the Galilee, and new data must undergird these excellent works of history. Finally, we have seen more archaeological interest in Galilee in those three decades. First in Upper Galilee and now in Lower Galilee, excavators have collected the material realia and, where they could do so, have attempted to connect them to and relate them to the literature. This information, scattered in essays, dig reports, and even in excavators’ notes, needs to be gathered together for convenient reference. We offer the present volume to provide this service. Because of these three developments, the editors began in 2010 to contemplate the present project. The project started in earnest in 2012, and the first submissions began to arrive in the fall of 2013. With the publication of this second volume, the project is now complete. xvii

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The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages

The reader will permit the editors a few words about this volume’s importance. First, whenever we could, we asked original excavators to produce chapters on sites they dug. When that was impossible for various reasons, we enlisted knowledgeable and thorough scholars to do the task. Second, several chapters compile, for the first time and in a comprehensive way, data from various digs and surveys by many groups over a number of decades. Third, some chapters present information that precedes and anticipates arguments and evidence that will appear in the directors’ final publications. The chapter on Sepphoris is simply a treasure. In addition to the two indexes at the end, we have supplemented this volume with a glossary of technical terms that appear in the chapters. The bibliographies that appear at the end of the chapters remain a gold mine. The editors thank Scott Tunseth and Marissa Wold Uhrina of Fortress Press for their patient responses to our concerns and their excellent work in the production of these two volumes. We again thank our spouses, Molly Fiensy and Laura Strange, for their support in the laborious work of overseeing the project. Finally, and not at all insignificantly, we honor the thousands of volunteers over the years who have dug at various sites in Galilee. They come in almost all ages and from many occupations to sink their trowels into Galilean soil. They do it for the fun of it, out of interest in Galilean history, and just to make a contribution, but it is they who recover and record the data. The excavations could not happen without them. David Fiensy Grayson, Kentucky

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James Riley Strange Birmingham, Alabama

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Introduction to Galilee: Volumes 1 and 2 David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange

Galilee has fascinated historians for the last 150 years. Ernest Renan, the nineteenth-century biographer of Jesus, thought that ancient Galilee must have been a paradise. He referred to the area around Nazareth as “This enchanted circle.” Galilee was “charming and idyllic” and was characterized by green, shade, beautiful flowers, and small, gentle animals. “In no country in the world do the mountains spread themselves out with more harmony.” Galilee, he thought, “spiritualised itself in ethereal dreams—in a kind of poetic mysticism, blending heaven and earth.”1 It was here in Renan’s dreamlike never-never land that he pictured Jesus’ youth. What we need is a more sober appraisal of ancient Galilee. The research in the last thirty years has sought to do that, but, nevertheless, the current study of Galilee is fraught with conflicting conclusions. If the Sermon on the Mount is known for its six antitheses (Matt. 5:2148), scholars may look back on this period of research as the antitheses of Galilee: (1) Some look at Galilee through the lenses of cultural anthropology and macro-sociology;2 others look at Galilee through the lenses of archaeology and reject the use of social theories.3 (2) Some

1.  Ernest Renan, The Life of Jesus (London: Trübner, 1867), 51, 74–76. 2.  See the analyses of Richard A. Horsley, “The Historical Jesus and Archaeology of the Galilee: Questions from Historical Jesus Research to Archaeologists,” SBL 1994 Seminar Papers (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1994), 91–135; Douglas E.. Oakman, “The Archaeology of First-Century Galilee and the Social Interpretation of the Historical Jesus,” in ibid., 220–51; and Seán V. Freyne, “Archaeology and the Historical Jesus,” in Archaeology and Biblical Interpretation (ed. John R. Bartlett; London: Routledge, 1997), 129. 3.  J. Andrew Overman, “Jesus of Galilee and the Historical Peasant,” in Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods (ed. Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997), 67–73; and, in the same volume, Dennis E. Groh, “The Clash between Literary and Archaeological Models of Provincial Palestine,” 29–37.

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The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages

maintain that the relations between rural villages and the cities were hostile;4 others propose that the relationship was one of economic reciprocity and good-will.5 (3) Some suggest that Galilee was typical of other agrarian societies, with poor peasants who lived in the rural areas and exploitative wealthy people who lived mostly in the cities;6 others respond that life was pretty good for everyone in Galilee and that it was an egalitarian society.7 (4) Some regard Galilee as so hellenized (Greek-like) that there were Cynic philosophers running around;8 ­others retort that Galilee was thoroughly Jewish.9 (5) Some think Sepphoris, one of the cities of Lower Galilee, was rather large for an ancient city (up to 30,000 persons); others think it was a small “city” (around 7,500).10 (6) Some think that the theater ruins in Sepphoris of ­Galilee (only five kilometers, or three miles, from Nazareth) indicate that Jesus could have attended 4.  Oakman, “Archaeology of First-Century Galilee”; Richard A. Horsley, Archaeology, History, and Society in Galilee: The Social Context of Jesus and the Rabbis (Valley Forge, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 1996), 70–83; Gerhard E. Lenski, Power and Privilege: A Theory of Social Stratification (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966), 206. 5.  See David Adan-Bayewitz, Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Stury of Local Trade (Bar-Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture; Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993), 23–41, 216–36; AdanBayewitz, “Kefar Hananya, 1986,” IEJ 37 (1987): 178–79; Adan-Bayewitz and Isadore Perlman, “The Local Trade of Sepphoris in the Roman Period,” IEJ 40 (1990): 153–72; James F. Strange, “First Century Galilee from Archaeology and from the Texts,” in Edwards and McCollough, Archaeology and the Galilee, 41; Douglas R. Edwards, “FirstCentury Urban/Rural Relations in Lower Galilee: Exploring the Archaeological and Literary Evidence,” in SBL 1988 Seminar Papers (ed. David J. Lull; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997), 169–82; Edwards, “The Socio-Economic and Cultural Ethos of the Lower Galilee in the First Century: Implications for the Nascent Jesus Movement,” in The Galilee in Late Antiquity (ed. Lee I. Levine; New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992), 53–73; Eric M. Meyers, “Jesus and His Galilean Context,” in Edwards and McCollough, Archaeology and the Galilee, 57–66. 6.  John Dominic Crossan and Jonathan L. Reed, Excavating Jesus: Beneath the Stones, Behind the Texts (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2001), 70; Richard A. Horsley, “Jesus and Galilee: The Contingencies of a Renewal Movement,” in Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures (ed. Eric M. Meyers; Duke Judaic Studies Series 1; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999), 65. 7.  Groh, “Clash between Literary and Archaeological Models,” 29–37. 8.  Howard Clark Kee, “Early Christianity in the Galilee: Reassessing the Evidence from the Gospels,” in Levine, Galilee in Late Antiquity, 3–22, esp. 15; Robert W. Funk, Honest to Jesus: Jesus for a New Millennium (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1996), 58; Burton L. Mack, A Myth of Innocence: Mark and Christian Origins (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988), 64, 66. 9.  See Jonathan L. Reed, Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus: A Re-Examination of the Evidence (Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000), 49–51; Mark A. Chancey and Eric M. Meyers, “How Jewish Was Sepphoris in Jesus’ Time?” BAR 26, no. 4 (2000): 18–41, 61; Eric M. Meyers, “Jesus and His World: Sepphoris and the Quest for the Historical Jesus,” in Saxa loquentur: Studien zur Archäologie Palästinas/Israels: Festschrift für Volkmar Fritz zum 65. Geburtstag (ed. Cornelis G. den Hertog; Ulrich Hübner, and Stefan Münger; AOAT 302; Münster: Ugarit, 2003), 191–95; Mark A. Chancey, The Myth of a Gentile Galilee (SNTSMS 118; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 79–90. 10.  Compare the figures in Reed, Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus, 117. Meyers suggests 18,000 for Sepphoris and 24,000 for Tiberias (“Jesus and His Galilean Context,” 59). J. Andrew Overman offered 30,000 to 40,000 for Tiberias and 30,000 for Sepphoris (“Who Were the First Urban Christians?” in SBL Seminar 1988 Seminar Papers, 160–68); Horsley maintained that both cities together had a population of 15,000 (Archaeology, History, and Society in Galilee, 45).

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theatrical performances; others maintain that the theater was not constructed until after Jesus’ time.11 These contradictory viewpoints have made it a cliché that the quest for the historical Jesus is at the same time a quest for the historical Galilee.12 The geographical and cultural location of Jesus’ youth, it is surmised, may help us understand his later message and/or his pattern of ministry. Certainly scholars of the past have thought as much; the current group seems to have the same opinion.13 Today Galilee studies are having an influence on several areas of New Testament studies. In addition to the study of the historical Jesus, mentioned above, many today see Galilee as the context for the composition of the sayings source commonly called Q.14 Others add that the Gospel of Mark was also composed in Galilee.15 Research in the New Testament Gospels mandates that we have an up-to-date assessment of ancient Galilee. Students of ancient Judaism also have an interest in Galilee. As archaeological surveys are demonstrating, Judeans began to immigrate into Galilee during the Hasmonean period (early first century bce) and, consequently, Galilee became a very Jewish territory.16 When the great Jewish War erupted in 66 ce, Galilee was the focal point. It was there that the Roman army first attacked, defeating Josephus’s army and laying waste to several cities (J.W. 2.566–3.203). After the war, Judaism eventually reorganized there. The Sanhedrin moved at first to Yavneh (Jamnia) on the coast, then to Usha, to Beth She‘arim, to Sepphoris, and finally to Tiberias (all in Galilee).17 It was in Galilee, in Sepphoris, that Rabbi Yehudah ha-Nasi lived and redacted

11.  For a date in the early first century (thus the time of Antipas and Jesus), see James F. Strange, “Six Campaigns at Sepphoris,” in Levine, Galilee in Late Antiquity, 342; and Richard A. Batey, Jesus and the Forgotten City: New Light on Sepphoris and the Urban World of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991), 83–103. For a date of late first century or early second century for the theater, see Zeev Weiss and Ehud Netzer, “Hellenistic and Roman Sepphoris: The Archaeological Evidence,” in Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture (ed. Rebecca Martin Nagy, Carol L. Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, and Zeev Weiss; Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996; distributed by Eisenbrauns, Winona Lake, Ind.), 32; Carol L. Meyers and Eric M. Meyers, “Sepphoris,” OEANE 4:533; and Meyers, “Jesus and His World,” 188–90. 12.  Seán Freyne, “The Geography, Politics, and Economics of Galilee and the Quest for the Historical Jesus,” in Studying the Historical Jesus: Evaluations of the State of Current Research (ed. Bruce Chilton and Craig A. Evans; NTTS 19; Leiden: Brill, 1994), 76; and Halvor Moxnes, “Construction of Galilee,” BTB 31 (2001): 26–37, 64–77. 13.  See the surveys in Moxnes, “Construction of Galilee”; and Mark Rapinchuk, “The Galilee and Jesus in Recent Research,” Currents in Biblical Research 2 (2004): 197–222. 14. Reed, Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus, 170–96; John Kloppenborg Verbin, Excavating Q: The History and Setting of the Sayings Gospel (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000), 170–75, 214–61. 15.  Joel Marcus, “The Jewish War and the Sitz im Leben of Mark,” JBL 111 (1992): 441–62; Werner H. Kelber, Mark’s Story of Jesus (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1979), 13. 16.  See the chapters by Jensen and Chancey in volume 1 of Galilee. 17. See b. Roš Haš. 31b and E. Mary Smallwood, The Jews under Roman Rule: From Pompey to Diocletian. A Study in Political Relations (SJLA 20; Leiden: Brill, 1976), 474.

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the Mishnah.18 Several other important rabbis also lived in Galilee.19 Galilee, therefore, has played an important role in both the formation of early Christianity and the reformulation of the Judaism that arose after the destruction of the temple to become the ancestor of the Judaisms we know today. The Galilee at the time of Jesus and the Mishnah has received intense scrutiny in the past thirty years. Scholars have combed through the texts (especially Josephus) and the material remains to form an increasingly complete and complex picture. Archaeologists have reopened sites already dug and have sunk their spades into previously unexcavated sites. During this time, several useful collections of articles have appeared.20 These collections are certainly full of very helpful information, and they have expanded the knowledge of the region during our period of interest. The authors of the present volume owe a great debt to these previous contributions to the field, yet some of the conclusions and hypotheses may now need reevaluation, and the information can certainly always be updated. What we propose in these two volumes is to offer the general reader a somewhat full report of the status of Galilean studies. These two volumes consolidate a great deal of information that has been brought to light in various journals, field reports, and essays over the past thirty years. Our goal has been to make this information easily accessible to New Testament scholars and Mishnah scholars not familiar with these materials, and also usable to the average intelligent reader. The volumes will integrate the various excavations (for example, the three excavations at Sepphoris) and will also integrate the archaeological and textual data where possible. We have sought to hear all voices: archaeologists, historians, biblical scholars, and social-science interpreters; Christians, Jews, and secular scholars; North Americans, Europeans, and Israelis; those who have devoted a significant amount of time and energy to this research (especially those who have excavated in Galilee for many years), a few newcomers, and even “outsiders” who offer a new look at the data. As noted above, there is—and this is hardly surprising—no unanimity with respect to several issues. It has not been the editors’ goal to harmonize opinions or reduce disagreements. We present them as they exist and let the reader make decisions. Volume 1 has collected chapters on the life and culture of ancient Galilee. After surveys of the modern study of Galilee and of Galilean history, there are specialized studies on ethnicity, on religious practices of Galilee (including synagogues), on notable personalities, and on important social movements. Village life is featured in one essay on the village, followed by one 18. Smallwood, Jews under Roman Rule, 499. See the chapter by Caulley vol. 1 of Galilee. 19.  For example, Rabbi H|anina lived in Sepphoris (y. Ta‘an. 3:4; y. Pe’ah 7:1). See also Shaye J. D. Cohen, “The Place of the Rabbi in Jewish Society,” in Levine, Galilee in late Antiquity, 157–73. 20.  See Levine, Galilee in late Antiquity ; Nagy et al., Sepphoris in Galilee ; Edwards and McCollough, Archaeology and the Galilee ; Eric M. Meyers, Galilee through the Centuries; and Jürgen Zangenberg, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin, eds., Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition (WUNT 210; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007).

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on household Judaism, and then one on the village houses. This section of the volume ends with essays on education and diseases and health. There follow offerings on the road system, trade and markets, the urban–rural divide, and the economic life of the village. In relation to these latter is the chapter—consisting of two companion essays—that forms a debate on the standard of living of the average villager during our time period. Were they destitute, living modestly, or prosperous? A chapter on taxation rounds out part four of volume 1. Volume 2 collects reports on all the archaeological excavations of Galilee at which significant remains from our period of time have been found. Among the sites we discuss, some have seen significant excavation (Capernaum, Sepphoris); in some the excavators focused on synagogues (Meiron, Khirbet Shema‘, Gischala/Gush H|alav); others have seen limited excavation either because of modern construction (Nazareth, Tiberias) or because the dig began recently (Shikhin). Those sites with remains only before or after our time period (100 bce–200 ce) find no discussion here.21 Also, generally speaking, those sites only surveyed but not excavated will not be covered, even though there may be strong evidence of occupation during our time period. The editors thought it important to include chapters on both cities (such as Sepphoris and Tiberias) and villages, because it is the social, economic, religious, and cultural interactions between village and city that provide the basis for so much of the discussion in volume 1. In both volumes, the reader has the opportunity to watch both textual scholars and archaeologists attempt to make sense of the ancient texts that talk about, and the material culture used and left by the inhabitants of, the Galilee. This is no light task, for it requires making inferences about human institutions and values. Those more ephemeral realities do leave their imprints in material culture and texts, but usually in an oblique way, and scholars are forced to interpret. That observation provides one of the most valuable offerings of these two volumes: the chance to see how scholars make arguments, while assessing the arguments of others. In this way we take our readers seriously as conversation partners, for we offer up the strengths and weaknesses of our conclusions for their assessment as well. The other value of the volumes is to be found in the bibliographies at the end of each chapter: they are gold mines for people who want to do further reading on their own. The editors invite readers into the ongoing conversations captured, in part, in these volumes. If you have read this far, it is clear that you are interested in the subject. It is our hope that the curious will find some answers here, and that others will learn how important the questions are. After all, we are looking at the birth of two of the world’s great religions: Christianity and the Judaism of the Sages of Blessed Memory.

21.  Therefore, towns and villages such as Philoteria, Horvat Kur, Bethlehem of Galilee, Kefar Reina, Chorazin, and Gabara will not be treated in vol. 2.

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The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages Bibliography

Adan-Bayewitz, David. Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Study of Local Trade. Bar-Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture. Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993. ———. “Kefar Hananya, 1986.” IEJ 37 (1987): 178–79. Adan-Bayewitz, David, and Isadore Perlman. “The Local Trade of Sepphoris in the Roman Period.” IEJ 40 (1990): 153–72. Batey, Richard A. Jesus and the Forgotten City: New Light on Sepphoris and the Urban World of Jesus. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991. Chancey, Mark A. The Myth of a Gentile Galilee. SNTSMS 118. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Chancey, Mark A., and Eric M. Meyers. “How Jewish Was Sepphoris in Jesus’ Time?” BAR 26, no. 4 (2000): 18–41, 61. Cohen, Shaye J. D. “The Place of the Rabbi in Jewish Society.” In The Galilee in Late Antiquity, edited by Lee I. Levine, 157–73. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992. Crossan, John Dominic, and Jonathan L. Reed. Excavating Jesus: Beneath the Stones, Behind the Texts. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2001. Edwards, Douglas R. “First Century Urban/Rural Relations in Lower Galilee: Exploring the Archaeological and Literary Evidence.” SBL 1988 Seminar Papers, edited by David J. Lull, 169–82. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988. ———. “The Socio-Economic and Cultural Ethos of the Lower Galilee in the First Century: Implications for the Nascent Jesus Movement.” In The Galilee in Late Antiquity, edited by Lee I. Levine, 53–91. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992. Edwards, Douglas R., and C. Thomas McCollough, eds. Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods. South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997. Freyne, Seán. “Archaeology and the Historical Jesus.” In Archaeology and Biblical Interpretation, edited by John R. Bartlett, 117–44. London: Routledge, 1997. ———. “The Geography, Politics, and Economics in Galilee and the Quest for the Historical Jesus.” In Studying the Historical Jesus: Evaluations of the State of Current Research, edited by Bruce Chilton and Craig A. Evans, 75–122. NTTS 19. Leiden: Brill, 1994. Funk, Robert W. Honest to Jesus: Jesus for a New Millennium. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1996. Groh, Dennis E. “The Clash between Literary and Archaeological Models of Provincial Palestine.” In Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods, edited by Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 29–37. South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997.

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Horsley, Richard A. Archaeology, History, and Society in Galilee: The Social Context of Jesus and the Rabbis. Valley Forge, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 1996. ———. “The Historical Jesus and Archaeology of the Galilee: Questions from Historical Jesus Research to Archaeologists.” In SBL 1994 Seminar Papers, 91–135. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1994. ———. “Jesus and Galilee: The Contingencies of a Renewal Movement.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 57–74. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. Kee, Howard Clark. “Early Christianity in the Galilee: Reassessing the Evidence from the Gospels.” In The Galilee in Late Antiquity, edited by Lee I. Levine, 3–22. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992. Kelber, Werner H. Mark’s Story of Jesus. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1979. Kloppenborg Verbin, John. Excavating Q: The History and Setting of the Sayings Gospel. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000. Lenski, Gerhard E. Power and Privilege: A Theory of Social Stratification. New York: McGraw Hill, 1966. Levine, Lee I., ed. The Galilee in Late Antiquity. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992. Mack, Burton L. A Myth of Innocence: Mark and Christian Origins. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988. Marcus, Joel. “The Jewish War and the Sitz im Leben of Mark.” JBL 111 (1992): 441–62. Meyers, Carol L., and Eric M. Meyers. “Sepphoris.” OEANE 4:533. Meyers, Eric M., ed. Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. ———. “Jesus and His Galilean Context.” In Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods, edited by Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 57–66. South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997. ———. “Jesus and His World: Sepphoris and the Quest for the Historical Jesus.” In Saxa loquentur: Studien zur Archäologie Palästinas/Israels. Festschrift für Volkmar Fritz zum 65. Geburtstag, edited by Cornelis G. den Hertog, Ulrich Hübner, and Stefan Münger. AOAT 302. Münster: Ugarit, 2003. Moxnes, Halvor. “The Construction of Galilee as a Place for the Historical Jesus.” BTB 31 (2001): 26–37, 64–77. Nagy, Rebecca M., Carol L. Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, and Zeev Weiss, eds. Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture. Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996. Distributed by Eisenbrauns, Winona Lake, Ind. Oakman, Douglas E. “The Archaeology of First-Century Galilee and the Social Interpretation of the Historical Jesus.” In SBL 1994 Seminar Papers, 220–51. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1994.

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Overman, J. Andrew. “Jesus of Galilee and the Historical Peasant.” In Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods, edited by Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 67–73. South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997. ———. “Who Were the First Urban Christians?” In SBL 1988 Seminar Papers, 160–68. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988. Rapinchuk, Mark. “The Galilee and Jesus in Recent Research.” CBR 2 (2004): 197–222. Reed, Jonathan L. Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus. Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000. Renan, Ernest. The Life of Jesus. London: Trübner, 1867. Smallwood, E. Mary. The Jews under Roman Rule: From Pompey to Diocletian. A Study in Political Relations. SJLA 20. Leiden: Brill, 1976. Strange, James F. “First Century Galilee from Archaeology and from the Texts.” In Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods, edited by Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 39–48. South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997. ———. “Six Campaigns at Sepphoris: The University of South Florida Excavations, 1983– 1989.” In The Galilee in Late Antiquity, edited by Lee I. Levine, 339–56. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992. Weiss, Zeev, and Ehud Netzer. “Hellenistic and Roman Sepphoris: The Archaeological Evidence.” In Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture, edited by Rebecca Martin Nagy, Carol L. Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, and Zeev Weiss, 29–37. Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996. Zangenberg, Jürgen, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin, eds. Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition. WUNT 210. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007.

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1 The Transformation from Galil Ha-Goyim to Jewish Galilee The Archaeological Testimony of an Ethnic Change Mordechai Aviam* While the letter was being read, other messengers arrived from Galilee with their garments torn, bearing similar news, “The people of Ptolemais, Tyre, and Sidon have joined forces with the whole of gentile Galilee to destroy us!” When Judas and the people heard this, they held a great assembly to decide what should be done for their oppressed countrymen who were under attack from their enemies. Judas said to his brother Simon, “Pick your men and go and relieve your countrymen in Galilee, while my brother Jonathan and I make our way into Gilead.” He left Joseph son of Zechariah and the people’s leader, Azariah, with the remainder of the army in Judea to keep guard and gave them these orders, “You are to be responsible for our people. Do not engage the gentiles until we return.” Simon was allotted three thousand men for the expedition into Galilee, Judas eight thousand for Gilead. Simon advanced into Galilee, engaged the gentiles in several battles and swept all before him; he pursued them to the gate of Ptolemais, and they lost about three thousand men, whose spoils he collected. With him, he took away the Jews of Galilee and Arbatta, with their wives and children and all their possessions, and brought them into Judea with great rejoicing. (1 Macc. 5:15-23) This paragraph of debated historical value1 gives us a picture of the ethnic structure of Galilee in the mid-second century bce. Regardless of whether it accurately reports an event in which *  This article is dedicated to the blessed memory of my good and beloved friend Modi Brodetzki, who passed away while I was writing this chapter. Together we read and discussed Josephus’s writings and hiked the tracks of Galilee. 1.  For a short discussion, see Uzi Leibner, Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee (TSAJ 127; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), 277–79.

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a Jewish force commanded by Simon the Maccabee marched from Jerusalem to the Galilee to rescue his “brothers” or is largely legendary, in my view it reflects an ethnic landscape of this period. After the conquest of the Galilee by the Assyrians and the massive deportation of its population, many Galilean towns and villages were completely abandoned. Even the very recent excavations in the Galilee continue to reveal destruction and abandonment layers in Iron Age II sites. One of the very few sites with continued occupation after the Assyrian conquest is Tel Dan, especially at the cultic site. There, beginning in the eighth and seventh centuries and continuing to the fourth century bce, the activity looks as if it was connected to the region of Phoenicia. Some figurines from Dan bear some similarities to those found at the Phoenician temple at Mount Mizpe Yammim. During the Hellenistic period, the cultic site had a revival that is reflected mainly in the famous bilingual Greek and Aramaic inscription, “Zoilos made his vow to the God of Dan.”2 Who is the God of Dan? One reasonable hypothesis is that the inscription reveals the memory of a “great God” who resided here and who probably was later syncretized with Zeus. It is also important to note that in the Hellenistic period the cultic site at Dan was within the territory that may have belonged to the Itureans. In the Hellenistic levels at Dan, a few storage jars were found that are identical to Iturean jars from the northern Golan. Moreover, similar to a few other jars from the Golan, one of them bears an inscribed Greek name.3 This cultic site most likely bordered on two Lebanese cultural regions: the Phoenician coast and the Itureans along the Hermon ridge and the Bakaa. Continuing farther southwest, we come to Kedesh. The excavations at the site revealed a large administrative building that was first built in the Persian period; it continued in use into the Hellenistic period but was mostly abandoned in the second century bce.4 In the Hellenistic period, some rooms were beautifully decorated with frescoes and stucco. A hoard of more than two thousand bullae found in one of the rooms demonstrates connections between Kedesh’s inhabitants and Tyre. One of the storage rooms contained a series of storage jars. Although the excavators do not use this terminology, these jars are similar to the Galilean jars that we identified in the Galilee survey and excavations as “Galilean Coarse Ware” (GCW, discussed below). In any case, they do not resemble either the Golan types or those found in Tel Dan. Sharon C. Herbert and Andrea M. Berlin suggest that this administrative building was destroyed in the mid-second century bce as the result of the Hasmonean victory on the Hazor plain (1 Macc. 11:63-74), after which Jonathan’s forces chased Demetrius’s defeated army to Kedesh, where they encamped. 2.  Avraham Biran, Biblical Dan (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society; Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion, 1994), 211–27. 3.  Moshe Hartal, Land of the Ituraeans (in Hebrew; Qazrin: Golan Research Institute, 2005), 263–69. 4.  Sharon C. Herbert and Andrea M. Berlin, “A New Administrative Center for Persian and Hellenistic Galilee: Preliminary Report of the University of Michigan/University of Minnesota Excavations at Kedesh,” BASOR 329 (2003): 13–59. See the chapter on Kedesh by Herbert and Berlin on pp. 424–41 in this volume.

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Figure A. Qeren Naftali site. Photo by Mordechai Aviam.

Two kilometers east of Kedesh, atop a high hill that goes by the modern name of Qeren Naftali, stand the remains of a massive fortress. My excavations there showed that the fortress was built in the Hellenistic period, in the third or second century bce, probably to guard and control both the central administration center of southern Phoenicia at Kedesh and the main highway in the Huleh Valley below.5 At a second stage, a mikveh was inserted into one of the fortress rooms. Together with the appearance of Hasmonean coins, it is one of the clearest pieces of evidence supporting the Hasmonean conquest of the Galilee. There are no clear historical records for the annexation of the Galilee to the young Hasmonean state. According to Flavius Josephus, in around 112–110 bce, John Hyrcanus I set out north from Jerusalem on a campaign in which he took Samaria and Scythopolis and went as far as Mount Carmel (J.W. 1.2.7 §§64–67). The last line of Josephus’s description says, “and all the land beyond it” (§64). Some scholars have suggested that this phrase refers to conquering the Jezreel Valley, but I have suggested that it refers to most parts of the Galilee, perhaps mainly the Lower Galilee. I do not suggest that the conquest of the fortress near Kedesh took place at the same time as Jonathan’s 5.  Mordechai Aviam, Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods (Land of Galilee 1; Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 2004), 59–88.

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Figure B. Mikveh at Qeren Naftali. Photo by Mordechai Aviam.

attack in around 160 bce. Rather, it probably happened much later, during the expansion of the Hasmonean kingdom, whether at the time of Hyrcanus I after his father’s campaign against Beth She’an,6 during the one-year reign of Aristobulus, as many scholars suggest, or during the days of Jannaeus himself. Josephus tells us that Hyrcanus I sent young Jannaeus to be raised in the Galilee, and, if this story is true, the Galilee was taken during the days of his father. There are four more excavated sites in the Galilee that display Hellenistic settlements that were destroyed in the second half of the second century bce and that provide evidence for the Hasmonean conquest. Ten kilometers west of Kedesh, a team and I excavated a small site by the modern Arabic name of esh-Shuhra. It was probably a small farmstead dating after the late Persian period and existing to the second half of the second century bce. The few rooms that we excavated had been destroyed by fire. On the floors we found pottery vessels clearly dating to the second century bce and coins. We also found two large, broken pithoi from the GCW group on the floor. The twenty-two silver coins from a hoard found many years before the dig were minted between the years 148 and 140 bce. The coins from the dig itself are evidence of the use of Tyrian/Seleucid coins up to around 125 bce, followed by the appearance of Jewish Hasmonean coins, which we found in and on top of the ash layer at the site. 6.  Ample evidence for the destruction and abandonment of Scythopolis/Beth She’an was found in the excavations. See Rachel Bar-Natan and Gabi Mazor, “Beth-Shean during the Hellenistic Period” (in Hebrew), Qadmoniot 27 (1994): 87–92.

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The remains of a Persian and Hellenistic period temple on top of Mount Mizpe Yammim have been excavated and recently published.7 For a long time, many scholars (I among them) discussed the remains as mainly dating to the Hellenistic period. Berlin analyzed the ceramic evidence and suggested that most of it had to be dated earlier, to the Persian period. She also suggested that the temple with its temenos and tower, together with their location on a strategic point, reflect not only a sacred place but also the limit of Phoenician control of the southern territory of Tyre. Although almost all the ritual activity at the site dated to the late Persian period, Berlin suggested that the final activity dated to the Late Hellenistic period. She based this argument on the Tyrian coin found at the late level, the violent desecration of the figurines, and the mutilation of the offerings, mainly the juglets, some of which were thrown out of the doorway. In her summary,8 she provides two possible perpetrators: the Hasmonean forces raiding the Galilee after the victory over Demetrius’s forces on the Hazor plain, or new settlers from Judea. Berlin’s reconstruction of the events leaves an open question: What happened at the site between the late Persian period (ending with Alexander the Great’s conquest in 332) and the desecration of the site sometime in the mid-second century bce? Was the site abandoned with the offerings left in place until the intruders came to desecrate it, or was there continued (probably minor) activity at the site that left only a few Hellenistic remains in the temple—a small number of cooking pots, bowls, and jars, a coin or two, and a handle of an imported amphora? Three kilometers west of Mizpe Yammim lie the remains of the ancient site identified as Beer Sheba of the Galilee. The Greek name Bersabe appears for the first time in Flavius Josephus’s histories of the region as one of the nineteen settlements he fortified before the Roman invasion of the Galilee. I surveyed the site during the 1980s, and Uzi Leibner has conducted a more recent survey.9 During my survey, we collected a large amount of GCW pottery as well as other Persian and Hellenistic types of pottery. (Naturally, the site continued into the Roman period.) Notably, we found three small bronze figurines. The first was a tiny figurine that could have been used as either a pediment or a standing representation of Horus the Infant, a wellknown Egyptian figurine. This design can be dated to the Persian and Hellenistic periods. A similar figurine was recovered at Gamla, where no Persian-period pottery was found; the figurine from Beer Sheba, therefore, should be dated to the Hellenistic period.10 The second was the headless bust of a female figurine holding an object to its belly. Although the figure is clearly nude, it is unclear whom this figurine represents. The naturalistic design hints at a Hellenistic origin rather than a local Semitic origin, and the figurine could very well be a repre7.  Andrea Berlin and Rafael Frankel, “The Sanctuary at Mizpe Yammim: Phoenician Cult and Territory in the Upper Galilee during the Persian Period,” BASOR 366 (2014): 25–78. 8.  Berlin and Frankel, “Sanctuary at Mizpe Yammim,” 69. 9. Leibner, Settlement and History, 122–27. 10.  Shemaryah Gutman, Gamla, A City in Rebellion (in Hebrew; Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense Press, 1994), 48.

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The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages

Figure C. The base of the Apis figurine found at Beer Sheba of the Galilee. Photo by Mordechai Aviam.

sentation of Aphrodite/Astarte. The third was the base (5 x 3 cm) of an Apis figurine. One hoof of a bull’s extended front leg was preserved on the base. Three sides of the base were preserved, each one carrying an inscription. An incomplete hieroglyphic inscription on one of the long sides probably has to do with giving a gift. This inscription is very shallow and eroded, and was probably the original inscription on this Egyptian object. The only preserved short side carries the three Aramaic letters ‫קרב‬, which probably means “sacrifice.” The second long side carries an indecipherable inscription, but the few identifiable letters are Greek, including Γ, Ε, and Λ written in mirror writing. Although these three figurines were found in a survey, they clearly reflect pagan society in the Hellenistic period. The Apis base (see fig. C) was imported from Egypt, similar to some of the cultic objects from Mount Mizpe Yammim, and bears an original inscription in hieroglyphs, with a second, Aramaic inscription later chiseled into the metal at Beer Sheba. The Greek inscription was added by the same hand as the Aramaic, and although it is indecipherable, it is clear that Greek was familiar to these people. In addition, the female figurine is depicted in a western style, which is not typical in the Persian period.

Figure D. A figurine from Beer Sheba. Photo by Mordechai Aviam.

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Figure E. GCW jar in the center with with two typical Hellenistic jars on either side. Photo by Mordechai Aviam.

In two different areas of the excavations at Yodefat, we discovered below the later Early Roman period a layer from the Hellenistic period. On the hill’s northern side, this layer was found beneath the Hasmonean wall that encircled the summit. On the floor of this room we found two GCW pithoi together with an imported wine jar with a stamped handle that was dated to the beginning of the second half of the second century bce.11 Kh. ‘Aika was partially excavated on the summit of a hill in the eastern Lower Galilee. The rich Hellenistic-period level yielded a large building that had been destroyed by fire. The building contained many GCW pithoi together with other vessels. Based on the date of stamped imported wine jars, coins, and other vessels, the excavator suggested that the destruction happened in the mid-second century bce.12 11.  See the chapter on Yodefat in this volume, pp. 109–26. 12.  Uzi Leibner, “The Origin of Jewish Settlement in Galilee in the Second Temple Period: Historical Sources and Archaeological Data” (in Hebrew), Zion 74 (2012): 437–69, esp. 459.

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Finally, below the Hasmonean layer of Magdala (Migdal) on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, an earlier Late Hellenistic layer containing GCW pithoi has recently been identified for the first time. Summing up the discoveries from different excavations and surveys, mainly in Upper Galilee but also in eastern Lower Galilee, the material culture reflects a pagan, autochthonic, mountainous population. On the one hand this population had a strong relationship with the Phoenician world, as reflected in the Phoenician inscription from Mount Mizpe Yammim, imported vessels from the Phoenician coast, and of course the distribution of Phoenician city coins. On the other hand, the Aramaic inscriptions from Dan and Beer Sheba of the Galilee, together with the local pottery, mainly the GCW, point to a population whose economic and cultural ties were mostly local. Following this situation came a change. Many of the sites with GCW ceased to exist, and in other sites a new layer was established that contained Hasmonean coins. A Jewish ritual bath was installed in one of the rooms of a former Seleucid fortress at Keren Naftali, and the temple at Mizpe Yammim was finally abandoned and its offerings and figurines desecrated. (Something similar may have happened at Beer Sheba of the Galilee.) What was the religion of the new population? Here we have no clear answers but can only compare what we find with what we know from Josephus’s other references to the ethnic ideals of the Hasmoneans. One of John Hyrcanus’s first acts was to destroy the Samaritan temple, a religious/ethnic act. Following that, he conquered Adora and Marisa and “permitted [the Idumeans] to remain in their country so long as they had themselves circumcised and were willing to observe the laws of the Jews” (Ant. 13.256–258). After conquering Samaria, Hyrcanus sold its citizens into slavery (J.W. 1.65). The archaeological evidence from Marisa, Samaria, Mount Gerizim, and Beth She’an/Scythopolis shows a massive destruction and complete abandonment. According to Josephus, Aristobulus conquered part of the Iturean land and forced them to convert to Judaism (Ant. 13.318–319). There is no good reason why we may not identify these events with the conquest of the Galilee. I assume that, as the Idumeans and the Itureans did, some of the pagan citizens of rural Galilee also “had themselves circumcised and were willing to observe the laws of the Jews,” some of them were exiled, others were sold to slavery, and others were killed. The Galilee was now “purified” from any idolatry, and the land was open to Judean immigrants. Scholars agree that the Galilean population at the turn of the first century bce was a mixture of Jewish remnants, converted pagans, veterans of the Hasmonean army, and many new immigrants from Judea. Many Galilean sites can be classified as Jewish based on their identification in Josephus’s narratives of Galilee in 67 ce, or by the presence of a synagogue, mikva’ot, and Hasmonean coins.13 Although today we know that Hasmonean coins were in circulation in the Jewish 13.  Danny Syon, Small Change in Hellenistic-Roman Galilee: The Evidence of Numismatic Site Finds as a Tool for Historical Reconstruction (Jerusalem: Israel Numismatic Society, 2015), 161–66.

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territory until the end of the revolt, there is little doubt that the existence of a large quantity of coins dates the establishment of the Jewish villages to the time of the Hasmonean dynasty, sometimes on the remains of an abandoned pagan village and sometimes as a new settlement. Two types of evidence provide strong support for the Hasmoneans’ royal investment in the Galilee. The first is the existence of the military. The mikveh from Keren Naftali is evidence not only that Jewish forces conquered the Seleucid/Phoenician fortress but also that a Jewish garrison occupied the northern edge of the kingdom. (It is, however, possible that the border with Phoenicia lay even farther north of Keren Naftali.) Support for this argument comes from Josephus’s description of the Herodian attack on Galilee in 38 bce: “and [Herod] proceeded to Galilee to capture some of the strongholds which had been occupied by the garrisons of Antigonus” (Ant. 14.413–414). It is clear from both archaeological evidence and ancient texts that the Hasmoneans held garrisons in fortresses at least on the Galilee’s borders, if not in its inner areas. This reality is probably reflected in the remains of a large (military?) structure at the top of the hill of Sepphoris, with a large mikveh dated to the early first century bce,14 and perhaps in the fortified settlement on the hilltop of Yodefat.15 This evidence also hints at the settlement of Jewish veterans in the new conquered territories. The second type of evidence is the archaeological/economic data. The surprising identification of the Hellenistic-type bathhouse at Magdala is evidence for the existence of a large town on the coast of the Sea of Galilee. Magdala’s central location and status are strengthened by the important discovery of the royal port at Magdala. Behind the Herodian pier, the archaeologists discovered an earlier pier with mooring stones and a massive tower to its north. (Was this tower the origin of the Hebrew name Migdal?) This substantial pier, unfamiliar in other parts of the lake and second only to the Herodian port in Caesarea, is strong evidence for royal investment in the Galilee. The port was probably used to increase the quantity of fishing boats, and consequently to increase the quantity of fish for the fishing industry of Magdala/Taricheae.16 I suggest that the second royal investment in the Galilee was the development of a largescale olive oil industry.17 The Galilee’s soil and weather provide an ideal environment for cultivating olive trees, and olive oil was produced there during its entire history. There is evidence for a few oil presses at different sites during the Iron Age, mostly on a domestic scale. The Galilee’s oil production during the Hellenistic period is reflected in the Zenon papyri. When Zenon arrived in the Galilee, he visited the royal estate at Kedesh, where the main products were wine and grain. This produce is depicted by symbols on the official bulla found at the

14.  Eric M. Meyers, “Sepphoris on the Eve of the Great Revolt (67–68 ce): Archaeology and Josephus,” in Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures (ed. Eric. M. Meyers; Duke Judaic Studies 1; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999), 11, fig. 2. The mikveh is on the top right. 15.  See the chapter on Yodefat in this volume, pp. 109–26. 16.  See the chapter on Magdala in this volume, pp. 280–342. 17.  For a larger discussion see Aviam, Jews, Pagans and Christians, 51–58.

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site.18 At present, we have no remains of an industrial19 oil press in any Hellenistic site in the Galilee; nevertheless, such developed machines have been found in Hellenisic sites in the Judean Shephelah, and they are especially characteristic of the oil production of Marisa in its later phase before its conquest and destruction by the Hasmoneans.20 At Mazor, in the northern Shephelah, a Hellenistic-period oil press was excavated and dated to the third and second centuries bce, and Hasmonean coins were found in the next phase.21 It seems as if during the Hasmonean expansion, after conquering towns and villages, the Jews were more familiar with the industrial oil press and started to use it in their agricultural industry. These machines were built in the Galilee while the new immigration wave came from Judea after the conquest of the region by the Hasmoneans. The earliest one excavated is at Gamla and has been dated by the excavators to the time of the Hasmoneans, no later than the turn of the first century. From that time forward, we find a growing number of oil presses in the Jewish settlements during the Early Roman period. The growth of this product is well reflected in both Josephus’s writings (J.W. 2.590–595) and talmudic sources (b. Men. 85b; Sifrei Deut. 316). Most scholars today agree that the existence of Hasmonean coins at a site clearly reflects Jewish life there. The appearance of Hasmonean coins in sites that in earlier phases contained GCW, figurines, and decorated figurative oil lamps points to the ethnic change discussed here. An ongoing question concerning Hasmonean coins in the Galilee is this: When did the first Hasmonean coins appear in the Galilee? Was it only after the final conquest of the Galilee, or were there coins of Hyrcanus I even before the annexation? Josephus provides the earliest evidence that Jannaeus took Gamla, yet Danny Syon claims in his new book that there are enough coins of Hyrcanus at Gamla to point to the existence of a Jewish population before Jannaeus’s conquest.22 Syon suggests that settlers from Judea immigrated to the Galilee from crowded Judea and settled in empty areas such as Gamla. I prefer another explanation, as I find it difficult to explain why a small group of Judean Jews would travel far into a hostile area, build a settlement there, and import Jewish coins minted in Jerusalem. It is more plausible to see this settlement as a long branch of the victory of Hyrcanus I and his sons over Scythopolis and the area “north of there.” Syon’s maps 34 and 35 show the distribution of coins of Hyrcanus I and Aristobulus I, which covers Lower Galilee, eastern Upper Galilee, and central Golan.23 This 18. Donald Ariel and Joseph Naveh, “Selected Inscribed Sealings from Kedesh in the Upper Galilee,” BASOR 329 (2003): 72–73. 19.  The term industrial points to the arrival of new machines that appear in the Mediterranean area in the Hellenistic period. These machines include (a) a crushing installation consisting of a round stone basin in which a stone wheel is turned around by the power of a donkey, mule, or horse; and (b) a squeezing installation consisting of a large beam from which three or four heavy stone weights are hung using a winch that can lower the beam by shortening the rope. 20.  Amos Kloner and Nahum Sagiv, “Subterranean Complexes 44 and 45,” in Maresha Excavations Final Report I (ed. Amos Kloner; IAA Reports 17; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2003), 51–72. 21.  David Amit and Irena Zilberbod, “Mazor” (in Hebrew), HA-ESI 106 (1999): 61–64. 22. Syon, Small Change in Hellenistic-Roman Galilee. 23.  Ibid., 165–66.

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distribution hints that the first campaign that annexed the Galilee occurred between 112 and 110 bce. Finally, in a recent study, Berlin suggests a process by which Judean Jews who immigrated to the Galilee brought with them their tradition of pottery manufacture and established the local Jewish pottery industry.24 Indeed, there are similarities between Late Hellenistic Judean vessel shapes and those of the Galilee in the Hasmonean layers, but there is still a missing piece: the typical Judean Hasmonean “pinched” oil lamp. Presently, we have no pinched oil lamps from a Galilean Hasmonean layer. Such a discovery would provide an important piece of evidence for Berlin’s suggestion. Summing up, there is no doubt that we have enough archaeological data to identify an ethnic change in the Galilee during the last decade of the second century bce. The disappearance of the GCW ceramics, which are good indicators of a pagan population,25 together with abandonment of the sites, is probably the most significant testimony for this change. At the same time or shortly thereafter, sites were settled with people who built stepped pools that we identify today as mikva’ot (Keren Naftali), who started using Jewish coins, and who stopped using imported wine in amphorae. Consequently, although we have no literary sources telling of such a change, we have to rely on the archaeological evidence to create the Galilee’s historical and ethnic framework. Leibner discusses such a framework in his detailed study on the survey of eastern Lower Galilee, and he suggests a number of steps in the Jewish settlement of the Galilee similar to what I have suggested. Leibner tries to avoid any identification of the Jewish inhabitants in the Hasmonean time as “native” Jews or as converts and rejects both references in the book of Maccabees to Simon’s campaign to the Galilee and Josephus’s note on the conversion of the Itureans. I propose that there is no reason to reject these stories as reflections of historical events. No dig will be able to prove either claim, as no one has found archaeological evidence for the conversion of the Idumeans. Although I base some of my own conclusions on surveys, we have to remember that arguments based on pottery gathered in surveys can quickly change when a site is excavated. For example, Leibner used evidence from Migdal (Magdala) to argue that the Hasmoneans established the town on a previously unoccupied site. Three years after his book was published, the excavations at Magdala revealed a Hellenistic layer with GCW jars in situ. The fact that the GCW sites also contain coastal Phoenician pottery does not mean that the inhabitants were Phoenicians from the coast. I still believe that, although Josephus named the territory north of the Jewish Galilee “the land of the Tyrians,” he himself did not think that 24.  Andrea M. Berlin, “Identity Politics in Early Roman Galilee,” in The Jewish Revolt against Rome: Interdisciplinary Perspectives (ed. M. Popović; JSJSup 154; Leiden: Brill, 2012), 69–106. 25.  In few preliminary reports and in oral communication, however, Moshe Hartal has suggested that GCW continued into the Roman period, at least at Gush H|alav (Giscala), where he conducted a few salvage excavations. See Moshe Hartal, “Gush Halav A-5471,” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng. aspx?id=1517&mag_id=117 [cited May 8, 2015]. At present, there is no information about Roman period GCW from any other Roman period sites.

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the inhabitants had anything to do with the city of Tyre. He refers to the large hinterland of Tyre, but the people were local, mountainous, pagan tribes. There is no clear evidence that they were not being converted and joining the new, large wave of Judean immigrants who arrived and settled in the Galilee. These gentiles brought with them the knowledge of the industrial oil press; they were probably subsidized by the Judean authorities of the Hasmonean kingdom; and they were able to develop a strong economy very quickly. Today we know about two small urban centers—Sepphoris in western Galilee and Migdal in the eastern Galilee—that the Hasmoneans developed and that no doubt strongly influenced the rural areas surrounding them. Although we do not yet have evidence for an indigenous population that identified itself as Jews and called Judah the Maccabee for rescue, I do think that they existed and were a minor part of the new Jewish Galilee formed by the Hasmoneans. From c. 110 bce to the year 66 ce, a period of almost 180 years, Jewish Galilee rapidly developed, and, according to Josephus’s account of the Jewish settlements in this region (both Galilees and central Golan), there were 204 Jewish settlements. I think that the inhabitants of the Galilee in 38 bce were obligated and loyal to the Hasmonean dynasty, not only because the Hasmoneans were priests and kings but also because the Galileans kept alive the memories of the settlement of the Galilee two to three generations earlier. Bibliography Amit, David, and Irena Zilberbod. “Mazor.” In Hebrew. HA-ESI 106 (1999): 61–64. Ariel, Donald T., and Joseph Naveh. “Selected Inscribed Sealings from Kedesh in the Upper Galilee.” BASOR 329 (2003): 61–80. Aviam, Mordechai. Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods. Land of Galilee 1. Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 2004. Aviam, Mordechai, and Aharoni Amitai. “Excavations at Khirbet esh-Shuhara.” In Eretz Zafon: Studies in Galilean Archaeology, edited by Zvika Gal, 119–34 (Hebrew section). Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2002. Berlin, Andrea M. “Identity Politics in Early Roman Galilee.” In The Jewish Revolt against Rome: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, edited by M. Popović, 69–106. JSJSup 154. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Berlin, Andrea M., and Rafael Frankel. “The Sanctuary at Mizpe Yammim: Phoenician Cult and Territory in the Upper Galilee during the Persian Period.” BASOR 366 (2014): 25–78. Biran, Avraham. Biblical Dan. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society; Hebrew Union College– Jewish Institute of Religion, 1994. Gutman, Shemaryah. Gamla, A City in Rebellion. In Hebrew. Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense Press 1994.

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Hartal, Moshe. “Gush Halav A-5471.” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http://www.hadashot esi.org.il/ report_detail_eng.aspx?id= 1517&mag_id=117 (cited May 8, 2015). ———. Land of the Ituraeans. In Hebrew. Qazrin: Golan Research Institute, 2005. Herbert, Sharon C., and Andrea M. Berlin. “A New Administrative Center for Persian and Hellenistic Galilee: Preliminary Report of the University of Michigan/University of Minnesota Excavations at Kedesh.” BASOR 329 (2003): 13–59. Kloner, Amos, and Nahum Sagiv. “Subterranean Complexes 44 and 45.” In Maresha Excavations Final Report I, edited by Amos Kloner, 51–72. IAA Reports 17. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2003. Leibner, Uzi. “The Origin of Jewish Settlement in Galilee in the Second Temple Period: Historical Sources and Archaeological Data.” In Hebrew. Zion 74 (2012): 437–69. ———. Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee. TSAJ 127. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Mazor, Gabi, and Rachel Bar-Natan. “Beth-Shean during the Hellenistic Period.” In Hebrew. Qadmoniot 27 (1994): 87–92. Meyers, Eric M. “Sepphoris on the Eve of the Great Revolt (67–68 ce).” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Myers, 109–22. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. Syon, Danny. Small Change in Hellenistic-Roman Galilee: The Evidence of Numismatic Site Finds as a Tool for Historical Reconstruction. Jerusalem: Israel Numismatic Society, 2015.

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2 Sepphoris A. The Jewel of the Galilee James F. Strange The Name Sepphoris: Hebrew Tsippōri, Tsippōrim (sippôrî, sippôryîm; ‫צפורי‬, ‫ )צפורים‬and sometimes without the Hebrew waw or ō; Aramaic Tsipporin (sippôrîn, ‫ ;)צפורין‬Greek usually Sepphōris (Σεπφωρις). Josephus calls the city “Sepphoris” or “Sepphoreis” (σεπφωρις, σεπφωρεις). He calls its citizens Sepphōritai (Σεπφωριται). Ptolemy (Geographica 5.16.4) calls the city Σεπφουρει or Σεπφουρις (Sepfourei, Sepfouris). The Latin name is usually Seffora. In Arabic sources the name is “Saffuriya” (‫صفورية‬, ‎Safuriyah and Suffuriyeh). A single Hebrew graffito from the destruction of the “House of St. Peter” in Capernaum mentions someone called “the Sepphorite” (s ipr’t, ‫)צפראת‬.1 During the reign of Hadrian (117–138 ce), the city received the name of “Diocaesarea” (Διοκαισάρεα or -ια, Diokaisarea or -ia). The prefix “Dio-” honors Zeus, while “Caesar” honors Hadrian, who bore the title of “Divi” or Zeus. This name appears for the first time on milestones of 120 ce, one found south of Sepphoris toward Legio and the other northwest of Sepphoris toward Acco.2 Jewish literature calls the city by its Hebrew or Aramaic name; in 1.  Yoel Elitzur, Ancient Place Names in the Holy Land: Preservation and History (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, Hebrew University; Winona Lake, Ind. Eisenbrauns, 2004), 79–87; Emmanuele Testa, Cafarnao IV: I Graffiti della Casa di S. Pietro (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1972), no. 100, table 23, and fig. 12. 2. Iaakov Meshorer, “Sepphoris and Rome,” in Greek Numismatics and Archaeology: Essays in Honor of Margaret Thompson (ed. Otto Mørkholm and Nancy M. Waggoner; Wetteren: Editions NR, 1979), 159–71, esp. 163–65; Israel Roll, “Between Damascus and Megiddo: Roads and Transportation in Antiquity across the Northeastern Approaches to the Holy Land,” in Man near a Roman Arch: Studies Presented to Prof. Yoram Tsafrir (ed. Leah Di Segni, Y. Hirschfeld, J. Patrich, and R. Talgam; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2009), 1*–20*, esp. 13*.

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Christian and most other Greek sources the city appears as “Diocasearea,” while in Christian Syriac the name reverts to “Sōphrīn” (swpryn).3 The city coins of Sepphoris always name the city or its citizens in Greek, sometimes abbreviated. At first, the city is “Sepphoris,” but after Hadrian the name is always “Diocaesarea.” For instance, a coin of 67/68 ce uses Sepphō or Sepphōr (Σεπφω, Σεπφωρ). Under Trajan (98–118 ce), a coin of Sepphoris names the “Sepphoreans” (SEPPHŌRĒNŌN, ΣΕΠΦΩΡΗΝΩΝ). Under Antoninus Pius (138–161), a coin reads, “Of Diocae(sarea)” (DIOKAI[SARIAS], ΔΙΟΚΑΙ[ΣAPIAΣ]). “Diocaesarea” is the name in most Greek inscriptions. The Hebrew appellative behind the name (siippôr, ‫ )צפור‬means “bird” or “crown” or, metaphorically, “beautiful.” The name does not appear in the Hebrew Bible or in the New Testament except in one manuscript of Codex Bezae, probably a copyist’s error (Σαμφουρειν, Samfourein).4 The name occurs hundreds of times in Jewish literature with minor variations in spelling. Location The city of Sepphoris stood on a low hill roughly in the center of Lower Galilee. The peak of the hill stood at 289 m (948 ft) above sea level. It is a “city set on a hill” (see Matt. 5:14, πόλις . . . ἐπάνω ὄρους, polis . . . epanō orous). The distance from Sepphoris to the western border of Galilee is 19 km (11.8 mi). The Mediterranean shore lies another 12.2 km (7.6 mi) west. To the east, Tiberias and the Sea of Galilee lie 24.5 km away (15.2 mi). The border with the city territory of Tiberias is only 11.6 km east (7.2 mi). One encounters the border with Upper Galilee due north at 23 km (14.3 mi). To the south, one encounters the southern border of Lower Galilee at 30 km (18.6 mi). Scythopolis lies 34 km (21.1 mi) away to the south and east. Mount Tabor stands mostly east 10.2 km away (6.3 mi). The rabbis used to say that the land around Sepphoris extends sixteen (Roman) miles in all directions and flows with milk and honey (y. Bik. 1:8; b. Ketub. 11b). The city territory of Sepphoris contains at least eighty named and unnamed ancient villages and 1,271 sq km (491 sq mi) of land. That is roughly half the area of Luxembourg or about the area of Los Angeles. The full extent of the city of Sepphoris in various periods is not yet known, as no city wall has been traced. Magen Broshi has estimated that the city occupied

3.  Kenneth W. Russell, “The Earthquake Chronology of Palestine and Northwest Arabia from the 2nd through the Mid-8th Century A.D.,” BASOR 260 (1985): 37–59, esp. 42. 4.  “Jesus therefore no longer walked about openly among the Jews, but went from there to a town called Ephraim in the region [of Samfourein] near the wilderness; and he remained there with the disciples” (John 11:54 NRSV). If the scribe meant to refer to Sepphoris, he placed it in Judea. See Yoram Tsafrir, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green, Tabula Imperii Romani: Iudaea-Palaestina: Eretz Israel in the Hellensistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods; Map and Gazetteer (Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994), 227–28.

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The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages

Figure A. A “city on a hill.” An engraving of the Plain of Buttauf, ­Palestine, with the village of ­Sefuriyeh (site of Sepphoris) in the background. Picture from W. M. Thomson, The Land and the Book; or Biblical Illustrations Drawn from the Manners and Customs, the Scenes and Scenery of the Holy Land (New York, 1859), 2:133.

60 hectares, which yields a population of 16,000–24,000 inhabitants.5 Others have estimated a population of 8,000–12,000.6 Natural Resources: Soil, Springs, Agriculture, Trees, Climate, Rainfall The soils around Sepphoris form on a limestone substrate. This bedrock furnishes building stone in a soft variety that can be carved with a knife and a hard variety suitable for major structures. The clay that forms directly on bedrock is dark red (terra rosa) and is prized by farmers. Because of the limestone bedrock, soils are generally alkaline, and therefore organic debris from human occupation (wood, leather, cloth) seldom survives, though teeth and bones sometimes do, as do charred wood and seeds. Metals are subject to severe corrosion.7 5.  Magen Broshi, “The Population of Western Palestine in the Roman-Byzantine Period,” BASOR 236 (1979): 5. 6.  Jonathan L. Reed, Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus: A Re-examination of the Evidence (Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000), 80. 7.  Efraim Orni and Elisha Efrat, Geography of Israel (3rd rev. ed.; New York: American Heritage, 1971); Yohanan Aharoni and Michael Avi-Yonah, The Macmillan Bible Atlas (3rd rev. ed.; Tel-Aviv: Survey of Israel; New York: Macmillan, 1985).

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The soils are generally rich and support extensive agriculture well. The immediate region was famous for its wine and oil (wine presses and olive presses abound), but it also produced wheat, barley, grapes, figs, olives, lentils, chickpeas, onions, cucumbers, melons, pomegranates, almonds, and spices. Flax yielded linen and rope.8 The climate comprises summer drought alternating with fall, winter, and spring rains (“Mediterranean Zone”). Rainfall is generally 50 to 70 mm (19 to 27 in) annually for nine or ten months. Temperatures are moderate, ranging from 0˚ C (32˚ F) in winter to as high as 40˚ C (104˚ F) in late summer. Historically, snow and frost are known. Sepphoris and its city territory were forested in the Late Hellenistic period with standing forests of kermes oak, Mount Tabor oak, terebinth, and Aleppo pine. The storax shrub often grew with Mount Tabor oaks, and wild olive trees are found in Josephus’s writings and to this day. Researchers have observed the lentisk, laurel, “Spanish broom,” carob, hawthorn, myrtle, caper, and sumak (shikmah) at Sepphoris and in its fields.9 History and Archaeology According to scattered pottery finds, small, transient populations occupied Sepphoris in the EB II, LB II, Iron I, Iron II, Persian, and Hellenistic periods. The beginnings of the city, however, date to the second century bce, according to the excavations, perhaps under John Hyrcanus (134–103 bce) or Alexander Jannaeus (103–76 bce) or both.10 The earliest inhabitants built a fortress that was in place before the attack of Ptolemy Lathyrus of Egypt about 103 bce. Ptolemy successfully “besieged” (ἐπολιόρκει, epoliorkei) Ptolemais-Acco and then sacked the nearby, unwalled village of Asochis (Shikhin) on a Sabbath, which indicates that the citizens were Jews, and he enslaved the survivors. He then “made an attempt on Sepphoris” in the field (πειράσας δὲ καὶ Σέπφωριν, peirasas de kai Sepphōrin [Josephus Ant. 23.334–344]). He avoided a direct attack on the large, Hellenistic fortress of Sepphoris. The population of Sepphoris could withdraw into the fortress when threatened. The commanders of the fortress were likely Jewish, for the title “Commander” appears as a Greek word written in Hebrew letters on an ostracon (a piece of pottery with writing) brought to light by the Sepphoris Regional

8.  Michael Avi-Yonah, “Economic Geography,” in The Holy Land from the Persian to the Arab Conquests (536 B.C. to 640 A.D.): A Historical Geography (rev. ed.; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1977), 188–211. 9.  Nili Lipschitz, Timber in Ancient Israel: Dendroarchaeology and Dendrochronology (Tel Aviv University Sonia and Marco Nadler Institute of Archaeology Monograph Series 26; Tel Aviv: Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University, 2007). 10.  The two-stage hypothesis is in Mordechai Aviam, “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First-Century Galilee and Its Origins: A Comprehensive Archaeological Synthesis,” in The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (ed. David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins; Early Christianity and Its Literature 11; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013), 11.

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Figure B. Foundation of the “citadel” on the highest point of the hill of ­Sepphoris. The Foundations date to the fourth century ce, reusing earlier stones. Photo by James Riley Strange. Used with permission.

Project (’pmls-, ‫ ;אפמלס‬epimelētēs, ἐπιμελητής).11 Furthermore, one of the ritual baths of the fortress must be dated to the Late Hellenistic period. It is likely that the rabbis remember this early Hellenistic fort as the “old fort” of Sepphoris in m. ‘Arak. 9:6 (‫קצרה הישנה‬, qs irh hyšnh).12 At the coming of the Romans in 63 bce, Sepphoris was the largest and most impressive Jewish city in the Galilee, likely because of its fortress. Perhaps for that reason, Gabinius, proconsul in Syria, established one of five councils or synods (σύνοδος, synodos) at Sepphoris in 57 bce (Josephus J.W. 1.170). This decision allowed aristocrats shared governance and effectively reduced the duties of John Hyrcanus to sacerdotal affairs.13 Meanwhile, during their forays against Roman territory, the Parthians gave the title “King” to Antigonus, the son of Aristobulus, in 40/39 bce. The Romans responded by placing all Syria under Herod’s control (τὴν ἐπιμέλλειαν ἅπασαν ἐνεχείρισαν Ἡηρώδη, tēn epimelleian hapasan enecheirisan Hērōdē). Herod bore the rank of governor (στρατηγός, stratēgos [Josephus Ant. 14.280]).14 Antigo11.  Eric M. Meyers, “Sepphoris on the Eve of the Great Revolt (67–68 ce): Archaeology and Josephus,” in Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures (ed. Eric M. Meyers; Duke Judaic Studies 1; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999), 112. 12.  Stuart S. Miller, “New Perspectives on the History of Sepphoris,” in Meyers, Galilee through the Centuries, 145–60. 13.  Meyers, “Sepphoris on the Eve of the Great Revolt,” 113. 14.  But see ibid.

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nus installed a garrison at Sepphoris, probably in the fortress. Herod, acting as client of the Romans, attacked Sepphoris in a snowstorm to dislodge Antigonus (Ant. 14.413), only to discover that Antigonus had already departed. Herod captured Sepphoris and stationed his troops there during his prosecution of the civil war with Antigonus. Herod then dispatched his troops from Sepphoris to the caves of the cliffs of Arbel west of the Sea of Galilee, where the last rebels had fled. He killed all the rebels (λησταί, lēstai [Ant. 14.420–430]). After a two-year struggle, Herod defeated Antigonus in Jerusalem, and Mark Antony executed Antigonus at once (Ant. 14.490–491). By 38 bce, Herod the Great, the Roman client-king and friend of Augustus, established Sepphoris as his capital. Josephus (Ant. 18.27) relates that Herod “built the wall” (a single Greek word) of Sepphoris, making it “the ornament of all Galilee” (Ἡρώδης Σέπφωριν τειχίσας πόσχημα τοῦ Γαλιλαίου παντός, Hērōdēs Sepphōrin teichisas poschēma tou Galilaiou pantos), and he called the city “Autokratoris” (ἠγόρευεν αὐτὴν Αὐτοκρατορίδα, ēgoreuen autēn Autokratorida). “Autokratoris” is the title of Augustus, whom Herod honors. Josephus claims that it was “the strongest city in Galilee” (ἡ κρατερωτάτη τῆς Γαλιλαίας πόλις Σέπφωρις, hē kraterōtatē tēs Galilaias polis Sepphōris [J.W. 2.511 and Life 232]). Herod likely built his palace at Sepphoris, and in 1937, N. Manasseh thought he had found the foundations emerging on the east side of the “citadel,” then understood to be an Ottoman tower.15 The University of South Florida Excavation dated the foundations of this structure to the fourth century. Herod invested money in Galilee, but less so in Sepphoris. At the end of his long reign, this city rose in revolt against Herodian rulers and suffered a devastating destruction and depopulation by the Roman governor of Syria, Varus. Josephus writes, “[Gaius, a friend to whom Varus gave the operation,] took Sepphoris, enslaving its inhabitants and setting fire to the city” (Σέπφωριν ἑλὼν τοὺς μὲν οἰκήτορας ἠνδραποδίσατο τὴν δὲ πόλιν ἐνέπρησεν, Sepphōrin helōn tous men oikētoras ēndrapodisato tēn de polin eneprēsen [Ant. 17.289; J.W. 2.68]. Herod Antipas, son and heir of Herod the Great, immediately ordered that the city be rebuilt, apparently as a showplace befitting himself as ruler, and took up residence as tetrarch of Galilee and Perea. He reestablished law and order and, by year 4 of his reign, or 1 ce, minted a trial coin on a Hasmonean flan, presumably at Sepphoris. This is a prutah in Hebrew (prwtih, ‫)פרוטה‬, a “mite” in English, or a lepton in Greek (λεπτόν, lepton; see Mark 12:42). The obverse shows a grain of wheat, Herod Antipas’s title, and a Greek delta, signifying his fourth regnal year. The reverse shows a palm tree and an abbreviation of Herod’s name: Hērō- (ΗΡΩ-). Between 19 and 21 ce, Antipas founded Tiberias, his new capital, where he minted more coins and built another palace and likely the theater.16

15.  N. E. Manasseh, “Architecture and Topography,” in Leroy Waterman et al., Preliminary Report of the University of Michigan Excavations at Sepphoris/Diocaesarea, Palestine in 1931 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1937), 1–17, esp. 3–4. 16.  David Hendin, “A New Coin Type of Herod Antipas,” INJ 15 (2003–2006): 56–61; David Hendin, Guide to Biblical Coins, with values by Herbert Kreindler (5th ed.; New York: Amphora, 2010), 247–50.

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Figure C. The basilical building floor plan. Drawing by the author. Used with ­permission.

The University of South Florida Excavations at Sepphoris credit Herod Antipas as the most likely builder of the basilical building at the foot of the hill at the intersection of the cardo maximus and decumanus (fig. C). (The building covers the remains of a Hasmonean house not on the city grid.) The location suggests that he also laid out the first grid, paved with limestone gravel, expanding the city to the south and east and thus investing in the city. Originally, the basilical building featured a white mosaic and a string of shops or offices on the north and south sides. By the fourth century ce, the mosaic was a splendid colored mosaic with realistic depictions of local flora and fauna. The USF Excavations also credit Antipas as the most likely builder of the theater at Sepphoris, transforming the city into a Roman city in appearance. The city fathers enlarged the theater in the second century ce. This two-phase construction and enlargement repeats itself in the theater at Tiberias, also initially a project of Antipas.17 Antipas is also the strongest candidate for building the reservoir and first aqueduct, six Roman miles 17.  Walid Atrash, “Tiberias, the Roman Theater,” HA-ESI 122 (2010): 1381ff. The Joint Sepphoris Project argues that the theater dates probably to the second century ce. See “Sepphoris: From Galilean Town to Roman City, 100 bce–200 ce” by Zeev Weiss in this volume, pp. 53–75. Also see Eric M. Meyers, “Roman Sepphoris in Light of New Archaeological Evidence and Recent Research,” in The Galilee in Late Antiquity (ed. Lee I. Levine; New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992), 321–38.

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Figure D. Isometric sketch of the Early Roman phase of the Sepphoris theater. Drawing by James Riley Strange. Used with permission.

from the spring of Abel to Sepphoris.18 Antipas’s fortunes changed in 40 ce when the emperor Caligula banished him and gave his territories to Herod Agrippa I, who ruled the city and other territories for four more years. From that point, there was steadily advancing tension between Rome and the Judeans. Open revolt came in 66 ce., but Josephus points out, “Only the citizens of Sepphoris of Galilee were minded for peace” (οἱ τῆς Γαλιλαίας Σέπφωριν νεμόνενοι μόνοι τῶν τῇδε εἰρηνικὰ φρονοῦντες, hoi tēs Galilaias Sepphōrin nemonenoi monoi tōn tēde eirēnika phronountes [J.W. 3.30), so they offered peace to Vespasian and asked for protection from their more bellicose neighbors (3.31–34). A coin of Sepphoris memorialized the city’s pursuit of peace in year 14 of Emperor Nero, or 67/68 ce (fig. E). The legend names Vespasian as governor and gives two city titles: “Neronias” (νερωνίας, nerōnias in honor of Nero and “Irenopolis” (ἰρηνόπολι[ς], irēnopoli[s]) or “City of Peace” in honor of their peace stance. Also under Nero, the capital of Galilee was returned to Sepphoris along with the “archives” (Josephus Life 37–39).

18.  Tsvika Tsuk, “The Aqueducts to Sepphoris,” in Meyers, Galilee through the Centuries, 161–75. See “The Sepphoris Aqueducts” in this volume, pp. 76–87.

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Figure E. Coin of Sepphoris minted under Agrippa II and struck in 67/68 (the first year of the revolt), naming Nero Caesar on the reverse, and “City of Peace” with crossed cornucopia on the obverse. Reprinted with permission of dk, wildwinds.com.

Like other major cities, Sepphoris owed allegiance to a series of Roman procurators, beginning with Cuspius Faddus in 44 ce. Ten years later, Sepphoris dismantled the “old fort” and covered the foundations with soil and built a new quarter, perhaps to persuade the procurators that its citizens were not rebellious.19 Sepphoris did not suffer from Roman attacks during the First Revolt. Agrippa II gained more power and recognition until he was appointed the new Jewish king in 68 ce, before the culmination of the First Revolt. Agrippa died in office in 95 ce. Figure F. Coin of Sepphoris struck in honor of Trajan, showing the emperor surrounded by “Emperor Trajan bestowed” on the obverse, and “Of the Sepphoreans” inside a wreath on the reverse. Reprinted with permission of cngcoins. com and wildwinds.com.

The peace policy of Sepphoris seems to have won Trajan’s favor (98–117 ce). Sepphoris minted coins under Trajan featuring portraits of him (fig. F). The coins name the citizens “Sepphoreans” (SEPPHŌRĒNŌN, ΣΕΠΦΩΡΗΝΩΝ). The coin legend declares, “Trajan gave Sovereignty” or “the emperor Trajan bestowed” (TRAIANOS AUTOKRATŌR[IAN] EDŌKEN; ΤΡΑΙΑΝΟΣ ΑΥΤΟΚΡΑΤΩΡ[ΙAN] ΕΔΩΚΕΝ). “Autokratōria” (Aὐτοκρατωρία) or “Sovereignty” is one of the emperor’s titles. By displaying the emperor’s image on its coins, the city changed its presentation of itself from a predominantly observant Jewish city to a predominantly Roman city. At some point after the end of the First Revolt, the extensive cluster of mikva’ot, or ritual baths, beneath the USF villa, which was founded in the Early Roman period, went out of use. Workmen soon built a common ritual bath with at least eight small pools that stood south and west of the USF villa. Inside the pools and on the walkways around the pools were hundreds of fragments of second-century round discus lamps, which dated the pools and revealed that 19.  Meyers, “Sepphoris on the Eve of the Great Revolt,” 114.

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the interior was not well lit with natural light. This common bath lasted less than a century before it went out of use in a major destruction accompanied by burning.20 Perhaps this was the Trajanic earthquake mentioned in ancient sources.21 What, therefore, did Trajan “bestow”? An unpublished proposal from within the USF expedition suggests that there is enough evidence of destruction in the common bath south and west of the villa and within the villa itself to suggest earthquake destruction and burning. There was also extensive rebuilding in the villa, which at first was interpreted as renovation and expansion. This is also the time of the stone paving of the cardo and decumanus and the expansion and renovation of the theater. Perhaps what Trajan “bestowed” (ἔδωκεν) was money for reconstruction and expansion, for Kenneth Russell suggests that he gave money to several ancient cities for that purpose.22 Sepphoris appears to lose favor under Hadrian (117–138), when Sepphoris minted no coins. Hadrian assigned to Sepphoris the new name “Diocaesarea,” a name honoring both Jupiter and himself. The USF Excavations found an unreadable fragment of a formal inscription in Latin, probably from the second century ce. Since Latin was only for the military, one may surmise that the inscription was attached to some monument and was intended for Roman soldiers stationed at Sepphoris, perhaps in the second century.23

Figure G. Coin of Sepphoris showing Antoninus Pius on the obverse, with a tetrastyle temple containing a divine image on the reverse. Photos copyright © http://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk and KHM (GR22406). Used by permission.

Sepphoris stopped minting coins for a generation until Antoninus Pius (138–161 ce). These coins present Sepphoris as a fully Roman city. They bear portraits of Antoninus Pius with his titles. The reverse shows the façade of a tetrastyle temple and a city goddess or the Capitoline Triad of Zeus, Hera, and Athena. The legend reads, “Of Diocaesarea the Holy, 20.  James F. Strange, “Six Campaigns at Sepphoris: The University of South Florida Excavations, 1983– 1989,” in Levine, Galilee in Late Antiquity, 347–48. 21.  Russell, “Earthquake Chronology.” 22.  Thomas R. W. Longstaff, unpublished proposal; Russell, “Earthquake Chronology,” 41. 23.  This inscription is not published as of this writing but is listed by Mark A. Chancey, “The Epigraphic Habit of Hellenistic and Roman Galilee,” in Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition (ed. Jürgen Zangenberg, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin; WUNT 210; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007), 83–98, esp. 95 and n. 61.

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Autonomous, [City of ] Asylum” (DIOKAI[SARIAS] IERA[S] ASYL[OS] AUTO[NOMOU], ΔΙΟΚΑΙ[ΣAPIAΣ] ΙΕΡΑ[Σ] ΑΣΥΛ[OΣ] ΑΥΤΟ[NOMOΥ]). Scholars have disagreed whether the depicted temple actually existed or was a pictorial obeisance to Roman power, but the discovery by the Hebrew University of a pagan temple at Sepphoris favors a literal interpretation.24 The temple is contemporary with the stone paving of the city grid. Many fragments of pagan statues of the second century have appeared in the various excavations. Yet Sepphoris steadily gained a reputation as a Jewish intellectual center, beginning with Yose bar Halafta and Shim‘on bar Yochai about 130–160 ce. The peak of this development some forty years later was under Judah ha-Nasi (“the Prince”) or simply “Rabbi” as patriarch, who joined the rabbinate in Sepphoris for the last seventeen years of his life (y. Kil. 9.3). He died there about 217 ce. Judah is the redactor of the Mishnah. His funeral bier was set down eighteen times on the way to Beth She‘arim to be buried (y. Kil. 9.3). This has given rise to the popular interpretation that there were eighteen synagogues in Sepphoris. Several generations of rabbis expounded on the Mishnah at Sepphoris, and their names appear in the tradition. For example, R. Hananina headed the academy at Sepphoris. He is associated with R. Yannai the Elder, R. Jonathan ben Eleazar, and R. Hoshayah, called “Rabba” or “Great.” Tomb finds at Sepphoris also include inscriptions of the names of the deceased, some of whom are called “Rabbi.” These include R. Yosa Hirorah, Rabbi Hosochi, and most famously Yehoshua Ben Levi ha-Qapar, a rabbi quoted in the Jerusalem Talmud who lived in the early third century.25 Many incidental mentions of Sepphoris in the Jewish literature of the third to fifth centuries give limited information about the city. For example, m. ‘Erub. 8:7 alludes to the aqueduct that flowed from Abel to Sepphoris. Mishnah tractate B. Mes ii‘a 8:8 reads, “In Sepphoris, a man rented a bathhouse from his fellow” (‫בציפורין באחד ׁשׁשכר מרחץ לחברו‬, bs iypwryn b’h\d ššcr mrh\s i lh\brw), which suggests the presence of Jewish bathhouses in the second century ce. According to m. B. Bat. 6:7, the rabbis of Sepphoris defined the width of roads public and private, including a “king’s [imperial] road, [which is] without limit” )‫דרך המלך אין לה שיעור‬, drk hmlk ’yn lh šy‘wr). We learn from the Jerusalem Talmud that ­Sepphoris contained synagogues, inns, schools, and academies. The Jerusalem Talmud speaks of a synagogue for the people of Gophna (y. Naz. 56a), likely the Gophna fifteen Roman miles north of Jerusalem. The Talmud of the land of Israel mentions the “synagogue of the Babylonians” at Sepphoris (y. Šabb. 6.8a). 24.  Zeev Weiss, “From Roman Temple to Byzantine Church: A Preliminary Report on Sepphoris in Transition,” JRA 23 (2011): 197–218. 25.  Rebecca Martin Nagy, Carol L. Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, and Zeev Weiss, eds., Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture (Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996). A tomb bearing the Aramaic epitaph “This is the burial place of Rabbi Yehoshua Bar Levi the Caper Maker” inside a tabula ansata on the tomb door has been discovered within Moshav Zippori. An inscription over the door mentions Sepphoris. See Mordechai Aviam and Aharoni Amitai, “The Necropolis of Sepphoris: The Results of Field Survey,” in A City Set on a Hill: Essays in Honor of James F. Strange (ed. Daniel A. Warner and Donald D. Binder; Mountain Home, Ariz.: Borderstone, 2014), 4–16.

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Figure H. Cutaway view of Leroy Waterman’s “basilica,” identified as a courtyard house by the USF Excavation. Drawing by James Riley Strange. Used by permission.

Beneath the medieval Church of Anna and Joachim at Sepphoris, a fragment of a synagogue mosaic floor has been known since 1910. It bears an Aramaic inscription: “Be remembered for good Rabbi Yudan bar Tanhum [bar Botah] who gave [this mosaic].” The floor is usually dated to the fourth century ce.26 The Sepphoris Regional Project recovered fragments of a destroyed mosaic floor (not published), but the fragments simply bore one Hebrew or Aramaic letter. The USF Excavation excavated other architecture near the summit first investigated by Leroy Waterman in 1931, and also turned to areas he had not touched. Renewed digging 26.  Prosper Viaud, Nazareth et ses deux églises de l’Annonciation et de Saint-Joseph d’après les fouilles récentes pratiquées (Paris: A. Picard, 1910).

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revealed traces of occupation before Alexander Jannaeus (103–76 bce) and coins of this very ruler. The occupation extended to the middle of the fourth century ce. Originally, in the Early Roman period, a small house occupied the area, but it was expanded in the second century to a much larger courtyard house, reaching its floruit in the second, third, and mid-fourth centuries ce, or in the very period when the rabbis were active at Sepphoris (fig. H). Its courtyard was paved with a white mosaic with black borders and a side room with a black trellis on white. It is likely that the inhabitants were Jews, as revealed by the lack of pig bones in the debris, by finds of dozens of chalkstone vessel fragments, and by the number of rock-cut ritual baths beneath the house beginning at its founding.27 The Joint Expedition to Sepphoris uncovered a courtyard house near the summit of the third and fourth centuries ce with a splendid colored mosaic depicting a drinking bout between Dionysos and Heracles. There is also a surround of small panels showing a processional in honor of Dionysos. The mosaic has places for three couches to function as a formal dining room or triclinium. The villa is dated to the early third century ce.28 In the fourth century ce, Christianity became legal in the empire, and a growing Christian population left its mark on Sepphoris. Eusebius of Caesarea wrote about Diocaesarea in his Onomasticon (a list of biblical cities), using Diocaesarea as the central location from which other biblical cities were located (Onomasticon, Klostermann edition 22,5; 28,23; 70,9; 98,24; 140,17). He also wrote that Sepphoris was a largely Jewish city in his time (Martyrs of Palestine 29). Likewise, in this very century the pagan temple east of the cardo was abandoned and stood neglected for years, perhaps due to the waning of the old Roman religion.29 There is no agreement whether Diocaesarea sent a bishop to Nicaea in 325 ce. Two bishops of the sixth century ce are known: Marcellinus in 518 and Cyriacus in 536. Marcellinus appears in a Greek inscription from Diocaesarea that mentions renovation of a church and statues of former emperors.30 Yet Jews seem still to be the majority in the city during the sixth century. In the middle of the fourth century, Sextus Aurelius Victor, a Christian writer in Pannonia Secunda, wrote of a Jewish Revolt in his time but omitted the city or province. In the fifth century, Jerome specified that the cites were Diocaesarea, Tiberias, and Caesarea. Gallus Caesar crushed the revolt, but the Constantinian brothers recalled him to Rome and executed him for reacting excessively against these cities and their villages (Chron. 238). This revolt would date to 350–351 ce. Another disaster that struck Diocaesarea and other Palestinian cities was the earthquake of 363 ce, which was enormously destructive. Harvard Syriac 99 is a letter from Jerusalem, 27.  James F. Strange, Thomas R. W. Longstaff, and Dennis E. Groh, Excavations at Sepphoris, vol. 1, The University of South Florida Probes in the Citadel and Villa (Brill Reference Library of Judaism 22; Leiden: Brill, 2006). 28.  Meyers, “Roman Sepphoris,” 321–38. See in this volume, “Sepphoris: From Galilean Town to Roman City, 100 bce–200 ce,” pp. 53–75. 29.  Weiss, “From Roman Temple to Byzantine Church,” 209–12. 30.  Michael Avi-Yonah, “A Sixth Century Inscription from Sepphoris,” IEJ 11 (1961): 184–87.

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perhaps by Cyril of Jerusalem (315–386 ce.), that records the extent of the damage. He says of the destruction of Sepphoris, “the whole of Sepphoris (SWPRYN) and its territory.”31 Archaeologists at Sepphoris are hard-pressed to distinguish which of two events caused the fourth-century destruction layers in their excavations. These are found in many places. In the middle of the fourth century ce the theater was filled in. All structures in a rectangular area on the summit about 100 by 80 meters were destroyed down to bedrock, including the villa excavated by the USF Excavations. A layer of fill almost two meters thick was laid on the summit inside the rectangular area over time. Around this rectangle a huge wall was built from spoils robbed from the dismantled houses. It cut across the cavea of the theater, leaving the stage and its substructures intact. Apparently a military presence built the 50-x-50-Roman-feet tower in the center of the rectangle using spoils from a Herodian structure, but also from private houses (fig. B). The basilical building fell down or was pulled down in the lower city, but not equally violently everywhere. Large architectural fragments crashed down onto the polychrome mosaic at the west end of the inner hall, but afterward the citizens were able to remove architectural fragments, probably for use elsewhere. The geometric mosaic near the east end of the building did not suffer this kind of damage. Survivors systematically looted the remains of the basilical building for a generation or more.32 Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis on Cyprus, was born at Beth Guvrin in Judea. Around 375 ce he wrote the Panarion, in which he quotes Count Joseph of Tiberias (a Jew converted to Christianity), saying that the count petitioned the emperor for permission to build churches at Diocaesarea, Tiberias, Capernaum, and Nazareth (Pan. 30). We do not know whether he built them, but his petition presupposes that these towns had no churches. In the fifth century ce, Palladius (Lausiac History 46) relates the story of a certain Melanie, a Christian woman of rank, who cared for Orthodox Christians exiled by the Arian emperor Valens (364–378) to the territory of Sepphoris. Evidently, Valens thought Diocaesarea was an appropriate city (Orthodox Christian and perhaps severely damaged) to which to exile his enemies. Christian congregations built two churches in Sepphoris, both east and west of the cardo of the city in the fifth or early sixth century ce.33 The east church rose up on the foundations of the pagan temple found by the Hebrew University. In the same century—about 570 ce— the Pilgrim of Piancenza (Travels 161) visited Diocaesarea, where he and his fellow pilgrims venerated the “jar and basket” of Saint Mary, Mother of Jesus. He does not mention a church. Eventually, in the Crusader period, local Christians built a church dedicated to Anna and Joachim, Mary’s parents.34 31.  Russell, “Earthquake Chronology,” 42. 32.  Strange, “Six Campaigns at Sepphoris,” 349–51. 33.  See “Sepphoris: From Galilean Town to Roman City, 100 bce–200 ce,” by Zeev Weiss in this volume, pp. 53–75. 34.  Jaroslav Folda, “The Church of Saint Anne,” BA 54 (1991): 88–96; and Folda, The Art of the Crusaders in the Holy Land: 1098–1187 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 320–31.

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The sidewalks at the southeastern intersection of the cardo and decumanus bear several Greek inscriptions of a certain Bishop Eutropios. One of them praises Eutropios and Marianus, the chief physician, for their public works. It mentions “the 11th Indiction,” but no other detail to establish the date. It could be from the fifth century, and, if so, Eutropios would be contemporary with both Bishop Marcellinus and the fifth-century rabbis. A contemporary, fifth-century find by the USF Excavations of a Jewish copper foil amulet in Aramaic and another in silver foil in Hebrew shows the Byzantine interest in magic at Sepphoris. The text of the copper amulet simply relates that the amulet is against a protracted fever and features additional Hebrew letters and magical symbols.35 Conclusion From mentions of Sepphoris/Diocaesarea in Josephus and other Jewish literature, inscriptions, coins, Christian literature, and from the stratigraphy and archaeological finds, one sees that Sepphoris was occupied continuously from the second century bce to the present. Its name receives far more recognition in Jewish texts than in Christian histories, but that is probably because it was not mentioned in the New Testament. It is mentioned hundreds of times in Jewish sources, however. It seems that Sepphoris was a major regional city in the Galilee, only at times overshadowed by Tiberias. Only in late Byzantine times was it eclipsed by Scythopolis to the southeast. After the Muslim conquest it remained a regional market city. Bibliography Aharoni, Yohanan, and Michael Avi-Yonah. The Macmillan Bible Atlas. 3rd rev. ed. Tel-Aviv: Survey of Israel; New York: Macmillan, 1985. Atrash, Walid. “Tiberias, the Roman Theater.” HA-ESI 122 (2010): 1381ff. Aviam, Mordechai. “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First-Century Galilee and Its Origins: A Comprehensive Archaeological Synthesis.” In The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus, edited by David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins, 5–48. Early Christianity and Its Literature 11. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013. Aviam, Mordechai, and Aharoni Amitai. “The Necropolis of Sepphoris: The Results of Field Survey.” In A City Set on a Hill: Essays in Honor of James F. Strange, edited by Daniel A. Warner and Donald D. Binder, 4–16. Mountain Home, Ariz.: Borderstone, 2014.

35.  C. Thomas McCollough and Beth Glazier-McDonald, “An Aramaic Bronze Amulet from Sepphoris,” ‘Atiqot (English Series) 28 (1996): 161–65; C. Thomas McCollough and Beth Glazier-McDonald, “Social Magic and Social Realities in Late Roman and Early Byzantine Galilee,” in Meyers, Galilee through the Centuries, 269–80.

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Avi-Yonah, Michael. “Economic Geography.” In The Holy Land from the Persian to the Arab Conquests (536 B.C.. to 640 A.D.): A Historical Geography, 188–211. Rev. ed. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1977. ———. “A Sixth Century Inscription from Sepphoris.” IEJ 11 (1961): 184–87. Broshi, Magen. “The Population of Western Palestine in the Roman-Byzantine Period.” BASOR 236 (1979): 5. Chancey, Mark A. “The Epigraphic Habit of Hellenistic and Roman Galilee.” In Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition, edited by Jürgen Zangenberg, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin, 83–98. WUNT 210. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007. Elitzur, Yoel. Ancient Place Names in the Holy Land: Preservation and History. Jerusalem: Magnes Press, Hebrew University; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2004. Folda, Jaroslav. The Art of the Crusaders in the Holy Land: 1098–1187. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. ———. “The Church of Saint Anne.” BA 54 (1991): 88–96. Hendin, David. Guide to Biblical Coins. 5th ed. New York: Amphora, 2010. ———. “A New Coin Type of Herod Antipas.” INJ 15 (2003–2006): 56–61. Lipschitz, Nili. Timber in Ancient Israel: Dendroarchaeology and Dendrochronology. Tel Aviv University Sonia and Marco Nadler Institute of Archaeology Monograph Series 26. Tel Aviv: Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University, 2007. Manasseh, N. E. “Architecture and Topography.” In Leroy Waterman et al., Preliminary Report of the University of Michigan Excavations at Sepphoris/Diocaesarea, Palestine in 1931. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1937. McCollough, C. Thomas, and Beth Glazier-McDonald. “An Aramaic Bronze Amulet from Sepphoris.” ‘Atiqot (English Series) 28 (1996): 161–65. ———. “Social Magic and Social Realities in Late Roman and Early Byzantine Galilee.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 269–80. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. Meshorer, Iaakov. “Sepphoris and Rome.” In Greek Numismatics and Archaeology: Essays in Honor of Margaret Thompson, edited by Otto Mørkholm and Nancy M. Waggoner: Editions NR, 159–71. Wetteren, 1979. Meyers, Eric M. “Roman Sepphoris in Light of New Archaeological Evidence and Recent Research.” In The Galilee in Late Antiquity, edited by Lee I. Levine, 321–38. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992. ———. “Sepphoris on the Eve of the Great Revolt (67–68 ce): Archaeology and Josephus.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 109–22. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. Miller, Stuart S. “New Perspectives on the History of Sepphoris.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 145–60. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999.

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Nagy, Rebecca Martin, Carol L. Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, and Zeev Weiss, eds. Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture. Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996. Orni, Efraim, and Elisha Efrat. Geography of Israel. 3rd rev. ed. New York: American Heritage Press, 1971. Reed, Jonathan L. Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus: A Re-examination of the Evidence. Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000. Roll, Israel. “Between Damascus and Megiddo: Roads and Transportation in Antiquity across the Northeastern Approaches to the Holy Land.” In Man near a Roman Arch: Studies Presented to Prof. Yoram Tsafrir, edited by Leah Di Segni, Y. Hirschfeld, J. Patrich, and R. Talgam, 1*–20*. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2009. Russell, Kenneth W. “The Earthquake Chronology of Palestine and Northwest Arabia from the 2nd through the Mid-8th Century A.D.” BASOR 260 (1985): 37–59. Strange, James F. “Six Campaigns at Sepphoris: The University of South Florida Excavations, 1983–1989.” In The Galilee in Late Antiquity, edited by Lee I. Levine, 339–55. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992. Strange, James F., Thomas R. W. Longstaff, and Dennis E. Groh. Excavations at Sepphoris. Vol. 1, The University of South Florida Probes in the Citadel and Villa. Brill Reference Library of Judaism 22. Leiden: Brill, 2006. Testa, Emmanuele. I Cafarnao IV: Graffiti della Casa di S. Pietro. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1972. Tsafrir, Yoram, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green. Tabula Imperii Romani: Iudaea Palaestina: Eretz Israel in the Hellensistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994. Tsuk, Tsvika. “The Aqueducts to Sepphoris.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 161–75. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. Viaud, Prosper. Nazareth et ses deux églises de l’Annonciation et de Saint-Joseph d’après les fouilles récentes pratiquées. Paris: A. Picard, 1910. Weiss, Zeev. “From Roman Temple to Byzantine Church: A Preliminary Report on Sepphoris in Transition.” JRA 23 (2011): 197–218. ———. The Sepphoris Synagogue: Deciphering an Ancient MessagetThrough Its Archaeological and Socio-Historical Contexts. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society; Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2005.

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B. Residential Area of the Western Summit Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon General Background Sepphoris (Hebrew Z\ippori ‫ציפורי‬, Arabic Safuriyye) is located in the heart of Lower Galilee, equidistant (29 km or 18 mi) between the Mediterranean Sea and the Sea of Galilee and about six kilometers (4 mi) northwest of Nazareth. It is well situated on a hill that rises c. three hundred meters above the surrounding valleys: the Beit Netofa Valley to the north, and the Nazareth basin to the south. Its strategic location along the main east–west road linking Acco (Ptolemais) with Tiberias was a major factor in the city’s development in antiquity. Its proximity to the Via Maris, the main north–south road, added to its significance in commerce and trade. In addition, the availability of ample water from springs to the east (at Mashhad and Reina) and south (‘Ein Z\ippori) made the site desirable. See maps 3 and 4C in the color gallery. The site, which was occupied from at least the Persian period until the 1948 war, consists of an upper city or summit on the west, crowned by a citadel with a superstructure dating to Crusader times, and a large lower city surrounding the summit.1 The site suffered greatly during the 1948 war and especially its aftermath, when the Palestinian town was destroyed and planted over by trees. In the process, large areas of the ancient city lying under the Palestinian town were badly disturbed, rendering them useless to archaeology and making it difficult to estimate the size of the ancient settlement. Nonetheless, its size and location have drawn archaeologists since 1931, when the first excavations at Sepphoris were carried out by the University of Michigan under the direction of Leroy Waterman. In 1983, James F. Strange of the University of South Florida began a decades-long project at Sepphoris, beginning near the citadel and in the theater in the upper city, then concentrating on a large basilical building in the lower city and part of the adjacent cardo maximus.2 The Joint Sepphoris Project (JSP) began in 1985 as a Duke University and Hebrew University project under the directorship of Eric Meyers, the late Ehud Netzer, and 1.  For a summary of the history and excavations of both the upper and lower cities, see Eric M. Meyers and Carol Meyers, “Sepphoris,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology (ed. Daniel Master; New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 2:336–48; and Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers, “Sepphoris,” in OEANE 5:527–36. The upper city is presented in Eric M. Meyers, Ehud Netzer, and Carol L. Meyers, Sepphoris (Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1992). See also James F. Strange, Thomas R.W. Longstaff, and Dennis E. Groh, Excavations at Sepphoris, vol. 1, University of South Florida Probes in the Citadel and Villa (Brill Reference Library of Judaism 22; Leiden: Brill, 2006). 2.  See James F. Strange’s article in this volume (pp. 22–38) on the University of South Florida excavations.

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Figure A. A pre-1948 view of the Arab village Safuriyye (site of Sepphoris). Photograph dating to 1931 shown in All That Remains by Dr. Walid Khalidi.

Carol Meyers. The JSP excavated for five seasons and focused on the domestic areas, the large House of Dionysos, and parts of the theater, all on the western summit. In 1990 and following, Zeev Weiss became codirector with Ehud Netzer of the Hebrew University team and focused on the lower city, including sections of the cardo and decumanus, as well as a section of the easternmost sector of the summit begun by the JSP.3 The Duke team, now called the Sepphoris Regional Project (SRP), continued in the domestic areas until 2000, with a small sounding conducted in 2011.4 Under the direction of Tsvika Tsuk, an international team sponsored by the Israel Nature and Parks Authority and Tel Aviv University surveyed and excavated the aqueducts and reservoirs of Sepphoris’s water system beginning in 1993. In 1992, the site became Z\ippori National Park, and soon afterward a museum was opened in the citadel and shelters were constructed over several of the major buildings. It is also on Israel’s list, formed in 2010, of National Heritage Sites. The many literary references to Sepphoris assist in the reconstruction of its history. However, the Persian period occupation is known only from archaeology: the discovery of a number of Attic-ware sherds, other Persian-period ceramics, and several distinctive artifacts (including a rhyton, a quadrilingual inscription, and several incense altars) suggest the presence of a military garrison or some sort of administrative center or trading post on the westernmost area

3.  Their work on the eastern part of the upper city involved additional work on a large building with a Dionysos mosaic. See the essay by Zeev Weiss in this volume (pp. 53–75) and also Rina Talgam and Zeev Weiss, The Mosaics of the House of Dionysos at Sepphoris: Excavated by E. M. Meyers, E. Netzer, and C. L. Meyers (Qedem 44; Jerusalem: The Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University, 2004). 4.  The 2000 season was directed by Jonathan Reed as part of the Sepphoris Acropolis Project (SAP).

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Figure B. Schematic plan of the western summit of Sepphoris, showing excavation areas. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol ­Meyers, Duke University.

of the site.5 An abundance of Hellenistic pottery and coins points to a growth in population sometime before the Hasmonean domination of the site and region, probably by Aristobulus (104–103 bce) and Alexander Jannaeus (103–76 bce). Jannaeus, many of whose coins have been found at the site, successfully repelled the attack of Ptolemy Lathyrus of Egypt at the beginning of his reign. This event is mentioned in the first literary reference to Sepphoris, in Josephus (Ant. 13.338). Soon after the Roman conquest of Palestine, Sepphoris became the administrative center or capital of Galilee in 57 bce when Gabinius, Pompey’s legate to Syria, assigned one of the five synedrias or “councils” (Ant. 3.337–338; J.W. 1.170) to the city, no doubt because of its importance at the end of the Hellenistic period. Herod the Great captured the city in a snowstorm c. 40 bce (Ant. 17.271) and made it the northern command post for the rest of his reign. According to Josephus (J.W. 2.68; Ant. 17.289), Sepphoris was supposedly burned to the ground and many of its inhabitants taken as slaves during the so-called Varus Revolt when Herod died in 4 bce, but excavations have found no trace of such an event. Sepphoris was made the capital of Galilee by Herod Antipas (4 bce–39 ce) when he inherited the Galilean and Golan section of the territory of his father. Josephus reports that Antipas fortified the site and made it the “ornament of all Galilee” and called it “Autocratis” (Ant. 18.27), but again excavations have not

5.  Carol L. Meyers and Eric M. Meyers, “The Persian Period at Sepphoris,” ErIsr 29 (2009): 136–43.

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found evidence of fortifications.6 The term Autocratis probably means that the city honored the emperor Augustus and enjoyed a measure of autonomy. All the Sepphoris expeditions have sought to assess the degree to which the material remains reflect Antipas’s presence in the Early Roman period. To put it another way: How quickly did the settlement expand in the Roman period, and when did the expansion occur and under whose auspices? What was the extent of urbanization at Sepphoris in the early first century ce, the period when Jesus lived in nearby Nazareth? These questions arise in part because the site is not mentioned in the New Testament, despite its proximity to Nazareth. Sepphoris’s special status in relation to Rome was manifest in its pro-Roman policy during the First Revolt (66–70 [73] ce) after Josephus surrendered his position as commander of the Galilean forces at nearby Jotapata (Yodfat). This status is also reflected in the coins minted at the site in 66–67 ce. They bear the designation “Eirenopolis-Neronias-Sepphoris.”7 Eirenopolis (“City of Peace”) testifies to the city’s pacifist stance—or perhaps pragmatic policy—during the revolt, as do Josephus’s comments (J.W. 2.30–31). This began a period of cooperation with Rome that lasted well into the third century, although Sepphoris’s role in the Second Revolt (132–135 ce) is not evident in either texts or archaeology. The growth and expansion of the city in the Middle Roman period (135–c. 300 ce) continued throughout the Late Roman period until 363 ce, when a catastrophic earthquake is thought to have caused widespread destruction at the site and brought the Roman period to an end. A major factor contributing to the growth of the city was the demographic shift that occurred after the two wars with Rome, when many Jewish refugees from the south fled to Galilee. During this period of expansion, the city was transformed from a predominantly Jewish city to one that was increasingly diverse. This change can perhaps be attributed to the arrival of Roman troops in the area during the reign of Hadrian (117–138 ce), when the Sixth Legion was stationed at nearby Legio (Lejjun, near Megiddo) and a new trans-Galilee east– west roadway, marked by milestones, was constructed just north of the site.8 By the reign of Antoninus Pius (138–161 ce), the city was renamed Diocaesarea in honor of Caesar and Zeus; a pagan temple—possibly the Capitoline temple depicted on coins of Antoninus Pius—was constructed and a gentile administration put in place.9 It was likely sometime in the aftermath of the two wars with Rome that the theater was built. Buildings uncovered by the excavations in the lower city also provide vivid testimony to the increasing strength of the Roman/gentile presence in the form of civic structures and elegant streets and plazas.10 The diversity of Sep6.  For the role of Sepphoris in relation to Greco-Roman culture, see Eric M. Meyers and Mark A. Chancey, Archaeology of the Land of the Bible, vol. 3, Alexander to Constantine (AYBRL; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), 269–80. 7.  See Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and David Hendin, “Further Reflections on Sepphoris and Rome: Numismatics and Archaeology,” ErIsr 31 (2015): 132–40. 8.  Editor’s note: see maps 3 and 4C in the front matter to this volume. 9.  Zeev Weiss, “From Pagan Temple to Byzantine Church: A Preliminary Report on Sepphoris in Transition,” JRA 23 (2010): 196–218. 10.  See the other Sepphoris entries by Strange and Weiss in this volume, pp. 22–38, 53–75, 76–87.

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Figure C. Aerial photo of the residential area on the western summit after the 1996 season, looking north. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

phoris by the early third century, when Rabbi Judah the Patriarch led the Sanhedrin (Jewish governing body) at Sepphoris, likely contributed to the shaping of the Mishnah, which was redacted by Rabbi Judah at that time. The Residential Area When the third-century ce sage Rabbi Zeira describes Sepphoris as “perched on a mountain like a bird” (b. Meg. 6a), he must have been envisioning the crowded residential area on the city’s summit. Houses hug the top of the hill and its slopes, commanding the views of the Nazareth hills and the Beit Netofa Valley below. The continuous occupation of the summit from the Persian period through antiquity has problematized the archaeological picture there. Later architecture and soil deposits regularly intruded into earlier layers, disturbing them and making it difficult to reconstruct the appearance of the area in any given period. The situation is further hindered by the relatively shallow depositional sequence on the summit. In some places, bedrock was encountered during excavations as little as one meter below topsoil. Despite these challenges, there is good evidence for a large-scale redevelopment of the western summit at some point in the Early Roman period. It is tempting to associate this project with the reign of Antipas, and the conglomeration of evidence from subfloor fills and

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Figure D. Remains of the main east–west street running through the residential area as it appeared at the end of the 1986 season, with surviving walls of adjacent houses abutting it, looking east. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

foundation trenches would agree with an early-first-century ce date for it. However, ruling out dates in the second half of the first century bce or even later in the first century ce for this redevelopment phase is currently impossible, given the nature of the archaeological record. During this project, remains of earlier Hasmonean-period structures seem to have been largely dismantled, the new structures making occasional use of individual or small clusters of earlier walls, as well as cisterns and other installations hewn into bedrock. The main artery of the redeveloped residential area was a narrow east–west street revealed over a length of forty meters and connecting with at least two north–south alleyways. These passageways could have accommodated little more than pack animals and foot traffic. While the neighborhood does not reflect the meticulous urban planning of the orthogonal street network of the lower city of Sepphoris, which was developed in the second century ce, it does exhibit some evidence of preplanning. For example, a property line runs over sixty meters and divides between a series of row houses to the north and south. The houses cascade down in terraced fashion from east to west along the slope of the summit, and then downward toward the northern slope of the hill where the later JSP excavations and the SAP project focused their attention. In the east, toward the center of the summit, there are buildings with particularly thick wall foundations in an area known as Unit I.11 11.  The unusually thick wall foundations in Unit I led to the assumption during excavations that the build-

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Most of the residences are moderately sized courtyard houses, measuring 10 x 18 m on average and probably having no more than two stories. Nothing higher than a few courses of their first-story walls survives. They are built of a mix of masonry styles. Quite prevalent in the Early Roman construction phase are roughly cut, squat ashlars, of a form reminiscent of paving stones, which were laid in alternating header-stretcher fashion. Only in Unit I is there evidence of the use of finely worked masonry of the typical “Herodian” style, with its wide, drafted margins and flat bosses. Unlike the more sumptuous residences farther east on the summit and in the lower city, no expansive mosaic carpets were uncovered in situ. Mosaic appears to have been used sparingly, with floors largely paved in simple plaster. The earth fill of one room of the Early Roman period contained numerous fragments of polychrome fresco, some with a vegetative decorative scheme. The room was once thought to have been a richly decorated reception or dining room, though the dispersed fresco fragments were later shown to have been introduced to this part of the site secondarily, perhaps during masonry recycling operations.12 Thus there is no good reason to suppose that these houses were appointed with lavish wall or floor ornament in the earlier centuries of the Roman period, in contrast for instance to the wealthy Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem of the first century ce and the upscale Sepphorean domiciles of the second century ce onward, such as the nearby House of Dionysos. The only possible rival to them is in Unit I, although too little of that building’s superstructure remains to ascertain its true nature and degree of opulence. During the post-bellum floruit in the city, houses on the western summit underwent alterations. Some of their cisterns and ritual baths were converted to refuse pits. These deposits are extraordinarily rich in Early Roman and Middle Roman finds and provide a clear picture of the material culture of the inhabitants of the area. The population stood at the geographic and economic center of regional trade works, purchasing predominantly local ceramics from the well-known Galilean workshops but exhibiting also a taste for imported wares and the occasional luxury item. Among the typical cooking wares, the most common by far are types probably produced at the Kefar H|ananiah workshop, located some thirty kilometers north of Sepphoris. As for the storage wares and pouring vessels, those associated with the workshop of nearby Shikhin are predominant. The large number of complete or restorable vessels contributed greatly to the understanding of standard Galilean pottery typologies of the Roman ing may have served as a fortress. This assumption has been reconsidered upon further analysis of the building in preparation for its final publication by Benjamin D. Gordon, “Units Ia, Ib, and Ic: Buildings in the Eastern Part of the Excavated Areas,” in The Architecture and Stratigraphy of the Western Summit of Sepphoris (ed. Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon; Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 3; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming). The building plan suggested by its foundations is quite similar in layout and orientation to the domicile excavated by Leroy Waterman, who identified it as a basilica, and later by the South Florida team, which corrected the identification to a villa; see Strange, Longstaff, and Groh, Excavations at Sepphoris, 71–122. 12.  Naama Vilozny, “Fresco, Stucco, and Mosaic,” in Artifacts and Other Finds from the Western Summit of Sepphoris (ed. Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon; Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 4; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming).

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Figure E. A selection of Roman-period pottery from the residential area. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

period, whose main characteristics were being worked out precisely as the JSP and SRP excavations took place.13 Alongside the local forms one finds a relatively small amount of imported wares, such as Eastern Terra Sigillata, Cypriot Sigillata, Western Terra Sigillata, Knidian Gray Ware, and Pompeian Red Ware.14 The imports show that Sepphoreans were well integrated into the commercial world of the Roman Empire, holding regular feasts and other special meals, an indicator of economic surplus. The lamps too exhibit a predominance of standard local types with noteworthy imported specimens, including some with erotic scenes, attesting to the worldly tastes of the inhabitants.15 Bronze figurines of Prometheus and Pan (or a satyr) reflect a similarly acculturated aesthetic.16 13.  See Marva Balouka, “Roman Pottery,” in The Pottery from Ancient Sepphoris (ed. Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers; [Duke] Sepphoris Excavation Reports 1; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2013), 13–129; David Adan-Bayewitz, Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Study of Local Trade (Bar-Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture; Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993), passim, esp. 58, 228–49. 14.  Anna de Vincenz, “Fine Wares; Byzantine–Early Islamic Wares,” in Meyers and Meyers, Pottery from Ancient Sepphoris, 142–46. 15.  On the lamps from the western summit and the trade networks they reflect, see Eric C. Lapp, The Clay Oil Lamps of Sepphoris in Galilee: Light Use and Regional Interactions (Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 2; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming). For a preliminary report, see Lapp, “Lamps,” in Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture (ed. Rebecca Martin Nagy et al.; Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996), 217–25. 16.  Sarah H. Cormack, “Roman-Period Sculpture,” in Nagy et al., Sepphoris in Galilee, 171–72; and Cormack, “Two Bronze Figurines: Prometheus and Pan (?) or a Satyr,” in Meyers, Meyers, and Gordon, Artifacts and Other Finds.

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Figure F. A selection of Late Hellenistic and Early Roman storage jars. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

Those finds notwithstanding, the houses on the western summit show clear signs of local Jewish cultural and religious practices, leading many to refer to the area colloquially as the “Jewish Quarter of Sepphoris,” and not without good reason. Over twenty Jewish ritual baths were discovered in the area, with each fully exposed house having at least two.17 These are rock-cut and/or stone-built installations characterized, in this area of Sepphoris, by a relatively small size and narrow L-shaped staircases; three of the site’s ritual baths are more in keeping with the “Jerusalem-style” ritual bath, marked by a larger basin and a broad stairwell.18 Most of the baths were probably built prior to the demise of the Jerusalem temple cult, when local purity customs inspired by priestly practice were widespread in greater Judea. Moreover, there is undeniable evidence that several were filled in or converted to other kinds of installations by 17.  See Katharina Galor, “The Stepped Water Installations of the Sepphoris Acropolis,” in The Archaeology of Difference: Gender, Ethnicity, Class and the “Other” in Antiquity. Studies in Honor of Eric M. Meyers (ed. Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough; AASOR 60/61; Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2007), 201–13. 18.  These three are in fact limited to a single building, Unit I, which is a larger and apparently more opulent structure than those to its immediate west. On the Sepphorean ritual baths in general, see Ronny Reich, Miqwa’ot (Jewish Ritual Baths) in the Second Temple, Mishnaic and Talmudic Periods (in Hebrew; Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi; Israel Exploration Society, 2013), 195–96, 216–20.

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Figure G. A ritual bath, prior to the excavation of its bathing basin, looking west. The basin was accessed through an arched opening. Image courtesy of Eric Carol Meyers, Duke University.

the Middle Roman period. In one, the stairs were cut out and the size of the basin enlarged; in another, the basin and stairwell were filled in with refuse and paved over with plaster. Yet there is also evidence, for example, of a ritual bath being constructed at an elevation that could only correspond with a Late Roman or Byzantine level. In sum, the number of private ritual baths appears to have declined shortly after the wars with Rome, yet their use was not eradicated altogether.19 Similarly, over one hundred fragments of chalkstone vessels characteristic of Early Roman sites in the region were retrieved. With a local production site for them only a few kilometers away at Reina, the popularity of these vessels is generally understood in terms of Jewish household purity laws.20 The assemblage from the western summit is marked by: a prevalence of small lathe-cut vessels such as spherical bowls, open bowls, and cups; a relative dearth of hand19.  For a discussion of this decline in household purity laws, see Yonatan Adler, “Tosefta Shabbat 1:14, ‘Come See the Extent to Which Purity Had Spread’: An Archaeological Perspective on the Historical Background to a Late Tannaitic Passage,” in Talmuda de-Eretz Israel: Archaeology and the Rabbis in Late Antique Palestine (ed. Steven Koller and Aaron Fine; Studia Judaica 73; Boston: de Gruyter, 2014), 73–76. 20.  Chalkstone vessels are thought to have been impervious to defiling agents that could have rendered ceramics unusable according to Jewish custom. See Yitzhak Magen, The Stone Vessel Industry in the Second Temple Period: Excavations at Hizma and the Jerusalem Temple Mount (Judea and Samaria Publications 1; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2002).

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carved mugs, also known as “measuring cups”; and fifteen fragments of the large, open jars known as kallal vessels.21 The expensive kallal jars are an additional marker of socioeconomic status and perhaps can be identified with the jars mentioned in John 2:6-7 in the account of the wedding at Cana, although one should mention that the appearance of the Sepphoris stone jars is relatively simple and coarse when compared to the elaborate jars of this type from the Jerusalem area. The continued production and use of chalkstone vessels into the second century ce and onward have been suggested by a number of archaeological sites, and scholars have listed this residential area among them.22 However, one should note that the assemblage from the residential area cannot rule definitively in one direction or another on the question of dating. This is because the assemblage derives from contexts with mixed ceramics and numismatics from the Early Roman period and later, usually the refuse deposits in cisterns, so that its vessels could theoretically have all been produced prior to the First Revolt. As for meat preparation and diet, a staggering number of 16,351 identifiable bone fragments from the residential area were analyzed.23 They derive from thirty-two animal species or analytical faunal categories. For deposits given general Hellenistic/Roman dates based on the ceramics and numismatics, one finds the typical mix of domesticated bird, goat/sheep, and bovine species, with a relatively small number of pig bones. There is also evidence in these earlier faunal assemblages of standardized methods of butchery, which could reflect a commercial operation.24 These operations were later eclipsed by a less standardized and ad hoc butchery system, as evidenced by faunal remains in Byzantine deposits; also apparent in these later deposits is a significant increase in pork consumption.25 What was once an area with a predominantly Jewish population evolved by late antiquity into one whose residents were significantly more diverse. In several places, these later inhabitants incorporated the architectural remains of the old Jewish residential area into their dwellings. In others, the occupational level by late antiquity had risen by over one meter or more to an elevation often corresponding to that of modern topsoil. In those cases, the Roman 21. See m. Parah 3:3. Jonathan Reed’s report (“The Stone-Vessel Assemblage”) on the chalkstone assemblage will appear in Meyers, Meyers, and Gordon, Artifacts and Other Finds. 22.  David Amit and Yonatan Adler, “The Observance of Ritual Purity after 70 ce: A Reevaluation of the Evidence in Light of Recent Archaeological Discoveries,” in “Follow the Wise” (B. Sanhedrin 32b): Studies in Jewish History and Culture in Honor of Lee I. Levine (ed. Zeev Weiss, Jodi Magness, Oded Irshai, and Seth Schwartz; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010), 141. Note, however, that Adler has recently shifted his position and now favors a more precipitous decline in chalkstone vessel production (and private ritual bath construction) after the Second Revolt; see “Tosefta Shabbat 1:14,” 76–80. 23.  See Billy Grantham’s report (“Faunal Remains”) on the faunal assemblage in Meyers, Meyers, and Gordon, Artifacts and Other Finds; for a preliminary analysis, see Grantham, “The Butchers of Sepphoris: Archaeological Evidence of Ethnic Variability,” in Edwards and McCollough, Archaeology of Difference, 279–89. 24.  For mentions of Sepphorean butchers, see, e.g., t. H|ull. 3:2 and y. Šeqal. 7:50c. For more texts and a discussion of them, see Stuart S. Miller, “Those Cantankerous Sepphoreans Revisited,” in Ki Baruch Hu: Ancient Near Eastern, Biblical, and Judaic Studies in Honor of Baruch A. Levine (ed. Robert Chazan, William W. Hallo, and Lawrence H. Schiffman; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999), 568–69. 25.  The evidence is laid out in Grantham’s forthcoming report; see n. 23.

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levels were encountered quickly during excavations because the Byzantine, Islamic, and later remains had been largely dismantled, their stones perhaps put to secondary use by the inhabitants of the Palestinian village of Safuriyye. This Galilean site thus offered archaeologists an opportunity to study an expansive, Roman-period urban residential area that underwent a transformation from a Jewish neighborhood built up under Herodian auspices, perhaps under the patronage of Antipas himself, into a more cosmopolitan space with the growth of Sepphoris as a regional center. Bibliography Adan-Bayewitz, David. Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Study of Local Trade. Bar-Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture. Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993. Adler, Yonatan. “Tosefta Shabbat 1:14, ‘Come See the Extent to Which Purity Had Spread’: An Archaeological Perspective on the Historical Background to a Late Tannaitic Passage.” In Talmuda de-Eretz Israel: Archaeology and the Rabbis in Late Antique Palestine, edited by Steven Koller and Aaron Fine, 63–82. Studia Judaica 73. Boston: de Gruyter, 2014. Amit, David, and Yonatan Adler. “The Observance of Ritual Purity after 70 ce: A Reevaluation of the Evidence in Light of Recent Archaeological Discoveries.” In “Follow the Wise” (B. Sanhedrin 32b): Studies in Jewish History and Culture in Honor of Lee I. Levine, edited by Zeev Weiss, Oded Irshai, Jodi Magness, and Seth Schwartz, 121–43. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010. Balouka, Marva. “Roman Pottery.” In The Pottery from Ancient Sepphoris, edited by Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers, 13–129. [Duke] Sepphoris Excavation Reports 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2013. Cormack, Sarah H. “Roman-Period Sculpture.” In Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture, edited by Rebecca Martin Nagy, Carol L. Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, and Zeev Weiss, 171–72. Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996. ———. “Two Bronze Figurines: Prometheus and Pan (?) or a Satyr.” In Artifacts and Other Finds from the Western Summit of Sepphoris, edited by Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon. Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 4. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming. Galor, Katharina. “The Stepped Water Installations of the Sepphoris Acropolis.” In The Archaeology of Difference: Gender, Ethnicity, Class and the “Other” in Antiquity. Studies in Honor of Eric M. Meyers, edited by Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 201–13. AASOR 60/61. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2007. Gordon, Benjamin D. “Units Ia, Ib, and Ic: Buildings in the Eastern Part of the Excavated Areas.” In The Architecture and Stratigraphy of the Western Summit of Sepphoris, edited by

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Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon. Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 3. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming. Grantham, Bill. “The Butchers of Sepphoris: Archaeological Evidence of Ethnic Variability.” In The Archaeology of Difference: Gender, Ethnicity, Class and the “Other” in Antiquity: Studies in Honor of Eric M. Meyers, edited by Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 279–89. AASOR 60/61. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2007. ———. “Faunal Remains.” In Artifacts and Other Finds from the Western Summit of Sepphoris, edited by Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon. Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 4. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming. Khalidi, Walid, ed. All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948. Washington. D.C.: Institute for Palestine Studies, 1992. Lapp, Eric C. “Lamps.” In Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture, edited by Rebecca Martin Nagy, Carol L. Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, and Zeev Weiss, 217–25. Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996. ———. The Clay Oil Lamps of Sepphoris in Galilee Light Use and Regional Interactions. Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 2. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming. Magen, Yitzhak. The Stone Vessel Industry in the Second Temple Period: Excavations at Hizma and the Jerusalem Temple Mount. Judea and Samaria Publications 1. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2002. Meyers, Carol L., and Eric M. Meyers. “The Persian Period at Sepphoris,” ErIsr 29 (2009): 136*–43*. Meyers, Eric M., and Mark A. Chancey. Archaeology of the Land of the Bible. Vol. 3, Alexander to Constantine. AYBRL. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012. Meyers, Eric M., and Carol L. Meyers. “Sepphoris.” OEANE 5:227–36. ———. “Sepphoris.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology, edited by Daniel Master, 2:336–48. 2 vols. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. Meyers, Eric M., Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon, eds. The Architecture and Stratigraphy of the Western Summit of Sepphoris. Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 3. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming. ———, eds. Artifacts and Other Finds from the Western Summit of Sepphoris. Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 4. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming. Meyers, Eric M., Carol L. Meyers, and David Hendin. “Further Reflections on Sepphoris and Rome: Numismatics and Archaeology.” ErIsr 31 (2015): 132*–40*. Meyers, Eric M., Ehud Netzer, and Carol L. Meyers. Sepphoris. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1992. Miller, Stuart S. “Those Cantankerous Sepphoreans Revisited.” In Ki Baruch Hu: Ancient Near Eastern, Biblical, and Judaic Studies in Honor of Baruch A. Levine, edited by Robert Chazan, William W. Hallo, and Lawrence H. Schiffman, 543–73. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999.

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Nagy, Rebecca Martin, Carol L. Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, and Zeev Weiss, eds. Sepphoris in Galilee: Crosscurrents of Culture. Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1996. Reed, Jonathan. “Stone-Vessel Assemblage.” In Artifacts and Other Finds from the Western Summit of Sepphoris, edited by Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon. Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 4. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming. Reich, Ronny. Miqwa’ot (Jewish Ritual Baths) in the Second Temple, Mishnaic and Talmudic Periods. In Hebrew. Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi; Israel Exploration Society, 2013. Strange, James F., Thomas R. W. Longstaff, and Dennis E. Groh. Excavations at Sepphoris. Vol. 1, University of South Florida Probes in the Citadel and Villa. Brill Reference Library of Judaism 22. Leiden: Brill, 2006. Talgam, Rina, and Zeev Weiss. The Mosaics of the House of Dionysos at Sepphoris: Excavated by E. M. Meyers, E. Netzer, and C. L. Meyers. Qedem 44. Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2004. Vilozny, Naama. “Fresco, Stucco, and Mosaic.” In Artifacts and Other Finds from the Western Summit of Sepphoris, edited by Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and Benjamin D. Gordon. Duke Sepphoris Excavation Reports 4. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming. Vincenz, Anna de. “Fine Wares; Byzantine–Early Islamic Wares.” In The Pottery from Ancient Sepphoris, edited by Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers, 142–215. [Duke] Sepphoris Excavation Reports 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2013. Weiss, Zeev. “From Roman Temple to Byzantine Church: A Preliminary Report on Sepphoris in Transition.” JRA 23 (2010): 196–218.

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C. From Galilean Town to Roman City, 100 bce–200 ce Zeev Weiss In the heart of Lower Galilee, midway between the Mediterranean Sea and the Sea of Galilee, around five kilometers west of Nazareth, lie the remains of Sepphoris, the capital of the Galilee for long periods during antiquity. Descriptions of Sepphoris in the late Second Temple period and Roman times appear mainly in Jewish literary sources. The Hebrew University team has been excavating in Sepphoris since 1985, beginning on the summit in conjunction with Duke University, and then, from 1991 on as an independent expedition directed by the late Ehud Netzer (until 1995) and Zeev Weiss, on the eastern summit and its slopes, focusing primarily on the Lower City. The assortment of finds that have come to light in the course of our excavations provides a wealth of information about this multifaceted urban center, allowing us to draw some significant conclusions about this hellenized city’s demographic composition, architectural development, and everyday life, as well as the cultural relationship between the various communities residing there in the first centuries of the Common Era. This article, focusing on Sepphoris from 100 bce to 200 ce, lays out the archaeological data from the site excavated by the Hebrew University team and presents our perceptions regarding the settlement and its development over time. From the Late Second Temple Period up to the Great Revolt Sepphoris’s long history can be traced at least back to the Persian period, and it is probable that Jews populated the city by the second century bce and up to the Great Revolt, although a gentile population of a currently indeterminant size may have lived there as well.1 Herod the Great had a royal palace in the city (Josephus J.W. 2.56; Ant. 17.271), and after his death (4 bce) his son Herod Antipas made Sepphoris his capital until he founded Tiberias.2 Josephus remarks briefly that Antipas “fortified Sepphoris to be the ornament of all Galilee, and called it Autocratoris” (Ant. 18.27). Several scholars maintain that he fortified the city and established

1.  Seán Freyne, Galilee, Jesus, and the Gospels: Literary Approaches and Historical Investigations (Philadelphia: Fortress Press; Dublin: Gill & Macmillan, 1988), 167–75. 2.  Harold W. Hoehner, Herod Antipas (SNTSMS 17; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972), 43–110.

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Figure A. View of the acropolis on which Sepphoris’s settlement stood in the first century bce–first century ce. Photograph by Gabi Laron. Used by permission.

in it public buildings such as are often found in Roman cities, for example, a theater.3 A more precise reading of the text, however, indicates that Herod Antipas renovated only the city wall and did not construct or finance any other building projects there. Josephus mentions that Sepphoris now had a defensive fortification that, owing to its topographical location on the acropolis and its massive wall, could protect the city from attack.4 We know very little about the city’s municipal institutions in the first century ce. ­Josephus often mentions “the Sepphorites” (Σεπφωρίταις; J.W. 2.574, 645; Life 373, 380, 394, 411), 3.  See “Sepphoris: The Jewel of the Galilee” by James F. Strange in this volume, pp. 22–38. See also James F. Strange, “Some Implications of Archaeology for New Testament Studies,” in What Has Archaeology to Do with Faith? (ed. James H. Charlesworth and Walter P. Weaver; Faith and Scholarship Colloquies; Valley Forge, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 1992), 23–59; Morten H. Jensen, Herod Antipas in Galilee: The Literary and Archaeological Sources on the Reign of Herod Antipas and Its Socio-Economic Impact on Galilee (WUNT 2/215; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006), 149–62, 242–48. 4.  Stuart S. Miller, Studies in the History and Traditions of Sepphoris (SJLA 37; Leiden: Brill, 1984), 56–57; and, more extensively, see Zeev Weiss, “Josephus and Archaeology on the Cities of the Galilee,” in Making History: Josephus and Historical Method (ed. Zuleika Rodgers; JSJSup 110; Leiden: Brill, 2007), 392–94.

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but nowhere does he refer to the city’s functioning officials or public leaders. After the emperor Nero incorporated Tiberias and its environs into Agrippa II’s kingdom in 61 ce, Sepphoris regained its political status in the Galilee and restored the royal bank and public archive to the city (Life 38–39). The “old archi of Sepphoris,” mentioned several times in rabbinic literature (e.g., m. Qidd. 4:5), might refer to the municipal institutions that functioned there in earlier days; however, there is nothing in the texts that alludes to this apart from the former existence of Jewish archives in Sepphoris. The only public buildings in Sepphoris that Josephus mentions are the above-mentioned fortifications and the agora (marketplace; Life 104–11).5 Sepphoris in the first century bce and first century ce stretched over its hill and slopes, whereas the settlement’s size and outward appearance were not much different from the large Galilean villages that Josephus called poleis (fig. A).6 In contrast to other excavators of the site, according to our understanding, none of the Roman-style public buildings unearthed at the site so far dates to the early first century ce, but all seem to have been constructed when the city was expanded and completely remodeled as a Roman polis at the end of the first or early second century ce. The simple buildings exposed at the site, mainly on top of the hill, characterized the settlement; their layout lacked an air of monumentality and resembled the typical rural construction of the Galilee. Besides the road leading into the city and some agricultural implements from the immediate vicinity, only a few buildings, if any, would have been noticeable in Lower Sepphoris. The remains of several dwellings from the early Roman period were discovered in some areas scattered over the acropolis, indicating that domestic construction in the early city occupied wide areas of the hill and its slopes. The style and plan of these terraced structures find parallels elsewhere in the Galilee as well.7 Their walls are built of local stone, at times partially smoothed; the floors are made of packed plaster, stone pavers, or dressed bedrock, but no mosaics. Some of the houses constructed in the Second Temple period were used continuously in the first centuries ce, and modifications of these structures are evident throughout the period. They contained a courtyard, a variable number of rooms, mikva’ot (ritual baths) for immersion and purification, water cisterns, and different-sized storerooms in their basements. As elsewhere in the Galilee, the mikva’ot in Sepphoris were hewn into rock, in some places next to large water cisterns, and their walls were coated with a few layers of gray plaster.8 Descent into the mikveh was by steps, sometimes narrow, located on one of its side walls (fig. B). Their diversity lies in the features of the various staircases: either a straight or curved 5.  On the plan of the agora and its nearby buildings in the Hellenistic world, see John J. Coulton, The Architectural Development of the Greek Stoa (Oxford: Clarendon, 1976), 62–65. 6.  Weiss, “Josephus and Archaeology,” 393–407. 7.  Zeev Weiss, “Josephus and the Archaeology of Galilee,” in A Companion to Josephus in His World (ed. Honora Chapman and Zuleika Rodgers; Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, forthcoming). 8.  For a discussion of the ritual bath uncovered on the western acropolis in Sepphoris, see Katharina Galor, “The Stepped Water Installations of the Sepphoris Acropolis,” in The Archaeology of Difference: Gender, Ethnicity, Class and the “Other” in Antiquity: Studies in Honor of Eric M. Meyers (ed. Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough; AASOR 60/61. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2007), 201–13. Similar installations

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Figure B. Ritual bath (mikveh) discovered beneath the remains of the House of Dionysos, on the eastern side of Sepphoris’s acropolis. ­Photograph by Gabi Laron. Used by permission.

descent into the pool; differing numbers of steps; and extending to the breadth of the mikveh or only part of it. Most of the Sepphorean mikva’ot, which were in use from the late first century bce and throughout the Roman period, have no otzar,9 but were probably fed by a steady water supply, either via gutters running down from the buildings’ roofs or via channels that drained the water from nearby open areas. The dimensions of the mikva’ot in Sepphoris are not uniform; their capacity, even of the smallest ones, was double that needed according to Tannaitic halakhah but sometimes much smaller than those in Jerusalem (m. Miqw. 1, 4, 7).10 Some mikva’ot are especially small (2.3–4.5 cu m), though sufficient for the immersion of a were found elsewhere in early Roman Galilee; see, e.g., David Adan-Bayewitz and Mordechai Aviam, “Iotapata, Josephus, and the Siege of 67: Preliminary Report on the 1992–94 Seasons,” JRA 10 (1997): 151–52, 164. 9. The otzar is a small collection pool on one side of the mikveh in which water deemed “clean” for immersion is kept. The common wall between the two installations has a channel, pipe, or hole through which the drawn water in the mikveh and the “clean” rainwater in the otzar touch, thereby rendering the water in the mikveh suitable for immersion. According to Ronny Reich, the otzar was not a common feature in the Second Temple period, especially in Jerusalem; see Reich, Miqwa’ot (Jewish Ritual Baths) in the Second Temple, Mishnaic and Talmudic Periods (in Hebrew; Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 2013), 41–43. 10.  See also Reich, Miqwa’ot, 35–41.

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single individual of average size, whereas others are more spacious (6.0–8.5 cu m), allowing for comfortable immersion. No remains have been recovered of the palatial building, which according to Josephus stood in Sepphoris in the days of Herod the Great or when his son Herod Antipas resided in the city (J.W. 2.56; Ant. 17.271). Nevertheless, fragments of frescoes from fills beneath the House of Dionysos on the eastern side of the hill seem to belong to a more luxurious building, perhaps a palace or even a synagogue that stood in this part of the town, as was the case at Gamla, Yodefat, and Magdala.11 The plaster fragments were decorated with floral patterns in several shades on a gray-black background reminiscent of the Third Pompeiian Style (fig. C).12

Figure C. Fragment of frescoes with floral patterns belonging to a more luxurious building, perhaps a palace that once stood on the acropolis. Photograph by Gabi Laron. Use by permission.

11.  Yoav Farhi, “Stucco Decorations from the Western Quarter,” in Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor, Gamla, vol. 2, The Architecture: The Shmarya Gutmann Excavations, 1976–1989 (IAA Reports 44; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2010), 175–87; Mordechai Aviam, “Yodfat: Uncovering a Jewish City in the Galilee from the Second Temple Period and the Time of the Great Revolt” (in Hebrew), Qadmoniot 32 (1999): 98; Dina ­Avshalom-Gorni and Arfan Najjar, “Migdal,” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/Report_Detail_ Eng.aspx?id=2304&mag_id=120 (last accessed: July 10, 2014). 12.  Rina Talgam and Zeev Weiss, The Mosaics in the House of Dionysos at Sepphoris, Excavated by E. M. Meyers, E. Netzer and C. L. Meyers (Qedem 44; Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2004), 27–28.

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Sepphoris’s water supply in the Early Roman period was based largely on the drainage of rainwater into rock-quarried cisterns scattered over the hill and its slopes. Most of the exposed water cisterns (of varying capacities) were used for domestic purposes. A large one was discovered in the center of the acropolis, in front of and south of the Crusader fortress; owing to its capacity of about 380 cu m and its location in the center of the early settlement, it appears to have functioned as a public reservoir. Another public water installation, the “Arches Reservoir” located east of the saddle, stood in the early city. Having a capacity of about 180 cu m, it was roofed over with stone slabs laid across five massive arches and purportedly supplied water to the fields and a few buildings in the Lower City. Flavius Josephus’s autobiography tells the sequence of events preceding the outbreak of the Great Revolt in the Galilee and attests to one clear message: Sepphoris, acting independently during the revolt, opposed the rebels, closed the city gates, and joined the Romans (Josephus Life 373, 394, 411). This behavior greatly changed the city’s life, whether due to the reasoning that resistance could be detrimental to the city and its economy or to the understanding that the Jews were not capable of defeating the Romans. After the Romans’ suppression of the Great Revolt, Sepphoris gained a new status owing to its loyalty to Rome. This change profoundly affected the urban landscape, demographic structure, and daily life of Sepphoreans in the coming centuries. Seniority in the Galilee belonged now to Sepphoris—“Irenopolis,” the “City of Peace”—and the rehabilitation and recovery of Jewish society from the ravages of war after the destruction of the temple and Jerusalem were made possible in no small measure by the stability of the city and the other Galilean settlements that accepted Roman rule. Architecture, Art, and Cultural Behavior The building of Sepphoris as a Roman city after the Great Revolt attests to the changes taking place in the Galilee vis-à-vis Rome and its culture in this and the following eras. The city acquired a new status, and its renewed construction changed the face of the Galilean town, reshaping it as a polis boasting governmental institutions and public buildings. Designed according to Roman guidelines and embellished with colorful mosaics, the new edifices left their mark on both public and private spaces, touching on almost every aspect of daily life. This is evident in particular in the use of figurative images, which were almost completely avoided in the Second Temple period; coins, mosaics, statues (fig. D), reliefs, and small finds from this point on portrayed a variety of figurative images, including animals, human figures, gods, and mythological motifs.13 Owing to its newfound wealth and prosperous economy, Sepphoris grew significantly, and its population reached a peak of fifteen to twenty thousand inhabitants. The Hebrew 13.  Zeev Weiss, “Images and Figural Representations in the Urban Galilee: Defining Limits in Times of Shifting Borders,” in The Image and Its Prohibition in Jewish Antiquity (ed. Sarah Pearce; JJSSup 2; Oxford: Journal of Jewish Studies, 2013), 130–44.

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Figure D. Lower torso of a figure with a feminine appearance, most probably a nymph. Photograph by Gabi Laron. Used by permission.

University’s excavations on the plateau east of the hill indicate that, by the end of the first or early second century ce, the city’s impressive street network had expanded in this direction. Over the years, public buildings and private dwellings sprang up throughout the Roman city, including a temple, bathhouses, a theater, and a monumental building identified as a library or archive.14 Intended for the benefit of the local population, the monumental buildings constructed in Sepphoris fulfilled everyday needs, as in any other ancient city: municipal, religious, economic, and public entertainment. Both literary sources and archaeological finds indicate that pagans and Christians lived alongside the Jewish population. The many references to Sepphoris in rabbinic literature provide valuable information about the city’s social, economic, religious, and cultural life. A large number of Jewish sages lived in the city, which boasted numerous synagogues and academies (batei midrash), and when the patriarch (nāśî’, “prince”) Rabbi Judah moved to Sepphoris (where he edited the Mishnah) at the beginning of the third century ce, the Jews gained a significant presence on the city council.15 14.  For further discussion of the archaeological and artistic remains from Sepphoris, see Zeev Weiss and Ehud Netzer, “The Hebrew University Excavations at Sepphoris” (in Hebrew), Qadmoniot 113 (1997): 2–21; Weiss, “Sepphoris,” NEAEHL 5:2029–35; Weiss, “Mosaic Art in Ancient Sepphoris: Between East and West,” in La mosaïque gréco-romaine, vol. 11, Eleventh International Colloquium on Ancient Mosaics, October 16–20, 2009, Bursa, Turkey (ed. Mustafa Şahin; Istanbul: Ege Yayınları, 2012), 941–51. 15.  Shmuel Safrai, “The Jewish Settlement in the Galilee and Golan in the Third and Fourth Century” (in Hebrew), in Eretz-Israel from the Destruction of the Second Temple to the Muslim Conquest (ed. Zvi Baras et al.; Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 1982), 1:148–52. On R. Judah the Patriarch and his role in Sepphoris, see Alexander Guttmann, “The Patriarch Judah I: His Birth and His Death,” HUCA 25 (1954): 239–61; Shmuel Safrai, “The Nesiut in the Second and Third Centuries and Its Chronological Problems” (in Hebrew), in Proceedings of the Sixth World Congress of Jewish Studies (Jerusalem: World Congress of Jewish Studies, 1975), 2:51–57.

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Figure E. Plan of Sepphoris, including areas excavated by the University of South Florida and Duke University. Drawing by Anna Iamim. Used by permission.



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Figure F. Eastern view of the Lower City, with the impressive street network. Photo by Sky View. Used by permission.

The following archaeological evidence will serve to outline the profile of Roman Sepphoris from the turn of the second century ce until 200 ce. Colonnaded Streets The impressive street network in the Lower City, with two colonnaded streets (each about 13 m wide), the cardo maximus and the decumanus maximus intersecting at its center, includes five parallel streets running on a north–south axis and four on an east–west axis (figs. E and F; see also images on G-7 and G-8 in color gallery in the front of this volume). The decumanus (fig. G) functioned as the main artery by which one entered the city from the east;16 it then crossed the breadth of the Lower City, reaching the foot of the hill. The other east–west streets 16.  The eastern end of the decumanus may be linked with the road running from Tiberias to Sepphoris mentioned in talmudic sources; see, e.g., Lev. Rab. 16:1 (ed. Mordechai Margulies; 5 vols.; Jerusalem: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1953–60), 348.

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Figure G. The decumanus, one of the main colonnaded streets that cuts through the civic center running westward, toward the acropolis. Photo by Gabi Laron. Used by permission.

ran in the general direction of the hill, and it is probable that access to the Upper City was gained via some of them, though their exact route is unclear at this stage of research. The streets were paved with hard limestone, whereas the sidewalks lining both sides of the colonnaded streets were covered with either plaster or mosaics. The stone slabs in the cardo are marked with ruts made by carriage or wagon wheels that passed over this thoroughfare for many years. The small shops along the colonnaded streets seem to have been part of Sepphoris’s lower marketplace, where the hub of work and commercial life in the city was undoubtedly centered and about which we read in talmudic literature (b. ‘Erub. 54b). Early-second-century potsherds and a coin dated to the time of Trajan (98–117 ce) were found sealed in two probes conducted beneath the pavement of the main thoroughfares in Lower Sepphoris—one in the cardo and the other in the decumanus—and provide a terminus post quem for the construction of this street network.17

17.  These finds are based on the unpublished excavations of the Hebrew University excavation team. For further discussion on the date of the cardo and rejection of the possibility that it was constructed during the reign of Herod Antipas, see Weiss, “Josephus and Archaeology,” 399 n. 40.

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Figure H. Overview of the archive. To its left, a room containing niches; to its right, a peristyle courtyard. Photograph by Gabi Laron. Used by permission.

Archive A monumental building (16.8 x 14.5 m) dated to the Roman period is located on the eastern edge of the hill, facing the Lower City. It includes a peristyle courtyard and a row of rooms to its south, of which only the western one is well preserved (fig. H). This room has thick walls (1.15 m) on its four sides, which contain niches constructed at repeated intervals. Slits found within the two well-preserved niches indicate that they held wooden or marble shelves. The location of the building within the urban complex and its characteristics suggest that it functioned as a public building, perhaps an archive or library. Temple The temple, located in an insula (block of buildings) at the southeastern end of the main intersection, is dated to first half of the second century ce.18 It was set in a large courtyard or temenos (sacred precinct, 50.49 x 55.75 m) surrounded by a thick wall. A monumental ­propylaeum 18.  Zeev Weiss, “From Roman Temple to Byzantine Church: A Preliminary Report on Sepphoris in Transition,” JRA 23 (2010): 196–217.

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Figure I. Restored plan of the temple and temenos. Drawing by Anna Iamim. Used by permission.

(passageway) on the northern side of the temenos gave direct access from the decumanus into the Roman compound (fig. I). Inside the temenos, only the area leading from the street to the temple was paved with stones, while other parts of the courtyard were plastered. Only the deep, massive foundations of the temple were preserved; the superstructure appears to have been completely dismantled in antiquity. The temple (24.24 x 11.88 m) was built with a decorated façade facing northeast, toward the decumanus. The size of the building and the assortment of decorated elements found in the excavation suggest that the temple’s façade was composed of four slender columns, and its walls were decorated with semicircular engaged columns. No epigraphical, statuary, or iconographical evidence has come to light that can determine to whom the temple was dedicated or which deity was worshiped there. Theoretically, this could have been one of the gods portrayed on the city’s coins from the reign of Antoninus Pius (Tyche, the Capitoline triad, Zeus, Hera, or Heracles).19 Yet the temple’s monumental 19.  Ya‘akov Meshorer, “Sepphoris and Rome,” in Greek Numismatics and Archaeology: Essays in Honor of Margaret Thompson (ed. Otto Mørkholm and Nancy M. Waggoner; Wetteren: Editions NR, 1979), 159–71; Ya‘akov Meshorer, Gabriela Bijovsky, and Wolfgang Fischer-Bossert, Coins of the Holy Land: The Abraham and

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Figure J. Eastern view of the theater built on the northern slope of the hill. Photograph by Gabi Laron. Used by permission.

size and prominent location next to the decumanus, one of the major roads leading into the civic center, may suggest that it was a more prominent deity, such as Zeus; this suggestion also befits the city’s new name, Diocaesarea, from the early days of Hadrian’s rule.20 The temple was undoubtedly constructed and used by the pagan population residing in Sepphoris, but it is probable, as Sacha Stern argues, that some local Jewish aristocrats, even those from the patriarchal house, participated, at least passively, in the pagan sacrifices of the city.21 Marian Sofaer Collection at the American Numismatic Society and the Israel Museum (2 vols.; New York: American Numismatic Society, 2013), 67–68. 20.  The city was still called Sepphoris when coins were minted under Trajan, whereas Diocaesarea appears for the first time on several milestones erected along the new road leading from Legio (Caparcotna) to Sepphoris, which was constructed in 120 ce; see Meshorer, “Sepphoris and Rome,” 163–65; Benjamin Isaac and Israel Roll, “Legio II Traiana in Judaea,” ZPE 33 (1979): 149–56; Israel Roll, “Between Damascus and Megiddo: Roads and Transportation in Antiquity across the Northeastern Approaches to the Holy Land,” in Man near a Roman Arch: Studies Presented to Professor Yoram Tsafrir (ed. Leah Di Segni et al.; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2009), esp. 11*–13*. 21.  Sacha Stern, “Babylonian Talmud, Avodah Zarah 16a—Jews and Pagan Cults in Third-Century Sepphoris,” in Talmuda de-Eretz Israel: Archaeology and the Rabbis in Late Antique Palestine (ed. Steven Fine and Aaron Koller; Studia Judaica 73; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2014), 205–24.

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Figures K and L. Sealed assemblage of pottery discovered inside a cistern when building the theater in Sepphoris. The vault and ashlar wall above the cistern belong to the outer wall of the theater. Photos by Gaby Laron (fig. K) Eric M. Meyers (fig. L). Used by permission.

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Theater The theater was built on the northern slope in the early second century ce.22 It was 74 m in diameter and could seat 4,500 spectators (fig. J). The cavea was divided horizontally and vertically into blocks, but most of the seats and steps were stolen in antiquity. The structure had five entrances—three vomitoria around the cavea and two parodoi leading to the orchestra. The stage building (scaena) and stage (35 x 6 m) are almost completely destroyed, aside from its foundations, but several carved stones found here indicate that it was lavishly ornamented with architectural decorations. The entire length of the proscaenium (stage wall) was decorated with alternating square and semicircular niches, and the spaces between them were embellished with miniature flat pilasters. The date of the theater established by the Hebrew University team relies on a range of archaeological factors—material culture, building construction, building plan, architectural ornamentation, and, looking at the broader picture, how the theater fit into Sepphoris’s new urban infrastructure. A sealed assemblage of ceramic vessels—jars, jugs, and cooking ware from the second half of the first century (70–80 ce)—was found in a cistern located under a very thick layer of fill, beneath the semicircular outer wall of the theater and thus antedates the building’s construction (figs. K and L). These finds thus serve as a terminus post quem (earliest possible date) for the construction of this monumental building. Finds uncovered in several additional soundings inside the theater point to the same date. The construction of the lower cavea on the natural slope and the vaulted support of the upper cavea are both building techniques employed in theaters erected throughout Syro-Palestine from the late first century ce onward.23 The design of various parts of the theater, such as the proscaenium, whose façade is decorated with alternating square and semicircular niches, follows patterns found in other buildings constructed in the second century ce. An analysis of the architectural decoration is also indicative of the theater’s later date (fig. M).24 Several dressed stones found in the debris around the stage and belonging to the scaenae frons, such as Corinthian capitals, friezes, and cornices, were molded with patterns comparable to Late Roman architecture known elsewhere. Finally, the construction of a monumental theater is compatible with the city’s massive development in the late first and early second centuries ce, with the expansion of the inhabited 22.  Weiss and Netzer, “Hebrew University Excavations at Sepphoris,” 7–8. The South Florida team argues for an earlier date, supposedly in the time of Herod Antipas; see “Sepphoris: The Jewel of the Galilee” by James F. Strange in this volume, pp. 22–38; see also James F. Strange et al., “Sepphoris (S\ippori) 1987,” IEJ 38 (1987): 188– 90; C. Thomas McCollough, “The Theater at Sepphoris: From Herodian Theater to Municipal Theater Complex,” ASOR Newsletter 53 (2003): 9–10. Other scholars follow the early date of the building; see Arthur Segal, Theatres in Roman Palestine and Provincia Arabia (Mnemosyne 140; Leiden: Brill, 1995), 4–5, 41–43. 23.  Zeev Weiss, Public Spectacles in Roman and Late Antique Palestine (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2014), 74–77, 84–85. 24.  Ibid., 92–95.

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Figure M. Architectural ­elements found in the debris uncovered in the western parodos (entrance) to the theater and belonging to the scaenae frons. Photograph by Gabi Laron. Used by permission.

area eastward and the construction of the civic center in Lower Sepphoris. Enhancing Sepphoris’s urban landscape with a theater amid other Roman-style public buildings by the late first or early second century ce is consistent with the urbanization process of cities in ancient Palestine following the suppression of the Great Revolt.25 Bathhouses Two bathhouses dated to the Roman period were located on either side of the cardo. The eastern bathhouse is dated to the late first or early second century ce. It is a small structure with several rooms, including a rectangular caldarium (hot room), a mikveh (stepped pool), and two barrel-vaulted cisterns. The western bathhouse was constructed in the third century ce and was in use through the Byzantine period. The well-organized building (27 x 26 m), with two perpendicular axes of symmetry and lavish mosaic pavements, is almost square in plan (fig. N). The courtyard was flanked on three sides by a single row of rooms, while the southern side had two rows of rooms, including several pools and caldaria with hypocausts. Water Supply Two aqueducts constructed in the second century ce ensured the supply of water to the city.26 Issuing from the springs of the villages of er-Reina and Mashhad, these aqueducts supplied water to different parts of the Lower City, but, owing to differences in elevation, the water did 25.  Gerasa was highly developed, with the construction of its street network and several public buildings by the late first century ce; see Rubina Raja, Urban Development and Regional Identity in the Eastern Roman Provinces, 50 BC–AD 250: Aphrodisias, Ephesos, Athens, Gerasa (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, University of Copenhagen, 2012), 138–72. 26.  Tsvika Tsuk, “The Aqueducts to Sepphoris,” in The Aqueducts of Israel (ed. David Amit et al.; JRASS 46; Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002), 278–94.

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Figure N. View of the southern caldaria in the Roman bathhouse west of the cardo. Note that the westernmost caldarium was octagonal, while the other two were square. The octagonal room was transformed into a pool at a later stage. Photograph by Gabi Laron. Used by permission.

not reach the houses on the summit. As in earlier times, the summit used rainwater collected and channeled into subterranean cisterns cut beneath each house as well as the large water cistern located in the center of the acropolis, south of the Citadel. For more, see “The Sepphoris Aqueducts” by James F. Strange in this volume, pp. 76–87. Urban Dwellings Private dwellings were located throughout the city. They form a mixture of several architectural types constructed in various manners. Most of the common population lived in simple houses, whereas the wealthy inhabitants resided in large, spacious, and well-planned domiciles whose floors were decorated with colorful mosaics. The simple houses represent local Galilean architecture, whereas the houses of the wealthy followed state-of-the-art Roman architectural traditions. Huge and ornate residences were erected beside simple ones in both Upper and Lower Sepphoris, and therefore one cannot point to a clear division of the city, either by neighborhood or by social, religious, or economic status. On the northern slope and in the Lower City, the Hebrew University team exposed houses of a simple character alongside public buildings. In some cases, having undergone certain modifications, the buildings constructed in the first century ce were still in use in the

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Figure O. Plan of the House of ­Dionysos. Drawing by Anna Iamim. Used by permission.

Roman period and even beyond. Others constructed in the second century ce followed the simple, functional, plain pattern of their predecessors.27 As mentioned earlier, these simply built houses followed no standardized plan, but all contained ritual baths. Houses of the wealthy were uncovered throughout the site, but the only building that is both relevant to our discussion and most impressive is the House of Dionysos, constructed around 200 ce.28 The building (45 x 23 m) probably had a second story that covered only its 27.  Zeev Weiss, “Private Architecture in the Public Sphere: Urban Dwellings in Roman and Byzantine Sepphoris,” in From Antioch to Alexandria: Recent Studies in Domestic Architecture (ed. Katharina Galor and Tomasz Waliszewski; Archaeologia Transatlantica 24; Warsaw: Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw, 2007), 125–36. 28.  Talgam and Weiss, Mosaics in the House of Dionysos, 17–33.

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northern and central parts (fig. O). Its courtyard, surrounded on three sides by rows of columns, was located in the center of the building, with a triclinium at its northern end. The other rooms of the house were arranged around the triclinium and peristyle courtyard. The rooms south of the courtyard were arranged on two levels, one at the level of the courtyard and the other below it. Some of the rooms on the lower level served as storerooms, while those on the south, which opened onto the street running along the southern edge of the hill, functioned as shops. Many rooms inside the building were originally paved with mosaics featuring colorful geometric patterns, the most important one being that found in the triclinium whose decorated part forms the letter T and conforms to the seating arrangements in the typical Roman dining hall (fig. P). The central carpet of the mosaic is decorated with fifteen panels depicting various scenes from the life of Dionysos and his cult. The location of the House of Dionysos on the acropolis, its dimensions, and especially its elaborate ornamentation indicate that it was intended to be used by a family holding a special status in the city. Although the nature of the mythological scenes in the mosaic may suggest that the owner of the mansion was pagan, there is no substantive argument for rejecting the possibility that he was Jewish,29 or even R. Judah the Patriarch (early third century ce) himself, who was a member of this social class.30 This suggestion is based not solely on the assumption that the patriarch’s home was large and magnificent, but also on the fact that R. Judah’s economic strength and political status could have afforded him the power to build the mansion in Sepphoris in such a central and strategic spot in the city.31 His positive attitude toward Roman culture, and the fact that the Jews of Palestine did not avoid using figural art, allow us to assume—albeit with great caution—that the building might have been occupied by one of the above. Sepphoris: An Appraisal of the Archaeological Finds The Hebrew University’s excavations in Sepphoris over the years have unveiled an intriguing picture of this historic capital of the Galilee, which served as the administrative, religious, and cultural center of the Jews throughout much of the Roman and late antique periods. An analysis of the archaeological evidence from Sepphoris suggests that Jews were the predominant social segment in the city in the first centuries of the Common Era, and the evidence emerging 29.  The wealthy of Sepphoris are often mentioned in rabbinic literature; see y. Šabb. 12:3.13c; b. ‘Erub. 85b–86a; Esth. Rab. 2:3; see also Martin Goodman, State and Society in Roman Galilee A.D. 132–212 (Totowa, N.J.: Rowman & Allanheld, 1983), 33–34. 30.  Talgam and Weiss, Mosaics in the House of Dionysos, 127–31. 31.  Rabbi was accustomed to distributing food among the populace from his silos in famine years (b. B. Bat. 8a) and his table lacked nothing (b. Ber. 57b); he hosted the wealthy in his home (b. ‘Erub. 85b–86a) and invited students to dine at his table (b. Ber. 43a); we often hear of feasts he held in his home, where he served wine (b. Ned. 51a; b. Sanh. 38a).

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Figure P. Overview of the Dionysiac mosaic. Photograph by Zeev Radovan. Used by permission.

from the city’s burial caves, especially the epigraphical finds, support this assumption. At the same time, the urban layout of Sepphoris, including its Roman-style public buildings and the various mosaics unearthed at the site, demonstrates the scope of the Greco-Roman cultural influence on the local population. The wealth of evidence emerging from Sepphoris—the architectural remains, numerous mosaics, and other objects found at the site—convey the picture of a hellenized city. Although we lack conclusive proof that the construction of the various public buildings was initiated, planned, and executed by Jews, its seems certain that the range of buildings known in Sepphoris served the Jewish population, which was the dominant demographic group in the city. This conclusion may seem implausible to some, but one may ask why the Jews would refrain from using a colonnaded street, archive, or bathhouse built for the benefit of the citizens of the Roman city, or refuse to adorn their houses with lavish mosaics. The lifestyle of the Jews indeed differed from that of their non-Jewish neighbors, but their emulation of Roman-style structures did not affect their religious sensibilities. This is articulated in a homily attributed to the rabbis of the Ushan generation (mid-second century ce):

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R. Judah commenced the discussion, saying: “How fine are the works of this nation (referring to the Romans)! They have made marketplaces, built bridges, erected baths.” . . . R. Simeon bar Yoh\ai answered, saying: “All that they made, they made for themselves—they made marketplaces to set harlots in them, baths in which to refresh themselves, bridges from which to levy tolls.” (b. Šabb. 33b) In fact, R. Judah bar Ilai praised Roman building, which benefited not only the society at large but also each and every individual, and it seems that R. Simeon bar Yoh\ai did not deny the utility of Roman invention, but merely objected to “the ways of Rome,” which used these buildings solely to satisfy its own agenda. Following the destruction of the temple in 70 ce and the suppression of the Bar Kokhba revolt in 135 ce, the frustration and anger of certain sectors of the Jewish population in ancient Palestine gave way to a positive approach and a certain appreciation of Rome and its culture. The view that such exposure to Greco-Roman culture was not harmful to Jews paved the way for the assimilation of foreign influences in many realms of the lives of Jewish people. The wealth of evidence emerging from Sepphoris, one of the major Galilean settlements that nurtured the creation of part of the ancient rabbinic literary corpus, offers perhaps the greatest insight into Jewish society and its changing attitudes toward the Greco-Roman culture to which it was exposed. The finds at the site provide noteworthy information for the study of urbanism in ancient Palestine but also demonstrate how the Jewish population conducted its affairs in a period of transition and change. Bibliography Adan-Bayewitz, David, and Mordechai Aviam. “Iotapata, Josephus, and the Siege of 67: Preliminary Report on the 1992–94 Seasons.” JRA 10 (1997): 151–52, 164. Aviam, Mordechai. “Yodfat: Uncovering a Jewish City in the Galilee from the Second Temple Period and the Time of the Great Revolt.” In Hebrew. Qadmoniot 32 (1999): 98. Avshalom-Gorni, Dina, and Arfan Najjar. “Migdal.” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www. hadashot-esi.org.il/Report_Detail_Eng.aspx?id=2304&mag_id=120 (accessed: July 10, 2014). Coulton, John J. The Architectural Development of the Greek Stoa. Oxford: Clarendon, 1976. Farhi, Yoav. “Stucco Decorations from the Western Quarter.” In Gamla. Vol. 2, The Architecture: The Shmarya Gutmann Excavations, 1976–1989, edited by Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor, IAA Reports 44. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2010. Freyne, Seán. Galilee, Jes,us and the Gospels: Literary Approaches and Historical Investigations. Philadelphia: Fortress Press; Dublin: Gill & Macmillan, 1988. Galor, Katharina. “The Stepped Water Installations of the Sepphoris Acropolis.” In The Archaeology of Difference: Gender, Ethnicity, Class and the “Other” in Antiquity: Studies in

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Honor of Eric M. Meyers, edited by Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 201–13. AASOR 60/61. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2007. Goodman, Martin. State and Society in Roman Galilee A.D. 132–212. Totowa, N.J.: Rowman & Allanheld, 1983. Guttmann, Alexander. “The Patriarch Judah I: His Birth and His Death.” HUCA 25 (1954): 239–61. Hoehner, Harold W. Herod Antipas. SNTSMS 17. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972. Isaac, Benjamin, and Israel Roll. “Legio II Traiana in Judaea.” ZPE 33 (1979): 149–56. Jensen, Morten H. Herod Antipas in Galilee: The Literary and Archaeological Sources on the Reign of Herod Antipas and Its Socio-Economic Impact on Galilee. WUNT 2/215. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006. Margulies, Mordechai, ed. Leviticus Rabbah. 5 vols. Jerusalem: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1953–60. McCollough, C. Thomas. “The Theater at Sepphoris: From Herodian Theater to Municipal Theater Complex.” ASOR Newsletter 53 (2003): 9–10. Meshorer, Ya‘akov. “Sepphoris and Rome.” In Greek Numismatics and Archaeology: Essays in Honor of Margaret Thompson, edited by Otto Mørkholm and Nancy M. Waggoner, 159– 71. Wetteren: Editions NR, 1979. Meshorer, Ya‘akov, Gabriela Bijovsky, and Wolfgang Fischer-Bossert. Coins of the Holy Land: The Abraham and Marian Sofaer Collection at the American Numismatic Society and the Israel Museum. 2 vols. New York: American Numismatic Society, 2013. Miller, Stuart S. Studies in the History and Traditions of Sepphoris. SJLA 37. Leiden: Brill, 1984. Raja, Rubina. Urban Development and Regional Identity in the Eastern Roman Provinces, 50 BC–AD 250: Aphrodisias, Ephesos, Athens, Gerasa. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, University of Copenhagen, 2012. Reich, Ronny. Miqwa’ot (Jewish Ritual Baths) in the Second Temple, Mishnaic and Talmudic Periods. In Hebrew. Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 2013. Roll, Israel. “Between Damascus and Megiddo: Roads and Transportation in Antiquity across the Northeastern Approaches to the Holy Land.” In Man near a Roman Arch: Studies Presented to Professor Yoram Tsafrir, edited by Leah Di Segni et al., 1*–20*. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2009. Safrai, Shmuel. “The Jewish Settlement in the Galilee and Golan in the Third and Fourth Century.” In Eretz-Israel from the Destruction of the Second Temple to the Muslim Conquest, edited by Zvi Baras et al., 1:148–52. Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 1982. ———. “The Nesiut in the Second and Third Centuries and Its Chronological Problems.” In Hebrew. In Proceedings of the Sixth World Congress of Jewish Studies, 2:51–57. Jerusalem: World Congress of Jewish Studies, 1975. Segal, Arthur. Theatres in Roman Palestine and Provincia Arabia. Mnemosyne 140. Leiden: Brill, 1995.

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Stern, Sacha. “Babylonian Talmud, Avodah Zarah 16a—Jews and Pagan Cults in ThirdCentury Sepphoris.” In Talmuda de-Eretz Israel: Archaeology and the Rabbis in Late Antique Palestine, edited by Steven Fine and Aaron Koller, 205–24. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2014. Strange, James F. “Some Implications of Archaeology for New Testament Studies.” In What Has Archaeology to Do with Faith?, edited by James H. Charlesworth and Walter P. Weaver, 23–59. Faith and Scholarship Colloquies. Valley Forge, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 1992. Strange, James F., Thomas R. W. Longstaff, and Dennis El Groh. “Sepphoris (Sippori) 1987.” IEJ 38 (1987): 188–90. Talgam, Rina, and Zeev Weiss. The Mosaics in the House of Dionysos at Sepphoris, Excavated by E. M. Meyers, E. Netzer and C. L. Meyers. Qedem 44. Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2004. Tsuk, Tsvika. “The Aqueducts to Sepphoris.” In The Aqueducts of Israel, edited by David Amit, Joseph Patrich, and Yizhar Hirschfeld, 278–94. JRASS 46. Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002. Weiss, Zeev. “From Roman Temple to Byzantine Church: A Preliminary Report on Sepphoris in Transition.” JRA 23 (2010): 196–217. ———. “Images and Figural Representations in the Urban Galilee: Defining Limits in Times of Shifting Borders.” In The Image and Its Prohibition in Jewish Antiquity, edited by Sarah Pearce, 130–44. JJSSup 2. Oxford: Journal of Jewish Studies, 2013. ———. “Josephus and Archaeology on the Cities of the Galilee.” In Making History: Josephus and Historical Method, edited by Zuleika Rodgers, 392–94. JSJSup 110. Leiden: Brill, 2007. ———. “Josephus and the Archaeology of Galilee.” In A Companion to Josephus in His World, edited by Honora Chapman and Zuleika Rodgers. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, f­ orthcoming. ———. “Mosaic Art in Ancient Sepphoris: Between East and West.” In La mosaïque grécoromaine. Vol. 11, Eleventh International Colloquium on Ancient Mosaics, October 16–20, 2009, Bursa, Turkey, edited by Mustafa Şahin, 941–51. Istanbul: Ege Yayınları, 2012. ———. “Private Architecture in the Public Sphere: Urban Dwellings in Roman and Byzantine Sepphoris.” In From Antioch to Alexandria: Recent Studies in Domestic Architecture, edited by Katharina Galor and Tomasz Waliszewski, 125–36. Archaeologia Transatlantica 24. Warsaw: Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw, 2007. ———. Public Spectacles in Roman and Late Antique Palestine. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2014. ———. “Sepphoris.” NEAEHL 5:2029–35. Weiss, Zeev, and Ehud Netzer. “The Hebrew University Excavations at Sepphoris.” In Hebrew. Qadmoniot 113 (1997): 2–21.

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D. The Sepphoris Aqueducts James F. Strange Water was one of the necessities for life in antiquity. Above all, after the agricultural revolution of the Neolithic period, it gradually became the practice to collect and conduct water to human habitations and to cultivated fields, especially in the Mediterranean summer dry season. The inhabitants of the landscape began experimenting with impounding overflowing rivers as early as 6000 bce. True irrigation systems have been detected in Yemen dating from 4500 bce.1 Long before Sepphoris was founded, peoples of the ancient Near East developed watercourses, cisterns, and reservoirs. Some water installations, especially in the Hellenistic and Roman periods, were very impressive indeed. Roman Aqueducts Aqueducts are virtually an icon signifying the Roman Empire, particularly aqueducts lifted high above a valley on successive rows of stone arches. Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (c. 80 bce– after 15 ce) wrote his Ten Books on Architecture (De architectura libri decem) dedicated to the emperor, usually identified as Augustus Caesar. Vitruvius provided a detailed section in book 8 devoted to finding and testing water, surveying the courses of aqueducts, and fashioning their channels, foundations, and the required tunnels and bridges. The technology he describes was quite similar to the aqueducts of Sepphoris. For example, he explains that there is an optimal gradient that the aqueduct should run from its source to the city, which is a fall of 3 percent. If there are hills and valleys between the source and its destination, then workmen must cut a tunnel through the hill, or conduct the water around the hill at the same gradient. If there are one or more valleys cutting across the watercourse, then the workmen must build arches and bridges across the valleys to bear the pipes or stone channels in which the water runs. At the end of its course, the aqueduct will empty into a reservoir, which is a covered pool with three compartments from which water is distributed to basins and fountains. He explains that water runs into the first compartment at one end, overflows into the central compartment, and then overflows again into the third, from which it is distributed (De arch. 8.6.1). Frontinus (35–103 ce) wrote a treatise on the aqueducts of Rome (De aquaeductu) and was aware that they were formidable structures comparable to paved Roman roads.2 The first 1.  Michael J. Harrower, “Hydrology, Ideology, and the Origins of Irrigation in Ancient Southwest Arabia,” Current Anthropology 49 (2008): 497–510. 2.  Sextus Julius Frontinus, Stratagems. Aqueducts of Rome (trans. E. E. Bennett [revision of Clemens Hershchel]; ed. Mary B. McElwain; LCL; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1925).

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aqueduct he names is the Appian aqueduct: aqua Appia in urbem inducta est ab Appio Claudio Crasso censore (“the Appian water [aqueduct] was brought into the City by the censor Appius Claudius Crassus [in 283 bce]”).3 We might conclude that, in effect, building an aqueduct was a statement to the locals that Sepphoris was a very up-to-date city whose benefactors were firmly anchored in the latest Roman methods of construction. The First Sepphoris Aqueduct When the Hellenistic fortress-city of Sepphoris was first established near the end of the second century bce, there was no aqueduct. Residents apparently collected rainwater from their roofs and courtyards and channeled it into underground cisterns. The Hellenistic fortress of Sepphoris required cisterns for the security of the fortress, should it be under siege, but also for the daily needs of the inhabitants. Josephus relates that, at the death of Herod the Great (4 bce), the Sepphoreans rose up in revolt. Varus, legate of Rome, marched with two legions and four troops of cavalry from Damascus to Sepphoris to put down the revolt and punish the city. Part of his forces under his son and a friend captured Sepphoris, enslaved the inhabitants, and burned the city. The emptied ruin was eventually handed over to the new ethnarch, Herod Antipas, son of Herod the Great (Josephus Ant. 17.271). Antipas had no capital city apart from Sepphoris, so he simply rebuilt or “fortified” (τειχίσας) Sepphoris. He likely employed artisans from everywhere in Galilee and even beyond (Josephus Ant. 18.27). At the same time, he apparently ordered his workmen to build an aqueduct to Sepphoris from active springs in the vicinity. This system served the city until the second century ce. At that time, the city added a new aqueduct beginning at the el-Qanah spring, southeast of the village of Reina and 6.6 kilometers southeast of the hill of Sepphoris, which delivered water to a new, enormous underground reservoir 250 m long and thence to the city. History of Investigation of the Sepphoris Aqueducts From the 8th to the 20th of November, 1872, Charles Conder and Charles Tyrwhitt-Drake, the principal investigators of the Survey of Western Palestine (SWP), surveyed the Sepphoris aqueduct, establishing their camp at Nazareth.4 In volume 1 of the Survey of Western Palestine, published in 1881, Conder and H. H. Kitchener called attention to b. ‘Erub. 87a, “concerning the aqueduct that went from Abel to Sepphoris.”5 This passage in full reads, “Said R. Judah, 3. Frontius Aqueducts of Rome 1.5. 4.  C. R. Conder and H. H. Kitchener, Survey of Western Palestine, vol. 1, Galilee (London: Committee for the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881; repr., Jerusalem: Kedem, 1970), 330–31. 5.  Ibid., 1:330.

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‘There was a case of a water channel that flowed from Abel to Sepphoris, and on the authority of sages they drew water from it on the Sabbath.’”6 This sentence is textual grounds for identifying Khirbet Jinnân (“gardens”) with talmudic Abel, for it seemed clear to Conder and his associates that the origin of the watercourse was likely the springs at Khirbet Jinnân (Genona or Ginona), today identified as the Springs of Amitai and the Genona Spring. These flow from a rather high valley between modern Mesh-hed (Meshed, biblical Gath-H|epher) and Mount Jonah, which is a low peak 573 m above sea level northeast of Nazareth. The water would be conducted “a distance of nearly four miles along the hill-side to the extensive reservoirs [cisterns?] east of Saffurieh.” They noted that this is a gradient of 1/30 or 3.3 percent. Beginning south of Mesh-hed, the SWP investigators followed the watercourse underground at first and then on the exposed bedrock surface in a 14-inch wide (35 cm) channel sometimes still covered with slabs of stone. They noted small channels conducting the water at right angles into the main channel. This part they traced for about half a mile (0.8 km) to the west. “A little further west” they found a wall of hard Roman cement supporting the aqueduct across a steeply eroded ravine. They located three cisterns in the vicinity.7 At this point, the aqueduct turned north (for about 700 m) and then west toward Sepphoris. Along the course they investigated vertical shafts in a row that today we know descended to a tunnel for the system. Near the aqueduct they noticed rock-cut cisterns, which they interpreted as agricultural. At this point, the aqueduct was supported by a masonry wall five to six feet in height (1.5–1.8 m) that ran for a quarter mile or 402 meters. Flat slabs covered the top of the channel. “A little west of the end of this wall a rock-cut channel was found leading south, for a short distance, to the great reservoir for storing the supply.” Conder and Kitchener published a plan and section drawings8 of the underground reservoir measured to be 580 ft long (177 m) and 8 to 15 ft wide (4–4.5 m). They completed the plan and section on November 20, 1872. From the section drawing one finds that the maximum depth (measured from a watermark) was about 17 ft (5.1 m). The reservoir lies almost exactly 5/8 of a mile (1 km) east of Sepphoris and is oriented east to west. Conder and Kitchener identified it as part of the Mesh-hed aqueduct system. They found a short piece of a north–south watercourse north of and near the east end of the reservoir and deduced that it conducted water to the reservoir. They also found eight “manholes” in the roof. They describe other details of the reservoir, such as two coats of plaster and the division of the interior by two “barrages” or dikes that they interpreted as devices to filter the water from one pool to another by decantation. Conder and his team were pressed for time and did not find either the exit from the huge reservoir or the remaining aqueduct to Sepphoris.

6.  Jacob Neusner, trans., The Talmud of Babylonia: An American Translation, vol. 3.D, Erubin Chapters 7–10 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1993), 56. 7.  Conder and Kitchener, Galilee, 331. 8. Ibid., 331.

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In 1931, Leroy Waterman of the University of Michigan dug for one season at Sepphoris and published a preliminary report.9 N. E. Manasseh, the expedition’s architect, wrote a few pages on the “waterworks.”10 He remarked that the Springs of Sepphoris were downhill to the southwest 1.5 mi (2.4 km), and therefore water could not be conducted north to the city (uphill). More than 1.5 mi (2.4 km) east of Sepphoris, the team found the “masonry substructure” of an aqueduct about 1.2 m wide and 1.1 m high. The aqueduct flowed west toward Sepphoris. Associated with the aqueduct was a circular structure with an inside diameter of 2.75 m and a wall 1.6 m wide. Manasseh interpreted it as a guardhouse for the aqueduct.11 Closer to Sepphoris, the expedition found a “tunnel” to which the aqueduct connected. This is surely the reservoir that the SWP discovered, as shown by Waterman’s photographs, but apparently Waterman did not consult the SWP. The expedition measured it initially as more than 100 m long and “in some places . . . 6.5 meters high and 3.5 meters wide.” About three quarters of a mile (1.2 km) southeast of the village of Saffuriyeh, they found a pool 22 m by 16 m. They also heard a “local tradition” that an aqueduct on columns once connected this pool with cisterns on the hill of Sepphoris, but the columns pointed out on the village threshing floor likely belonged to the basilical building unearthed by the University of South Florida expedition beginning in 1987. The Waterman expedition sought more traces of the aqueduct system, but none was found. In 1966, Azriel Siegelmann conducted a survey of part of the water system near Sepphoris, which he published in Hebrew. He found a section of an aqueduct a short distance southwest of Mesh-hed that turned from west to north. He concluded that it was also part of the Sepphoris aqueduct and independently identified Khirbet Jinnân with Abel.12 Farther southwest of Mesh-hed, he found a wall on which the aqueduct from Reina transported water to Sepphoris. The spring at Reina was called the el-Qanah spring and originally flowed 1.7 km in an S-curve through Reina to the wall with its aqueduct to the northwest. Siegelmann concluded incorrectly that this section of the aqueduct did not belong to the Mesh-hed aqueduct and in fact did not feed Sepphoris. The originating springs for the first aqueduct to Sepphoris were the Springs of Amitai. They do not seem to have been abundant, so the aqueduct could not meet all the water needs for the new inhabitants of the rebuilt Sepphoris. They continued to rely on cisterns. From 1975 to 1991, Tsvika Tsuk of Tel Aviv University surveyed the water system of Sepphoris.13 He traced the entire system of two aqueducts from two different sets of springs: 9.  Leroy Waterman et al., Preliminary Report of the University of Michigan Excavations at Sepphoris/Dio­ caesarea, Palestine, in 1931 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1937). 10.  Ibid., 14–16, pls. XXI–XXIV. 11. Ibid., 15. 12.  Azriel Siegelmann, “Identification of the Location of the City of Abel” (in Hebrew), Nofim 5 (1976): 50–53. 13.  Tsvika Tsuk, “The Aqueducts to Sepphoris,” in Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures (ed. Eric M. Meyers; Duke Judaic Studies 1; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999), 161–76; Tsuk, “The Aqueducts

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Figure A. Map of Sepphoris’s water system. Drawing by J. Dekel. Used by permission of T. Tsuk.

the springs of Amitai with the Genona Spring near Mesh-hed (fig. A, no. 2) and the el-Qaneh Spring near Reina (fig. A, no. 9). From his surveys and excavations, a very complete picture emerged with extensive hydrological data, although the entrance to the city of the two debouchments has not yet been located. Tsuk and his associates traced the Mesh-hed aqueduct from the Amitai and Genona springs. About 300 m west they found the first fragment of a watercourse of the aqueduct, which ran about 200 m (fig. A, no. 3). Another 500 m to the northwest they found another fragment of the watercourse 300 m long that turned north toward Mesh-hed (fig. A, no. 4). Hardly 100 m farther north, they encountered the beginning to Sepphoris,” in The Aqueducts of Israel (ed. David Amit, Joseph Patrich, and Yizhar Hirschfeld; JRASS 46; Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002), 279.

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Figure B. Pool southeast of Sepphoris. Drawing by E. Cohen. Used by permission of T. Tsuk.

of the Nah\al Sepphoris or Wadi Saffuriyeh flowing west and south. This freshet eventually crosses the Nazareth–Shfar’am highway west of the Springs of Sepphoris.14 The Sepphoris aqueduct turned around the beginning of the Nah\al Sepphoris and flowed west toward Sepphoris, where it could be followed again as a channel cut in bedrock covered with slabs of stone mortared in place. This would be about 0.8 km southwest of Mesh-hed (fig. A, no. 5). The next fragment of aqueduct was 800 m long and was built on a wall in an S-curve leading west, but turning north at its west end (fig. A, no. 6). The probable feed of this portion led north and west for a total of 1.2 km. At that point, Tsuk and his associates followed the aqueduct another 1.2 km, following a ridge, where it disappeared (fig. A, no. 8). Four hundred meters farther west was the pool found by Waterman (fig. A, no. 16). The total length of the Mesh-hed aqueduct was originally about 6.3 km from the Springs of Amitai to the terminating pool (fig. B). Tsuk and his associates remeasured the pool to be 21 m by 14.5 m internally. It lay at an elevation of about 272 m. At this elevation, the Mesh-hed aqueduct could supply water to about 80 percent of the city, leaving out the houses and other buildings on the very top of the hill of Sepphoris, where the elevation is 289 m. In the second century ce, Sepphoris built a second aqueduct, which was doubtless needed to serve the increased population of the city. Tsuk and his associates followed this aqueduct from the spring of el-Qanah to the southeast of the village of Reina nearly 5 km from Sepphoris (fig. A, no. 9). This spring features an Early Roman springhouse originally built of fine-cut masonry (fig. C). The water flowed northwest through Reina in a serpentine course to join the 14.  Tsuk, “Aqueducts to Sepphoris” (1999), 164–65.

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Figure C. Plan and cross-section of the spring house at el-Qanah. Used by permission of T. Tsuk.

Mesh-hed aqueduct after four more kilometers. Nearly 100 m of this course had to cross two tributaries of Nah\al Sepphoris (fig. A, no. 11) and finally the Nah\al Sepphoris itself, probably on bridges now destroyed (fig. A, letter A). The section of aqueduct north of the Nah\al Sepphoris was nearly 100 m long and constructed of masonry 30 cm wide and 25 cm deep. About 200 m north of this channel, Tsuk and his associates found a tunnel about 200 m long (fig. A, no. 13) that conducted the water northeast and finally turned west to the join the original aqueduct (fig. A, no. 8).15 The major feature of the second aqueduct is an underground reservoir found 1.5 m east of Sepphoris, first recorded by the SWP (fig. A, nos. 14 and 15). This is an impressive waterstorage installation by any standard. It measured about 250 m long and averaged 3 m wide. 15.  Tsuk, “Aqueducts to Sepphoris” (1999), 165–67.

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Figure D. Plan and section of the reservoir excavated and surveyed by T. Tsuk. Drawing by J. Dekel. Used by permission of T. Tsuk.

It held as much as 4,300 cu m of water. The reservoir was cut in the bedrock exactly at a fault that marked the junction of hard limestone to the north and soft chalklike limestone to the south. The masons could cut the soft chalkstone with little effort. A 200-meter-long aqueduct conducted the water south to the east end of the reservoir. The water was decanted from rockcut chamber to chamber and then exited the west end at an as yet undiscovered point. Tsuk lead a team excavating the reservoir on behalf of the Tel Aviv University Institute of Archaeology from 1993 to 1994.16 The excavations revealed many details, including a “settling tank” at the main entrance to the east, nine manholes in the ceiling equally spaced, an “impressive entrance with a set of stairs” near the western end, and a previously unknown tunnel at the western end at the bottom of the reservoir (fig. A, no. 17). This tunnel was 55 m long and 60 to 80 cm wide, with a roof 70 to 100 cm high. Fifteen plastered projections from the wall bore oil lamps in antiquity to light the way for those who entered, presumably for maintenance and cleaning. At the very end of this narrow tunnel, a plastered masonry wall blocked the passage. There the excavators encountered a lead pipe 10.5 cm in diameter and “at least 5.8 m. long” conducting the water west out of the tunnel. The water exited the lead pipe into another tunnel cut large enough for most of its length to accommodate a standing human being (fig. A, between nos. 17 and 18). The tunnel height ranged from less than 1 m to 3 m and reached a width from 60 to 80 cm. The water channel 16.  Tsuk, “Aqueducts to Sepphoris” (1999), 167–69; Tsvika Tsuk, A. Rosenberger, and M. Peilstocker, The Ancient Reservoir of Sepphoris: Excavations 1993–1994 (in Hebrew; Tel Aviv: National Parks, Hydrology Society and Ministry of Tourism, 1996).

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Figure E. The tunnel at the meeting point Figure F. The final recovered section of between shafts 3 and 4. Photograph by T. Tsuk. ­Sepphoris’s aqueduct. Used by permission Used by permission. of T. Tsuk.

in the floor was 45 cm wide and 45 cm deep.17 It had six access shafts cut in bedrock in its roof at more or less equal distances (fig. E).18 The end of the lead pipe coincided with a set of stairs down from the surface to the final tunnel. In the floor of the tunnel at that point the excavators observed a “metal lug” fastened to the floor that would have held a gate valve or stopcock.19 From this point, the tunnel was 235 m long and emerged at the surface east of Sepphoris. The gradient at this point was 4 percent. At the point of egress of the water at the surface, one can follow the aqueduct for about 400 m to a point approximately 400 m from the city (fig. A, no. 18; fig. F). The excavators found many lamp niches in the walls of this tunnel. At its final preserved point, its gradient is 17.  Tsuk, “Aqueducts to Sepphoris” (1999), 170. 18.  Ibid., 171. 19.  Tsuk (ibid., 171 n. 10) refers to a similar water tunnel in Jordan with a gate valve; see John P. Oleson, “Nabataean and Roman Water Use in Edom: The Humayma Hydraulic Survey, 1987,” Echos du Monde Classique/ Classical Views 32 N.S. 7 (1988): 117–29.

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Figure G. Graph of the aqueducts’ courses and gradients. Surveyed by T. Tsuk. Drawing by J. Dekel. Used by permission of T. Tsuk.

2.1 percent. At this elevation, the reservoir could still supply water to about 80 percent of the city, the same figure as the Mesh-hed aqueduct.20 Therefore, the Sepphoris waterworks delivered water to most of the city of Sepphoris from its inception in the first century ce and again after the city fathers added the Reina aqueduct and its reservoir in the second century.21 Carbon-14 dating of the replastering of the reservoir showed that it required repairs after the earthquake of 363 ce. The excavators also found fourth-century pottery sherds in the top layer of plaster. This water system continued in use until the coming of Islam in the seventh century ce, as indicated by the Late Byzantine

20.  Tsuk, “Aqueducts to Sepphoris” (1999), 174. 21.  The money may have come from the emperor Trajan. If so, then the Sepphoris coin inscription “The Emperor Trajan bestowed” (TRAIANOS AUTOKRATŌR[OS] EDŌKEN, Τραιανος αυτοκρατωρ[ος] εδωκεν) is to be interpreted as lauding Trajan as benefactor. See “Sepphoris: The Jewel of the Galilee” by James F. Strange in this volume, pp. 22–38.

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(seventh century ce) cooking pots used for dipping in the entry settling tank at the east end of the reservoir.22 Conclusion It is now known that a similar reservoir and aqueduct system existed at the city of Capitolias (modern Beit Ras) in today’s northern Jordan. Not far away, there is an underground reservoir at Abila, namely, at the east side of the hill of the town.23 There is also a subterranean aqueduct system: that is, a network of tunnels that once bore water. Finally, we have published reports of a 120–130 km–long (75–80 mi) Roman aqueduct that originates in Syria and flows through Jordan almost entirely underground westward to Abila and Gadara.24 Sepphoris and its water system clearly benefited from the Roman technologies of hydrology and surveying that were to be found everywhere Roman hegemony extended. Bibliography Conder, C. R., and H. H. Kitchener. Survey of Western Palestine. Vol. 1, Galilee. London: Committee for the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881. Reprint, Jerusalem: Kedem, 1970. Döring, Mathias. “Roman Water Systems in Northern Jordan.” In Proceedings of the 12th International Congress on the History of Water Management and Hydraulic Engineering in the Mediterranean Region, Ephesus, Okt. 2004), 237–43. Österreichisches Archäologisches Institut, Sonderschriften 42. Leuven: Peeters, 2006. Frontinus, Sextus Julius. Stratagems. Aqueducts of Rome. Edited by Mary B McElwain. Translated by E. E. Bennett and Clemens Herschel. LCL. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1925. Harrower, Michael J. “Hydrology, Ideology, and the Origins of Irrigation in Ancient Southwest Arabia.” Current Anthropology 49 (2008): 497–510. Lentzen, C. J., and E. A. Knauf. “Beit Ras/Capitolias: A Preliminary Evaluation of the Archaeological and Textual Evidence.” Syria 64, nos. 1–2 (1987): 21–46. Mare, W. Harold. “The Technology of the Hydrological System at Abila of the Decapolis.” Studies in the History and Archaeology of Jordan 5 (1995): 727–35. Neusner, Jacob, trans. The Talmud of Babylonia: An American Translation. Vol. III.D, Erubin Chapters 7–10. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1993. 22.  Tsuk, “Aqueducts to Sepphoris” (1999), 168. 23.  C. J. Lentzen and E. A. Knauf, “Beit Ras/Capitolias: A Preliminary Evaluation of the Archaeological and Textual Evidence,” Syria 64, nos. 1–2 (1987): 21–46; W. Harold Mare, “The Technology of the Hydrological System at Abila of the Decapolis,” Studies in the History and Archaeology of Jordan 5 (1995): 727–35. 24.  Mathias Döring, “Roman Water Systems in Northern Jordan,” in Proceedings of the 12th International Congress on the History of Water Management and Hydraulic Engineering in the Mediterranean Region, Ephesus, Okt. 2004 (Österreichisches Archäologisches Institut, Sonderschriften 42; Leuven: Peeters, 2006), 237–43.

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Oleson, John P. “Nabataean and Roman Water Use in Edom: The Humayma Hydraulic Survey, 1987.” Echos du Monde Classique/Classical Views 32 N.S. 7 (1988): 117–29. Siegelmann, Azriel. “Identification of the Location of the City of Abel.” In Hebrew. Nofim 5 (1976): 50–53. Tsuk, Tsvika, “The Aqueducts to Sepphoris.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 161–76. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. ———. “The Aqueducts to Sepphoris.” In The Aqueducts of Israel, edited by David Amit, Joseph Patrich, and Yizhar Hirschfeld, 278–95. JRASS 46. Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002. Tsuk, Tsvika, A. Rosenberger, and M. Peilstocker. The Ancient Reservoir of Sepphoris: Excavations 1993–1994. In Hebrew. Tel Aviv: National Parks, Hydrology Society and Ministry of Tourism, 1996. Waterman, Leroy, et al. Preliminary Report of the University of Michigan Excavations at Sepphoris/ Diocaesarea, Palestine, in 1931. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1937.

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3 Kefar Shikhin* James Riley Strange Introduction: Shikhin in Ancient Sources The ancient site of Shikhin (‫שיחין‬/Šîh\în; Ἄσωχις/Asōchis in Josephus; ITM map ref. 200204656377) sits on a low ridge of three hilltops, almost completely surrounded by agricultural fields, at the southwestern end of the Beit Netofa Valley of Lower Galilee. The village occupied the northernmost hill, 188 m (617 ft) above sea level and about 0.5 km south of modern Highway 77. In antiquity, as today, one could reach Shikhin by walking 1.8 km (a little over a mile) north and slightly west of the acropolis of Sepphoris, which sits at 285 m (935 ft) above sea level.1 Excavations began in 2012 through the work of the Shikhin Excavation Project and continue to the present. Josephus’s writings contain the earliest mentions of Shikhin, and the sages of rabbinic literature also talk about it. Both sets of sources tend to mention Shikhin in connection with Sepphoris, and although Sepphoris usually served as the local seat of power throughout their shared history, the sources hint at the village’s importance. For example, Josephus tells us that Ptolemy (IX) Lathyros successfully took Asochis on a Sabbath day, after which he failed to take Sepphoris (Ant. 13.337; cf. J.W. 1.86). This information suggests that by the late second/ early first century bce, Shikhin was settled by Jews (because presumably Ptolemy considered it to be to his advantage to attack on the Sabbath), and that Shikhin probably was not fortified,

*  Reports of the excavations at Shikhin in this chapter draw directly from the field books of the Shikhin Excavation Project, which this author directs, and directors’ discussions. Readers are encouraged to look for upcoming preliminary publications of the lamp and pottery industry. Some information is available at http://www. samford.edu/shikhin. I thank Motti Aviam for reading the chapter and giving his suggestions. 1.  James F. Strange, Thomas R. W. Longstaff, and Dennis E. Groh, Excavations at Sepphoris, vol. 1, University of South Florida Probes in the Citadel and Villa (Brill Reference Library of Judaism 22; Leiden: Brill, 2006), 10.

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while Sepphoris, which must have been nearby, probably was.2 Surely exaggerating, Josephus also tells us that Ptolemy took ten thousand prisoners and a great deal of plunder.3 Despite the hyperbole, the claim does imply something about the town’s standing, as does Ptolemy’s desire to capture it. If Josephus’s account is generally correct, Shikhin probably already had a substantial Jewish population and some wealth by the time Aristobulus I annexed the Galilee to the Hasmonean kingdom in 104 bce. Shikhin might have received more Judeans after 70 and 135 ce, including priestly families.4 In another direct mention of Shikhin, a passage in the third-century ce Tosefta says that when the house of Joseph ben Simai (a second-century resident?) caught fire on a Sabbath, soldiers from Sepphoris ran to put it out (t. Šabb. 13:9; cf. y. Šabb. 16:7; b. Šabb. 16:121a; Deut. Rab.5). Both the rabbinic mentions and Josephus’s accounts link Shikhin and Sepphoris geographically, and the Tosefta passage indicates that Sepphoris’s soldiers (probably Roman soldiers) were obligated to put out fires at Shikhin, or at least at this man’s home. Hence, the story might preserve a significant political link, which suggests further social and economic links, between Roman Sepphoris and the nearest town under its jurisdiction.6 The Tosefta goes on to say that even though Joseph ben Simai refused to allow the fire to be extinguished, a miraculous rain put it out (suggesting that the narrative places the event in the summer, when it rarely rains), after which he sent money to Sepphoris’s soldiers and their commander. 2. See m. ‘Arak. 9:6 for a list of fortified Galilean towns in the Hellenistic period. 3. In J.W. 3.43, Josephus informs his readers that the smallest Galilean villages have populations exceeding fifteen thousand. He was speaking of the Galilee of his own day, but surely this also is a grossly inflated number. 4.  According to Samuel Klein, the fourteenth priestly course (‫ישבאב‬/Jeshebeab) was relocated to Shikhin. First Chronicles 24:1-19 attributes to David the organization of priestly families into twenty-four divisions or “courses” (‫משמרות‬/mišmārôt) according to ancestral families (cf. Neh. 12:1-19). Using piyyut iim and talmudic passages, Klein constructed hypothetical lists of these courses and Galilean villages, towns, and cities in which they allegedly resettled. Fragments of inscriptions bearing lists that match fairly well with Klein’s, so far as we can tell, were found at Caesarea in 1962. See Samuel Klein, Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas (Leipzig: R. Haupt, 1909), 66–67. Michael Avi-Yonah, “A List of Priestly Courses from Caesarea,” IEJ 12 (1962): 137–39; AviYonah, “The Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses,” in The Teacher’s Yoke: Essays in Memory of Henry Trantham (ed. E. Jerry Vardaman and James L. Garrett Jr.; Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 1964), 46–57; Jerry Vardaman, “Introduction to the Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses,” in Vardaman and Garrett, Teacher’s Yoke, 42–44. See y. Ta‘an. 4:6, 68d; cf. t. Ta‘an. 1:3. For a fuller discussion of similar fragments found elsewhere with bibliography, see n. 43 in ch. 8 of this volume, p. 172. See also Uzi Leibner’s discussion in Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee (TSAJ 127; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), 404–19. A passage in the Tosefta (Ta‘an. 1:13) states that it was the practice at Sepphoris (according to the testimony of R. H|alafta) and at Sikhnin/‫( סכנין‬according to R. H|anania) for the minister of the synagogue (‫)חזן הכנסת‬ to call on priests to sound the shofar during a fast. See n. 9 below for another reference to Sepphoris and Sikhnin. In conversation, šîh\în and śknîn could be confused for one another. Such confusion is less likely if an author is relying on a written text. 5. Lieberman edition p. 70. The English translation by J. Rabbinowitz does not contain this passage: Midrash Rabbah, vol. 7 (London and New York: Soncino, 1983). 6.  The passage in the Babylonian Talmud explains that the soldiers wished to put out the fire because Joseph was an administrator for the king.

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Josephus mentions that he lived at Asochis for a while (Life 384; cf. 233), and he called the Beit Netofa Valley, so-called after a village on its eastern edge, the “Plain of Asochis” (Life 207). Sages remembered that both Kefar H|ananya and Kefar Shikhin sold black (i.e., high quality) clay (t. B. Mes ii‘a 6:3; cf. b. B. Mes ii‘a 74a), and they compared ceramic vessels in both towns to iron vessels because they were not likely to burst in fires (b. Šabb. 120b). According to the Tosefta, Rabbi Neh\emiah used storage jars from Shikhin as a standard of measure (t. Ter. 7:14; cf. y. Ter. 8:6, 45d), and another reference suggests that Shikhin’s potters made ceramic oil lamps as well (t. Me‘il. 2:9; see the discussion below). The fact that sages from other Galilean towns knew about Shikhin’s jars implies that Shikhin exported jars, that it sold something in them—wine, oil, and mustard are possibilities7—or both. The plausibility that Shikhin exported goods and produce might explain the comparatively late rabbinic (hyperbolic?) claim that taxes from the villages of Cabul, Shikhin, and Magdala were of such a sum that they had to be carried to Jerusalem, with a gloss adding “in a wagon” (y. Ta‘an. 4:69a; cf. Lam. Rab. 2:2). The text also says that these villages were destroyed; perhaps the First Revolt is meant, but the evidence is slim.8 The Yerushalmi passage blames Shikhin’s destruction on sorceries, which could refer to the practice of Christianity there.9 At the same time, we have evidence that its residents practiced purity, which, at the end of the first century ce, is not incompatible with following Jesus’ halakhah.10 All of these references allow the excavators to develop hypotheses to test in the field. The excavation of Shikhin, therefore, has implications for the Jewish settlement of Galilee and Jewish social identity, as well as for the Galilean road system and economy in the period that concerns us in these volumes.11 It also stands to tell us about the relationship between a prominent Galilean city and a village under its jurisdiction. 7.  For the presence of olive and wine presses at the site, see below. The fertility of Shikhin’s mustard plants made an impression in one text. See y. Peah 7:4 (in this anecdote, a single cutting from a mustard branch grows to sufficient size to cover a potter’s booth); cf. b. Ketub. 111b. 8.  No other text that we currently have tells us Cabul, Shikhin, or Magdala was destroyed in the Bar Kokhba (133–135 ce) or Gallus (350–352 ce) revolts. Of these three towns, Josephus tells us only about the destruction of Magdala during the First Revolt, but only if the identification of ancient Magdala with Josephus’s Taricheae is correct (the evidence is strong; see “Magdala” article by Stefano De Luca in this volume, pp. 280–342. 9.  Admittedly the connection is conjectural. A much later passage in b. Sanh. 43a–b mentions the execution of a sorcerer, Yeshu, along with five disciples, during Passover, by stoning and hanging. A reference to a Christian from Sikhnin (‫)סכנין‬, whom R. Eleazar met in Sepphoris, occurs in t. H|ul. 2:24 and y. ‘Abod. Zar. 16b–17a. This town, Sigoph, which Josephus fortified (J.W. 2.573; Life 188; not to be confused with a town of the same name in the Golan, which he also fortified), lies several kilometers to the north of Shikhin. Again, the mention of Sepphoris and Sikhnin in such close proximity might indicate that śknîn was confused with šîh\în in conversation. 10.  The Tosefta (Nid. 8:6) credits R. Yose with the anecdote that people at Shikhin took for granted the uncleanliness of a cave (‫)מערה‬. After a thorough examination assured them the cave was clean, while digging in it, they discovered a mortar filled with human bones. 11.  See chapters by Oakman, Overman, Safrai, Mattila, and James F. Strange in David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange, eds., Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods, vol. 1, Life, Culture, and Society (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014).

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Figure A. Broken and weathered sarcophagus on Jebel Qat, east of ­Shikhin. Note the four-petaled flowers with garlands flanking a tabula ansata. Similar sarcophagi can be found built into the corners of the socalled citadel on the acropolis of Sepphoris. Drawing by Dina Shalem.

Surveys and excavations confirm the predominantly Jewish identity of Shikhin’s residents.12 This history of the site rests on preliminary pottery readings. Shikhin’s growth between the Hellenistic and Early Roman periods follows a well-established pattern at many eastern Galilean Jewish sites.13 Archaeological investigations have also turned up thirteen sarcophagi, both complete and fragmentary, both in tombs and on the surface, most of them apparently plain; two have one long side decorated in what Mordechai Aviam calls the Sepphorean nonrepresentational style (see fig. A).14 The excavators have found fragments of stone vessels and incense shovels, a fragment of a first- or second-century oil lamp decorated with a menorah flanked by palm fronds (fig. B), three mikva’ot (probably used by people leaving the cemetery south of the village), butchered bones only from kosher animals and following kosher practices,15 and remains of a Roman-period synagogue. Other lamp fragments have no decora12.  We do not yet have evidence to suggest that non-Jewish people, or non-observant Jewish people, lived at Shikhin. Admittedly, one cannot mount a strong argument from the absence of evidence. 13.  See the discussion below and the summary of survey results and following discussion in Leibner, Settlement and History, 309–76. Unlike many other Galilean sites, Shikhin does not show a floruit in the third century. Currently, the Shikhin Excavation Project is following the dating of archaeological periods in use by the USF Excavations at Sepphoris, modified for that city from those developed in the Meiron Excavation Project. 14.  Mordechai Aviam, “The Necropolis of Sepphoris: The Results of Field Survey,” in A City Set on A Hill: Festschrift in Honor of James F. Strange (ed. Daniel Warner and Donald Binder; Mountain Home, Ariz.: Borderstone, 2014), 4–16. 15.  The number of recovered bones admittedly has been quite small.

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Figure B. Lamp fragment showing a seven-branched menorah flanked by palm fronds. Drawing by the author.

tion, or they show such things as geometric patterns, dots, amphorae, leaves, vines, tendrils, grapes, and pomegranates. History of Investigation16 Heinrich Graetz first suggested the linguistic connection between the sages’ Šîh\în (“caves” or “pits”)17 and Josephus’s Asōchis, allowing scholars to read both names as references to the same town.18 Following W. Oehler,19 many scholars located Shikhin at Tell el-Badawiya, now commonly called Tel H|annaton.20 In 1988, a survey by a team from the University of South Florida (USF) Excavations at Sepphoris ruled out this location and made a strong case for the nameless hill near Sepphoris currently under excavation by the Shikhin Excavation Project. The survey team confined its work to the two northern hilltops. Among many features of archaeological interest on the northernmost hill, they found pottery wasters near the southern portion of the village’s clay pit (farmers at a local kibbutz reported that they had filled in the northern part, which extended into their agricultural fields). Part 2 of the survey’s publication included a discussion by David Adan-Bayewitz, Isadore Perlman, and their team, who, as part of an ongoing project, examined samples of pottery and pottery wasters collected on the hill. Neutron 16.  For a fuller account, see James F. Strange, Dennis E. Groh, and Thomas R. W. Longstaff, “Excavations at Sepphoris: The Location and Identification of Shikhin (Part 1),” IEJ 44 (1994): 217–21. 17. Klein, Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas, 69. 18.  Heinrich Graetz, Geschichte der Juden vom Untergang des jüdischen Staates bis zum Abschluss des Talmuds (Berlin: Oskar Leiner, 1853), 3:123 n. 2; cited in J. F. Strange et al., “Excavations at Sepphoris (Part 1),” 217. 19.  W. Oehler, “Die Ortschaften und Brenzen Galilaäs nach Joesphus,” ZDPV 27 (1905): 1–26; 49–74; cited in Strange et al., “Excavations at Sepphoris (Part 1),” 217. 20.  Map ref. 174-243 (OIG). See Yoram Tsafrir, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green, eds., Tabula Imperii Romani Judaea-Palaestina: Maps and Gazetteer (Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994), 70 (the TIR came out in 1994, the year that the USF survey published its first article).

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activation analysis21 led Adan-Bayewitz and Perlman to conclude that storage jars made at Shikhin constituted a significant portion of jars of that type found in surveys and excavations of Roman-period Galilean sites. Storage jars, serving bowls, and bell (a.k.a. “Sepphorean”) bowls made at Shikhin accounted for 45 percent of the pottery excavated on the acropolis of Sepphoris by the University of South Florida Excavations.22 Coupled with Adan-Bayewitz’s and Perlman’s findings about Kefar H|ananya, a town at the transition between the Upper and Lower Galilees, this information had a notable impact on discussions of the Galilean economy, particularly in scholarship on the so-called historical Jesus, and to a lesser extent on the Judaism of the Talmuds. References to Shikhin, most of them repeating Adan-Bayewitz’s and Perlman’s findings, litter recent books and articles about Jesus’ Galilee.23 Following the 2010 season of the USF Excavations at Sepphoris,24 in the summer of 2011, a team headed by the author (Samford University, director) and Prof. David Fiensy (Kentucky Christian University, associate director) conducted a second survey of Shikhin with the goal of sinking the first archaeological probes in 2012.25 This survey included all three of Shikhin’s hilltops and, because of time constraints, only part of Jebel Qat to the east. Mordechai Aviam (Kinneret Institute for Galilean Archaeology at Kinneret Academic College) assisted in the survey, and in 2012 he joined the Shikhin Excavation Project as associate director. Four excavation seasons occurred between 2012 and 2015, and more are planned for a number of future seasons. Population The 2011 survey located a rock-cut tomb on the middle hilltop, as well as a few more cave openings that may also indicate tombs. On Shikhin’s northern hill, about 200 meters south of archaeological Field I, a broken sarcophagus and its lid were reused in a field wall. Near the foot of the eastern slope of Shikhin’s middle hill, the 2011 survey also located the foundations of a small building, perhaps a mausoleum similar to the tomb of Rabbi Judah Nasiya southeast of Shikhin (between Shikhin and Sepphoris). On the western slope of Jebel Qat to the east of Shikhin, the survey team found a rock-cut tomb with arcosolia and four nearby sarcophagi 21.  David Adan-Bayewitz, F. Asaro, H. V. Michel, and I. Perlman, “The Evidence from Neutron Activation Analysis,” in James F. Strange, Dennis E. Groh, and Thomas R. W. Longstaff, “Excavations at Sepphoris: The Location and Identification of Shikhin (Part 2),” IEJ 45 (1995): 180–87. 22.  David Adan-Bayewitz and I. Perlman, “The Local Trade of Sepphoris in the Roman Period,” IEJ 40 (1990): 160, table 2. See also Strange et al., “Excavations at Sepphoris (Part 1),” 227; Adan-Bayewitz et al., “Evidence from Neutron Activation Analysis,” 182. 23.  See, for example, many of the chapters in this volume’s companion, Galilee I: Life, Culture, and Society. 24.  The first dig season happened in the summer of 1983, with the opening of probes around the so-called citadel and in the theater. See “Sepphoris: Jewel of the Galilee” by James F. Strange in this volume, pp. 22–38. 25.  See James Riley Strange, “Preliminary Report of the Samford University Survey of Shikhin,” HA-ESI 124 (2012): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.asp?id=2195&mag_id=119.

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Figure C. Map of the three hilltops of Shikhin. By the author.

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Figure D. Map of the northern hilltop of Shikhin and with Jebel Qat to the east. By the author.

sitting on the hillside within a few meters of the tomb.26 The excavations, burials, and other elements visible on the surface allow us to estimate the town’s greatest extent conservatively at 2.3 hectares (5.7 acres) on the northern hilltop, which in turn permits a cautious population estimation of between 57527 and 90028 at the height of Shikhin’s life, a number that falls within Fiensy’s category of a “village” (Greek kōmē, κώμη; Hebrew kāpār, ‫)כפר‬.29

26.  The sarcophagi are probably in situ: all are arranged east to west with the head in the east. 27.  I use the coefficient of 25 people per dunam derived from Magen Broshi, “Methodology of Population Estimates: The Roman-Byzantine Period as a Case Study,” in Bread, Wine, Walls and Scrolls (JSPSup 36; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 86–92; reprinted from Biblical Archaeology Today, 1990: Proceedings of the Second International Congress on Biblical Archaeology (ed. A. Biram and J. Aviram; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1993), 420–25. 28.  I base this estimate on the coefficient of 400 people per hectare (40 per dunam), accepted by Magen Broshi in an earlier work. This should be taken as an absolute maximum, since Broshi considers only urban populations, which typically are denser than village populations. See Magen Broshi, “The Population of Western Palestine in the Roman-Byzantine Period,” in Bread, Wine, Walls and Scrolls, 93–109; reprinted from BASOR 236 (1979): 1–10; cf. Yigal Shiloh, “The Population of Iron Age Palestine in the Light of a Sample Analysis of Urban Plans, Areas, and Population Density,” BASOR 239 (1980): 25–35. 29.  See David Fiensy’s chapter, “The Village,” in Galilee I: Life, Culture, and Society.

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The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages Roman Roads

Shikhin sat at the same major intersection of highways that Sepphoris oversaw. The Via Maris turned inland south of Dora and headed for the Sea of Galilee, passing Meggido, and just north of Shikhin it met up with this east–west highway.30 The 2011 survey found two uninscribed Roman milestones at the foot of the eastern slope of the hill. The stones, which probably date no earlier than the second century ce, lie too close together (around 80 m) to be in situ. Rather, both were probably pushed to their current locations when local farmers bulldozed the wadi east of the hill to make agricultural fields. The road descended north and slightly west from Sepphoris, running through the wadi and skirting the foot of Shikhin on the northeast (where curbstones are still visible), after which it headed northwest to meet up with the Acre/Ptolemais–Tiberias highway.31 A length of a similar road, located farther east, which descended from Sepphoris toward the north, probably to meet the same highway, has been excavated at the modern village of Hosha‘ayah.32 In the second century ce, Romans probably paved an earlier road. Cutting a section across the road will test this hypothesis. In antiquity, anyone traveling to Sepphoris from Acco/Ptolemais to the west would have passed by the foot of Shikhin before climbing the hill to Sepphoris, and Shikhin would have been the last suburb of Sepphoris that travelers passed on their way to Acco. Given its situation, and taking into account when the various cities were built, we can say that in the Late Second Temple through mishnaic periods, hypothetically at least, good roads gave Shikhin’s residents unimpeded access to Sepphoris, Acco, Tiberias, Legio, Caesarea, and Scythopolis, not to mention the many other villages that peppered the Lower Galilee. Water No natural spring waters Shikhin. Accordingly, the villagers relied entirely on cisterns cut into the hill’s soft chalk to catch runoff from the abundant winter rains.33 The 1988 survey team reported finding thirty-three cisterns and possible cisterns, along with two channels they iden30.  See Composite Map 4C in the front matter of this volume. See also the chapter on Galilean Roads by James F. Strange in Galilee I: Life, Culture, and Society. Chapters on Sepphoris, Karm er-Ras, Nazareth, and Kh. Qana mention this highway as well. 31.  This road is visible on 1945 aerial photos obtained from the Survey of Israel. 32.  Karen Covello-Paran and Yotam Tepper, “Zippori north: Final Report,” HA-ESI 123 (2011): A-5752; http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1674&mag_id=118. 33.  For a discussion of Galilee’s rains, see Agnes Choi, “Never the Two Shall Meet? Urban–Rural Interaction in Lower Galilee,” in Galilee I: Life, Culture, and Society , 301. Relying on the work of Efraim Orni and Elisha Efrat, Choi reports that Galilee currently receives between 400 and 700 mm (16 and 28 in.) of rain annually. See also J. F. Strange et al., Excavations at Sepphoris, 12. In “Nazareth” article in this volume (pp. 167–80), J. F. Strange

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tified as sections of aqueduct.34 In several cases, villagers cut cisterns and underground caves into bedrock within a few meters of one another, probably because they were making full use of the exposed soft limestone. The caves may have served both as work and as storage spaces for some of Shikhin’s industries. Natural terraces formed by vertical and horizontal fissures in the limestone bedrock step down the sides of Shikhin. At some point, people took advantage of the northern hill’s terraces by building walls along their edges to retain both soil and moisture. Many upper courses of these walls contain architectural fragments and even sarcophagi and so were probably built after the village was abandoned, but lower courses might have existed while it was populated. Shikhin’s hillsides, therefore, might have supported fields for cultivating grains, legumes, vegetables, grapes, and olives (olive trees are cultivated on the northern hill and part of Jebel Qat today), and other foods. Today, volunteer capers, za‘atar (hyssop), and wild asparagus sprout on the hill, so we can imagine that Shikhin’s residents had access to many naturally growing herbs, spices, and seeds. Activities and Industries 1. Olive and Grape Pressing The surveys of the northern hill located a fragment of the lower part of an olive crusher and remnants of a screw press for olives.35 Evidence of grape pressing can be found on all three of Shikhin’s hills and on Jebel Qat. Grain cracking also occurred on Jebel Qat, as indicated by the presence of an open cut into the bedrock there. 2. Grinding and Weaving Fragments of both mortars and querns (types of grain grinding stones) made of basalt found on the hill indicate that villagers produced flour in or near the village, which is evidence that they grew their own grain (evidence of plowing shows that grain was certainly cultivated on the hill after the village was abandoned). These grinders, which are ubiquitous at Galilean sites of the period, also suggest that Shikhin traded with settlements near the Sea of Galilee, where basalt is the native stone. About ten loom weights and several spindle whorls recovered in the course of the excavations supply evidence of wool production and weaving. says that Nazareth, a little over five miles distant from Shikhin, receives an annual rainfall of between 500 and 800 mm (20 to 32 in.). 34. Strange et al., “Excavations at Sepphoris (Part 2),” 173–77. The 2011 survey located thirty-two cisterns and possible cisterns. 35. Ibid.

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The Archaeological Record from Cities, Towns, and Villages 3. Stone Quarrying

As is typical in villages all over Israel, Shikhin and Jebel Qat contain many stone quarries. Because the stones were square-cut, they most likely were intended for the ongoing construction at Sepphoris. 4. Pottery Manufacture Currently, evidence of Shikhin’s famous pottery workshops comes from Field I, although wasters, burnt stones, and what are probably pieces of kilns have been found on the surface to the north of and downhill from Field I, where centuries of winter rains have washed them. Field I contains remnants of at least three buildings, all of which have been badly disturbed by robbing and plowing. Floors and founding courses of many surviving walls lie within centimeters of the surface, and the plowing of the top of the hill, which probably stopped in 1948, scarred the surviving upper courses of many walls and the surface of bedrock as well. Nearly all soil loci excavated so far result from human disturbance (plowing the field and robbing stones) or human fill operations. At present, the excavators can date only the final abandonment with confidence. All activities associated with the buildings ceased before the earthquake of 363. The pottery assemblage recovered in both surveys and all three excavation seasons allows the following preliminary conclusions about the settlement: (1) small amounts of pottery from the Iron II through Early Hellenistic periods indicate some human activity on the hill in that time, and (2) there was a significant population increase in the Late Hellenistic period, before pottery production began at the site, according to our current evidence. (3) The pottery counts surge in the Early Roman period and decline through the Late Roman period. Pottery manufacturing, rather than population growth alone, probably explains part of this increase. (4) The pottery counts decline following the Early Roman period, and very little dates later than the fourth century: we have found very few Byzantine and Islamic sherds, although we have lamps and lamp fragments from the Early Islamic period.36 The volume of pottery found at Shikhin suggests that its potters produced more vessels than its residents could use. The numismatic evidence supports this range of dates but shows a preponderance of coins (over 40 percent) from the second century bce (these are Tyrian, Seleucid, and Hasmonean), with the number of coins dropping off sharply in the Roman periods. The absence of thirdcentury ce coins among the coins found to date is arresting and requires further investigation. 36.  Three factors pose a challenge as we attempt to link the numbers of sherds recovered to Shikhin’s population in the three Roman periods. First, we have concentrated our excavations on the crown of the northern hill of Shikhin. (Our pottery profile, however, does correlate well with pottery recovered in both surveys.) Second, pottery manufacture for export—rather than for use by the population alone—probably accounts for a significant part of the surge in Early Roman pottery found. Finally, there is some question about when to date the horizons between the Roman periods. For example, does the Early Roman period end in 70, as the USF Excavations at Sepphoris date it, or in 135, as the Joint Expedition to Sepphoris and Duke University Excavations do (Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers, eds., The Pottery from Ancient Sepphoris [Sepphoris Excavation Reports 1; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2013], 4–5)?

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The northernmost squares of Field I (fig. E) reveal walls of two or more structures, some of which are associated with pottery and lamp production, although the excavations have not yet uncovered kilns, which probably lie north and east of our area, making use of the prevailing westerly winds to carry smoke and ash away from the village. We will be able to date the construction of the buildings when we dig wall foundations. Everywhere in the northern buildings of Field I, the excavators find the same basic sequence. (1) Villagers first cut the soft bedrock, probably quarrying for building stones (providing stones for nearby Sepphoris?) but also creating vats or pools (A and E). At least that is the consequence of their operations. (2) The reuse of these voids in the bedrock marks the second phase in the sequence. In more than one place, people built walls (C) above and more or less flush with the vertical faces of cut bedrock (see I.5 and I.8 in fig. E). A stub of a wall (B) in I.5, made up to the cut face of bedrock, may be contemporary with this building phase or may predate it. Some circular and square holes that survive in bedrock (most notably in I.3 and I.5) apparently supported superstructures for industries associated with the buildings. (3) Probably after the house whose southwest corner survives in I.5 was abandoned, people built a wall for a building to the south (D) parallel to the house’s southern wall, extending some meters to the west. In I.3, people made up a low, plastered bench (F) to the northern face of the southern wall of this building. They cut a threshold for a narrow door directly into the bedrock foundation of the southern wall. (4) They filled the void in I.5 and I.8 with over 1.5 m of pottery manufacturing waste in order to support a plaster floor (E), which they laid level with the uppermost surviving courses of the house walls. Seasonal plowing badly damaged this and some other plaster floors near the modern surface. In I.6, people transformed a void cut into the bedrock into a pool (A) for holding water by plastering the sides, and they increased its volume by building a plastered wall (A) on top of the vertical face of the rock, thus raising the sides of the pool. Currently, the hypothesis is that the pool served the levigation of clay, but other uses are certainly plausible. People made the pool at around the same time that they made the floor in I.5, because they built the pool’s wall against a supporting fill of pottery waste similar to what lay under the floor. Also in the fourth century, someone filled in the pool (but without the same concentration of pottery waste) and laid a plaster floor over it. This floor extends into I.4 to the south. In both places that contain fill made from pottery waste, the vast majority of the pottery dates to the three Roman periods. Because most are near the surface and damaged, as of yet we have recovered very little occupational evidence from floors in Field I. According to preliminary readings of Shikhin’s material culture, the third and fourth centuries saw several different construction operations in the northern part of Field I, followed by their dismantling or destruction and abandonment before the end of the Late Roman period. The final two construction phases made use of waste from pottery manufacturing. At this point, it is difficult to say what we may infer from so much activity and reuse of earlier structures in the Late Roman period. The waste is primarily in the form of thousands of pottery sherds, many of them “wasters” of various types: vessels that vitrified, turning green and in some cases slumping and

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Figure E. Northern squares of Field I: Pottery and lamp manufacture. Plan by J. F. Strange.

b­ ubbling in overheated kilns; jug bases that cracked before firing; gas bubbles and blowouts in vessel walls; and malformed rims. They also come from most of the common Galilean pottery forms: jars, jugs, bowls (including the “Sepphorean bowl” or “bell bowl”) kraters, and cooking pots. The waste also contains pieces of kiln walls and floors, as well as one fragment of the upper part of a potter’s wheel. Following the extensive work of Adan-Bayewitz and Perlman, many publications of ceramics from Galilean sites have mentioned the so-called Shikhin storage jar.37 Adan-Bayewitz and Perlman discussed the manufacture of bell jars and serving bowls (also known as “kraters”), as well as storage jars, at Shikhin and their presence at nearby Sepphoris, but emphasized the distribution of storage jars, which are the most commonly found storage jar type in the Galilee. The idea that some villages were pottery-production centers for the Galilee, and that two of these specialized in particular kinds of pots, bears further testing, now that the excavators are gaining a picture of the variety of vessel types that Shikhin produced.38 37.  Adan-Bayewitz describes it as “charaterised by an inset neck and everted rim” (“Evidence from Neutron Activation Analysis,” 182) and “the inset neck-everted rim storage jar” (“Local Trade of Sepphoris,” 168); this corresponds to Florentino Díez Fernández’s forms T 1.5 through T 1.10 (Cerámica común romana de la Galilea: Aproximaciones y diferencias con la cerámica del resto de Palestina y regiones circundantes (Madrid: Biblia y Fé, 1983), 137–43, 186–88. 38.  See Mordechai Aviam, “Kefar Hananya Ware Made in Yodefat,” in Roman Pottery in the Levant: Local Production and Regional Trade (ed. B. Genz, Y. Gerber, H. Hamel; Roman and Late Antique Mediterranean Pottery 2; Oxford: Archaeopress, 2013), 139–46.

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It is also worth noting that excavations at Shikhin are turning up an unusual number of uncommon pottery forms. Because some of these are wasters, we infer that Shikhin’s potters experimented with new forms.39 5. Lamp Production Evidence of ceramic oil lamp manufacturing at Shikhin has provided our most provocative discovery. We first entertained the possibility that Shikhin’s kilns produced lamps when we began to recover a surprising number of lamp fragments, some of them from unused lamps, in our first excavation season. For example, in 2012, out of eight archaeological squares and half-squares, most of which we did not complete, and most of which are relatively shallow, we registered 114 lamp fragments. We registered 406 lamp fragments after three seasons and twenty excavated squares. When we found our first three fragments of lamp molds in 2012, we knew we had strong evidence of lamp manufacturing at the site. We are now sure of it, having registered twenty fragments of lamp molds. By the end of the 2014 season, square I.8 alone had yielded 156 lamp fragments and fragments of six lamp molds. As with pottery, the number of lamp fragments and mold fragments suggests to us that Shikhin produced a surplus of lamps for export. All molds found so far are fragmentary, which suggests that they were broken during use or afterward as farmers plowed the abandoned hill. The location of mold fragments over parts of the synagogue indicates that plowing scattered them. We have found molds for Varda Sussman’s type RH4, what she calls “the northern undecorated mould-made lamps, whose top is circular with a sharp edge, with arched nozzles and no handles,”40 and which she dates to the first through second centuries ce (fig. F). These are relatively plain lamps, decorated only with concentric rings at the outer edge of the shoulder, produced with a compass, and sometimes with parallel curved lines on the nozzle, just below the fill hole. Corresponding to the mold shown in fig. F., we have one lamp fragment that matches, and we have the cutout for a fill hole that was fired, and hence survived (fig. G). On one side of the cutout, a knob corresponds to the hole made by the compass, and the potter left a thumbprint on the other. Another mold fragment found in I.13 shows pomegranates with a meandering tendril inside a circle between the fill hole and the edge, similar to an example

39.  Some apparently found a limited market in nearby Sepphoris, where the wide-mouthed jug JG3b was found: Marva Balouka, “Roman Pottery,” in The Pottery from Ancient Sepphoris (ed. Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers; Sepphoris Excavation Reports 1; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2012), 44; pl. 21:10–13. Examples have also been found at Shikhin, and Bellarmino Bagatti turned up similar forms in Nazareth (Gli scavi di Nazaret, vol. 1, Dalle origini al secolo XII [Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1967], 270, fig. 220, 10). Adan-Bayewitz has already suggested that this form was made at Shikhin; see Balouka, “Roman Pottery,” 44. 40.  Varda Sussman, Roman Period Oil Lamps in the Holy Land: Collection of the Israel Antiquities Authority (BAR International Series 2447; Oxford: Archaeopress, 2012), 92.

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Figure F

Figure I

   

Figure H

Figure J

Figure K

Figures F–K Mold and lamp fragments from Shikhin. Photos by Dror Maayan.

from Mishmar ha-’Emeq at the southwestern edge of the Jezreel Plain (fig. H).41 In 2013, in I.8, we discovered a fragment of a mold for the bottom of a “Darom” (“southern”)-style lamp. This fragment includes the nozzle and the section joining with the body (fig I). A lamp nozzle found nearby in I.5 is a good match (fig. J). In 2014, we found very near the surface a fragment of a mold for the top of a lamp that is clearly of the Darom style (fig. K). One can see part of the nozzle and part of one “wing” or “volute” left of the nozzle, with curved fluting on the nozzle neck, and with a radiating pattern inside a raised double circle on the shoulder. These lamps are Sussman’s type RH6, the northern variety of the Darom lamp. Sussman discusses the production of the Darom lamp in “the Judean Shephelah and the western slopes of the Hebron Hills,”42 in the late first century (after 70) and at least up to the Bar Kokhba revolt. She speculates that a northern workshop produced the wheel-made “tea-pot” lamp (RW2; manufactured from the middle or end of the first century bce through the first half of the first century ce), the well-known wheel-made Herodian lamp with the knife-pared nozzle (RH3; from the end of the first century bce through 135), the undecorated 41. Ibid., 313. 42. Ibid., 113.

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mold-made lamp already mentioned (RH4; from the first through second centuries ce), and two types of decorated mold-made lamps, one without volutes/wings (RH5; from the mid- or late first century ce through the mid-second century ce) and one with (RH6; from the mid first century bce through the mid second century ce).43 We can now make a persuasive argument that Shikhin produced Darom-style lamps, or the ‫“( צפוני דרום נר‬northern-southern lamp”: Sussman’s type RH6). Because its workshops produced Darom-style lamps, Shikhin may also be the site of the northern workshop near Nazareth that Sussman suspected of making other wheel-made and mold-made lamps, or one such workshop. Because all molds are fragments, making it difficult to identify clearly the types of lamps made in them, aside from some unused knife-pared nozzles, we do not yet have strong evidence at Shikhin for the manufacture of lamps other than Sussman’s forms RH4 and RH6. We have been speculating that manufacture of the Darom-style lamps began at Shikhin in 135 ce or later, when Judeans whom the Romans expelled migrated into Galilee. This hypothesis links production of these lamps with Shikhin’s appearance on lists of the priestly divisions (see above). Shikhin’s pottery kilns and clays could have attracted southern lamp makers. Excavations at Khirbet Wadi H|amam, however, have turned up both undecorated mold-made lamps (RH4) and Darom-style mold-made lamps (RH6) “that are accurately dated to the first third of the 2nd c. ce and were found in a destruction layer rich with coins and pottery.”44 The secured dating of the loci suggests that the lamps arrived in H|amam before or around the time of the Bar Kokhba revolt, not after. If these lamps are from Shikhin—which we do not yet know—production of RH4 and RH6 began at Shikhin before 135. Synagogue Despite the fact that the excavators have not yet secured the date of the synagogue’s construction, the building is significant because it was unknown before our team found its remains in a terrace wall in 2011. Based on preliminary pottery readings, currently we infer that it was abandoned or destroyed before 363 ce along with the rest of the village. The founding course of a short stretch of what is probably an exterior wall of the synagogue reveals stones with bossing on their eastern faces. All have been cut from larger bossed stones, and all are clearly in secondary use and laid on bedrock, which in places has been cut and leveled to match the line and height of this founding course. These stones probably come from a fine home or public building of the Early Roman period.

43.  Ibid., 75, 84, 92–94, 96. Sussman mentions the area near Nazareth specifically for the workshop that produced RW2, RH3, and RH6. 44.  E-mail exchange among the author, Uzi Leibner, and Mordechai Aviam, November 6, 2014. See the chapter by Uzi Leibner in this volume, pp. 343–61.

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Figure L. Southern squares of Field I: Synagogue remains. Plan by J. F. Strange.

Judging from architectural fragments found in 2011 in the terrace wall that currently marks the western limit of Field I (fig. L), as well as fragments turned up in the excavation, we can say that most of the synagogue was built from locally quarried nari, the upper layer of the local chalk limestone. We have found two badly battered and weathered fragments of Ionic capitals. One modified Attic column base has a diameter of 1.03 m at the lowest torus. The lowest part of the column shaft (the section integrated into the base) measures .76 m in diameter. Such a massive column (estimated to reach around 7 m in height) does not appear to fit the interior of the building and perhaps should be located in a porch. Alternatively, it may have originally supported another building. One of the two sections of heart-shaped columns we have found has lobes measuring around .60 m in diameter, similar to other battered and reused column drums found elsewhere in Field I. This might give us the dimensions of the synagogue’s interior columns: based on standard dimensions, a diameter of 60 cm allows us to project columns between 5.5 and 6 m in height, including all of their elements. Two pieces of threshold (fig. M) lying near each other were carved from hard limestone. Unequal in length (1.47 m and 1.28 m), they create a single threshold 2.75 m long (a little more than 9 Roman ft) and .91 m wide (a little more than 3 Roman ft), accommodating a double-leafed door 1.58 meters in width (a little over 5 Roman ft). The front edges and the door slots of the stones do not line up well. Accordingly, the halves may be spoils from two different thresholds. In the synagogue building, the entire threshold sat on a large foundation stone that, in combination with a parallel slot cut in bedrock, accommodated the width of the threshold.

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Figure M. Two pieces of synagogue threshold combined to create a single entry. Drawing by J. F. Strange

Remnants of plaster between 8 and 10 cm thick, some with two layers, found in a field wall bordering Field I to the east, suggest that the building had a plaster floor. Part of the floor might have been made of white mosaic, but to date only four tesserae have been found in the area of the synagogue, and none has turned up elsewhere. Fragments of roof tile in the area suggest that the synagogue had a peaked roof. Some fragments of red and yellow painted plaster found in Field I probably came from the synagogue’s walls. Excavations have yielded relatively few glass shards at the site, and many of them come from glass oil lamps that hung from chains. (We have recovered one piece of such a chain.) People did not typically use this type of lamp in homes, so the lamps probably illuminated the synagogue’s interior. To date, we have found no inscriptions or artwork associated with the synagogue. Judging from architectural fragments, Shikhin’s residents built a synagogue largely of local, soft limestone, in basilical or broadhouse style, probably not earlier than the second century, reusing pieces of an earlier private villa or public building. Further work will date the building’s founding securely and determine its basic layout and orientation. Conclusion The picture emerging from texts, surveys, and the excavation of Shikhin is that soon after an influx of Jewish settlers moved there near the transition from the Early to the Late Hellenistic periods, Shikhin became a village of some importance, perhaps in part because of its associations with its nearest neighbor, Sepphoris. It was feasible for someone to live in one and work in the other. Moreover, Sepphoris and Shikhin oversaw the same intersection of major high-

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ways, and Shikhin’s residents had access to these routes, as well as to the network of smaller roads and tracks that knit Galilee’s villages into cultural, trade, political, and kinship systems. Sages knew about is high-quality clays and pottery, its storage jars, and its lamps because people all over the Galilee, including its cities, owned these products of Shikhin’s industry. Throughout its relatively brief history, Shikhin maintained an observant Jewish population, although we cannot rule out the presence of non-Jews in the village. Its residents adopted features of Roman architecture for their synagogue (as was the Galilean custom), while keeping purity and otherwise maintaining a Jewish—that is, Judean—identity. These ideas will take clearer shape in the coming seasons. Bibliography Adan-Bayewitz, David, F. Asaro, H. V. Michel, and I. Perlman. “The Evidence from Neutron Activation Analysis.” In James F. Strange, Dennis E. Groh, and Thomas R. W. Longstaff. “Excavations at Sepphoris: The Location and Identification of Shikhin (Part 2).” IEJ 45 (1995): 180–87. Adan-Bayewitz, David, and I. Perlman. “The Local Trade of Sepphoris in the Roman Period.” IEJ 40 (1990): 153–72. Aviam, Mordechai. “Finds from a Burial Cave at Dabburiya.” In Eretz Zafon: Studies in Galilean Archaeology, edited by Zvika Gal, 135–39 (Hebrew section). Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2002. ———. “Kefar Hananya Ware Made in Yodefat.” In Roman Pottery in the Levant: Local Production and Regional Trade, edited by B. Genz, Y. Gerber, and H. Hamel, 139–46. Roman and Late Antique Mediterranean Pottery 2. Oxford: Archaeopress, 2013. ———. “The Necropolis of Sepphoris: The Results of Field Survey.” In A City Set on A Hill: Essays in Honor of James F. Strange, edited by Daniel Warner and Donald Binder, 4–16. Mountain Home, Ariz.: Borderstone, 2014. Avi-Yonah, Michael. “A List of Priestly Courses from Nazareth.” IEJ 12 (1962): 137–39. ———. “The Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses.” In The Teacher’s Yoke: Essays in Memory of Henry Trantham, edited by E. Jerry Vardaman and James L. Garrett Jr., 46–57. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 1964. Bagatti, Bellarmino. Gli scavi di Nazaret. Vol. 1, Dalle origini al secolo XII. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1969. Balouka, Marva. “Roman Pottery.” In The Pottery from Ancient Sepphoris, edited by Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers, 13–129. Sepphoris Excavation Reports 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2013. Broshi, Magen. “Methodology of Population Estimates: The Roman-Byzantine Period as a Case Study.” In Bread, Wine, Walls and Scrolls, 86–92. JSPSup 36. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001. Reprinted from Biblical Archaeology Today, 1990: Proceedings

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of the Second International Congress on Biblical Archaeology, edited by A. Biram and J. Aviram, 420–25. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1993. ———. “The Population of Western Palestine in the Roman-Byzantine Period.” In Bread, Wine, Walls and Scrolls, 93–109. JSPSup 36. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001. Reprinted from BASOR 236 (1979): 1–10. Covello-Paran, Karen, and Yotam Tepper. “Zippori North: Final Report.” HA-ESI 123 (2011): A-5752: http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1674&mag_id=118. Fernández, Díez Florentino. Cerámica comun romana de la Galilea: Aproximaciones y diferencias con la cerámica del resto de Palestina y regiones circundantes. Madrid: Biblia y Fé, 1983. Graetz, Heinrich. Geschichte der Juden vom Untergang des jüdischen Staates bis zum Abschluss des Talmuds. Vol. 3. Berlin: Oskar Leiner, 1853. Klein, Samuel. Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas. Leipzig: R. Haupt, 1909. Leibner, Uzi. Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee. TSAJ 127. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Meyers, Eric M., and Carol L. Meyers, eds. The Pottery from Ancient Sepphoris. Sepphoris Excavation Reports 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2013. Meyers, Eric M., A. Thomas Kraabel, and James F Strange. Ancient Synagogue Excavations at Khirbet Shema‘, Upper Galilee, Israel, 1970–1972. Meiron Excavation Project 1. AASOR 42. Durham, N.C.: Published for the American Schools of Oriental Research by Duke University Press, 1976. Meyers, Eric M., and Carol L Meyers. Excavations at Ancient Nabratein: Synagogue and Environs. Meiron Excavation Project 6. Winona Lake, Ind.: Published for the American Schools of Oriental Research by Eisenbrauns, 2009. Meyers, Eric M., Carol L. Meyers, and James F. Strange. Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush H|alav. Meiron Excavation Project 5. Winona Lake, Ind.: Published for the American Schools of Oriental Research by Eisenbrauns, 1990. Meyers, Eric M., James F. Strange, and Carol L. Meyers. Excavations at Ancient Meiron, Upper Galilee, Israel, 1971–72, 1974–75. Meiron Excavation Project 3. Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1981. Oehler, W. “Die Ortschaften und Brenzen Galilaäs nach Joesphus.” ZDPV 27 (1905): 1–26, 49–74. Rabbinowitz, J. Midrash Rabbah. Vol. 7. London: Soncino, 1983. Shiloh, Yigal. “The Population of Iron Age Palestine in the Light of a Sample Analysis of Urban Plans, Areas, and Population Density.” BASOR 239 (1980): 25–35. Strange, James F., Dennis E. Groh, and Thomas R. W. Longstaff. “Excavations at Sepphoris: The Location and Identification of Shikhin (Part 1).” IEJ 44 (1994): 216–27. ———.“Excavations at Sepphoris: The Location and Identification of Shikhin (Part 2).” IEJ 45 (1995): 171–87.

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Strange, James F., Thomas R. W. Longstaff, and Dennis E. Groh. Excavations at Sepphoris. Vol. 1, University of South Florida Probes in the Citadel and Villa. Brill Reference Library of Judaism 22. Leiden: Brill, 2006. Strange, James Riley. “Preliminary Report of the Samford University Survey of Shikhin.” HA-ESI 124 (2012): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.asp?id=2195&mag_id=119. Sussman, Varda. Ornamented Jewish Oil-Lamps from the Destruction of the Second Temple through the Bar-Kokhba Revolt. Jerusalem: Aris & Phillips, Israel Exploration Society, 1982 (Hebrew edition, Jerusalem: Bialik Institute and the Israel Exploration Society, 1972). ———. Roman Period Oil Lamps in the Holy Land: Collection of the Israel Antiquities Authority. BAR International Series 2447. Oxford: Archaeopress, 2012. Tsafrir, Yoram, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green, eds. Tabula Imperii Romani Judaea-Palaestina: Maps and Gazetteer. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994. Vardaman, Jerry. “Introduction to the Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses.” In The Teacher’s Yoke: Essays in Memory of Henry Trantham, edited by E. Jerry Vardaman and James L. Garrett Jr., 42–44. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 1964.

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4 Yodefat — Jotapata A Jewish Galilean Town at the End of the Second Temple Period: The Results of an Archaeological Project45 Mordechai Aviam The town of Jotapata is almost entirely built on precipitous cliffs, being surrounded by ravines so deep that sight fails in the attempt to fathom the abyss. . . . Concealed by other mountains surrounding it, the town was quite invisible until one came right up to it. —Josephus J.W. 3.158–160 Not only was Yodefat/Jotapata invisible in antiquity; the site was all but invisible throughout the history of research, rarely visited by scholars and surveyors and almost did not appear in the archaeological records since its destruction in the summer of 67 ce until the summer of 1992. The site of Yodefat is located on an isolated hill, the peak of which is 419 m above sea level. It is surrounded by deep ravines from three sides and connected by a gentle saddle from the north to Mount Miamin. This topographical position is accurately described by Josephus Flavius. The hill is shaped by two elevations: the high rounded peak with a rocky summit and a southern, moderate ledge. Remains of ancient buildings were found all over the hill including cut and sunken foundations on the summit.

45.  Although there is not yet a final report, a detailed study of the excavation can be found in Mordechai Aviam, “Yodefat: A Case Study in the Development of the Jewish Settlement in the Galilee During the Second Temple Period” (in Hebrew; Ph.D. diss., Bar-Ilan University, 2005).

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Figure A. Reconstruction of Ancient Yodefat by Brian Lalor. Used with permission.

The goals of the excavations were (1) to date the walls of which some segments could be seen on the surface around the perimeter of the hill; (2) to look for evidence of war and determine whether this site is the place of Jotapata that is described by Josephus; and (3) to locate and uncover residential units in an attempt to study first-century Galilean rural life, as most of the pottery collected in surveys was from this period. During seven seasons of excavations, from 1992 to 1999, a total of about 2,500 sq m was excavated, about half of it along the walls and the rest in the residential areas.1 Early Stage The earliest pottery found during the survey and excavations is dated to the Persian period, but nowhere at the dig did we identify any built structure dated to this period. In our survey, about 1.  The excavations were directed for the seven seasons by the author on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). For the first season, Douglas Edwards was a codirector on behalf of the University of Puget Sound. For the first three seasons, David Adan-Bayewitz was a codirector on behalf of the Bar-Ilan University. W. S. Green was the educational director. For the first two seasons J. Andrew Overman was an assistant director.

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Figure B. GCW Jar with two typical Hellenistic jars. Photo by Mordechai Aviam.

30 percent of the pottery, as well as some coins, was dated to the Hellenistic period. Coins and much pottery from the Hellenistic period were found in the Roman-period layer. A large quantity of the Hellenistic pottery belonged to the Galilean Coarse Ware (GCW) group.2 In three areas we identified the Hellenistic layer, one on the eastern slope below the Roman-period houses, the second below the Late Hellenistic (Hasmonean) wall in the northeast and the largest spot below the Hasmonean wall on the west, where two chambers lacking doorways (probably for storage), were discovered. On the floor of one of the rooms there were two large GCW pithoi and an imported amphora from Rhodes dated to the second half of the second century bce, all covered by a layer of ash. The discovery of a Hellenistic-period oil lamp decorated with Eros figures, together with the GCW vessels, indicates that the inhabitants of the Hellenistic village were pagans, similar to many other sites in Upper Galilee and northern Lower Galilee. Together with other evidence from Galilee, we believe that this destruction layer is evidence for the Hasmonean wars in the Galilee and its annexation to the young Hasmonean state. It seems 2.  For Galilean Coarse Ware, see Rafael Frankel, Nimrod Getzov, Mordechai Aviam, and Avi Degani, Settlement Dynamics and Regional Diversity in Ancient Upper Galilee (IAA Reports 14; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2001), 61–62.

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Figure C. Terraced houses the eastern slope. Photo by Howard Smithline.

as if this Hellenistic village occupied the top of the hill and was not fortified until its conquest by the Hasmoneans. During the Hasmonean reign, a strong wall was built, surrounding the summit with two strong towers controlling the northern accessible side. The Early Roman Period Town: Economy and Daily Life of Galilean Jews Four areas of dwellings were excavated: two on the southern plateau, one on the southern slope, and one on the steep eastern slope. The first three areas yielded a simple housing system. The houses are built of field stones; no remains of wall plaster were found, which means that they were plastered with mud plaster. Floors were packed soil or smoothed rock. Cut stones or ashlars were used only at the doorway where the wooden frame of the door would have been carefully attached. The houses and the entire town were not planned in advance but naturally developed as families grew. Narrow alleys separated the houses. As the town did not have a natural source of water (Josephus J.W. 3.181), each house had its own cistern with capacity large enough to supply water for the entire family and household.

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Wool Production In one of the courtyards, we uncovered the remains of a cooking oven (tabun), and nearby were home pottery vessels. In the same courtyard, about ten fired clay loom weights were uncovered within a layer of mud-roof. It seems that the house collapsed in the summer when the loom was on the roof. In total we have more than 250 loom weights from Yodefat, the largest number found at one site (comparable only to the finds from the fill of the cistern at Hellenistic Marissa/Maresha).

Figure D. Clay loom weights. Photo by Howard Smithline.

Information from animal bones retrieved at the site indicating more sheep (a high percentage of which were slaughtered at age five or more) than goats supports the understanding that spinning and weaving wool materials were an important part of Yodefat inhabitants’ livelihood, compensating for the lack of good arable land. Olive Oil Production In a cave on the southeastern slope, an oil press was found, proving that there was olive oil production at the town as well. The proximity between the cave and two nearby houses, each of which contained a mikveh, possibly supports other studies where it is suggested that in Jewish societies of the late Second Temple period the production of oil and wine was done “in purity.”3 3.  Ronni Reich, Miqwa’ot (Jewish Ritual Baths) in the Second Temple, Mishnaic, and Talmudic Periods (in Hebrew; Jerusalem: Yad Ben Zvi; Israel Exploration Society 2013), 255–56.

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Figure E. Tabun and vessels on destroyed floor. Photo by Howard Smithline.

Pottery Production Another important production of the people of Yodefat, and a great surprise for both archaeologists and historians, was the discovery of at least two pottery workshops, containing four pottery kilns, both located at the southern edge of the town. From the waste found around the kilns it is obvious that both cooking ware and storage jars were manufactured in the town, as well as other possible products such as bowls, oil lamps, stands, and loom weights. The cookware is identical in its shape and color to the well-known “Kefar Hananya” ware, and the jars are also known to have been produced in other villages’ production sites. It means that the Galilean cooking ware as well as the jars were not produced in one “center” but rather in many local producers’ kilns.4 Fresco House Another important surprise was the discovery of a section of a very rich mansion on the northern edge of the eastern slope. In this neighborhood, the houses were built along massive human-made terraces, rising up two or three stories. The uppermost building (only partially excavated) had one room, of which three of its walls were covered with colorful frescos of the 4.  See, Mordechai Aviam, “Kefar Hananya Ware Made in Yodefat,” in Roman Pottery in the Levant: Local Production and Regional Trade (ed. B. Genz, Y. Gerber, and H. Hamel; Roman and Late Antique Mediterranean Pottery 2; Oxford: Archaeopress, 2014), 139–46.

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second Pompeian style. The best parallels for these wall paintings were found in the Herodian palaces, the rich mansions in Second Temple–period Jerusalem and in a first-century mansion at Caesarea. Fallen chunks of frescos were also found in a couple of houses at Gamla.5 There was one more surprising element: the floor was frescoed in the design of black and red tiles (see image G-1a in the color photo gallery). Small Finds There were a few “small finds” that support the existence of wealth in the town. Among the pottery vessels retrieved from the area of the fresco house are a few parts of a multinozzle “knife pared,” gray oil lamp, which is a luxurious object, imported from Jerusalem.6 A pair of scale plates with the diameter of 5 cm informs us of the existence of delicate commodities in the town (fig. F). If there was a local dealer who sold expensive commodities such as fragrances or precious metals, there almost certainly were buyers who bought the merchandise. Another object is a large, iron door key (fig. G). Buying a lock and a key from a locksmith was expensive; if an ancient person invested in this security feature, he probably had something valuable to protect in the house. These discoveries shed important light on the question of how poor the Galileans were at the time of Jesus. The evidence from Yodefat, as well as finds from Gamla, clearly present a textured socioeconomic situation of rich and poor in villages, towns, and cities in first-century Galilee.7

Figure F. Pair of bronze scales. Photo by Ron Rabinowitz.

5.  For Gamla, see Yoav Farhi, “Stucco Decorations from the Western Quarter,” in Gamla, vol. 2, The Architecture (ed. Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor; IAA Reports 44; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2010), 175–87. For Herodium, see Virgilio Corbo, Gli edifici della reggia-fortezza (Herodion 1; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1989), 46, pl. II:I. 6.  Multinozzle lamps are now a favorite of those who forge antiquities, selling the forgeries to ignorant Americans. 7.  For a more detailed discussion, see Mordechai Aviam, “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First Century Galilee and Its Origins: A Comprehensive Archaeological Synthesis,” in The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (ed. David A. Fiensy and Ralph. K. Hawkins; Early Christianity and Its Literature 11; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013), 5–48.

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Figure G: Iron door key. Photo by Ron Rabinowitz.

Remains of the Walls The North Wall The first phase of the northern wall is dated to the Hasmonean period. Superimposed over the remains of the Hellenistic village, a massive wall was built. In the north, it was a double wall with two massive towers that stood guard over the topographic saddle, the only accessible side of the hill. A glacis made of white rock chips was leaned up against the central tower, strengthening its foundations and base. Judging by the remains in several more squares around the top of the hill, it seems as if the Hasmonean wall surrounded the top of the hill only and created a tiny fortified village or a fortress. Above the Hasmonean remains, a new wall was built in the Early Roman (ER) period. Although it is not totally clear, it seems as if the builders of the new wall used some segments of the earlier wall in places where it was still in good condition, while constructing new segments in places where the wall was missing or damaged. The northern section of the ER wall was built as a “casemate wall,” of which two casemates were preserved as well as the beginning of a third one. Each casemate was built with a 2.1-m-wide external wall and 0.8-m-wide inner wall. The inner space of each casemate room is 2.5 m wide. The external wall was based on the head of the limestone-chips glacis, and its foundations are very shallow. In the inner walls of both stretches of casemate are thresholds of the doors including hinge sockets. During the dig, we could not identify any floor of these rooms, but in the western room there was a massive and organized fill of stones filling up the entire western corner. The base of the fill was at the same level as the threshold. The absence of floors to these casemate additions and the presence of stone fill on the same level as the threshold indicates that this fortified section was built shortly before the fill was created and that this fill was intended to defend the wall against the Roman army’s battering ram operated from atop the assault ramp. When we took apart the stones of the fill, attempting to find any clues to date it, we discovered a ballista stone among the other field stones. The ballista stone proves that the fill was completed during a siege and under the firing of ballistae. Together with typical iron bow arrowheads and iron catapult arrowheads we had discovered conclusive evidence for a massive battle between the citizens of the town and the Roman army on this northern wall.

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Figure H. Ballista stones. Photo by Howard Smithline.

On the northern slope, right below the casemate wall, we discovered on the surface some patches of hard surface that were made of lime plaster mixed with crushed pottery. Two excavation squares were dug near these areas. We discovered that the patches are remains of a layer that covered another thick layer of soil and fieldstones that had been laid against the natural northern slope of the hill. Several short and thin walls prevented this fill from sliding downhill. While sifting the soil, we discovered several iron arrowheads and two tiny iron, mushroomshaped nails, which are known to belong to the caliga, the official Roman army shoe. While checking the area with a metal detector, we got some signals from the area inside the plaster layer. The hard surface was broken with hammers, and inside we discovered two more iron bow arrowheads. These finds prove that the plaster layer, the soil, and the stone fill were the constituent elements of the Roman assault ramp, described by Flavius Josephus (J.W. 3.161–65). Western Wall While checking the remains of the wall along the perimeter of the hill on the western side, we discovered that the wall alternates from casemates to solid wall and back to casemates. It seems as if in places where there was enough space between the houses and the beginning of the slope, the builders preferred to use the casemate design. Where there was not enough space, a solid wall about 2 m wide was built. In one place, the builders had no choice but to build the wall over a room of one of the houses. The pottery in the foundations of the house is from the first century. South from there, still on the western side, two casemate walls were excavated. The casemate room of the northern one is large, 3.5 x 6 m, and the pottery remains in its fill were not later than the first century ce. The southern one is very small, and its inner space is 1.5 x 2.5 m. Both of the casemates were built directly on the bedrock with no foundation trenches. In the middle of the small one, we discovered a shaft cut through the rock, about 1 m deep, with

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three steps at its bottom leading down to a horizontal, 2-m-long tunnel cut in the rock. The tunnel is roofed at the entrance with three couples of heavy stone slabs creating a gabled roof. The entrance to the tunnel could have been blocked with a stone door; there is a bolt-hole in the rock to the left. The tunnel leads into two rock-cut, human-made rooms, one to the north (1.35 x 1.3m and 1.25 m high) and one to the east (3.1 x 1.5 m and 1.07 m high). In these rooms, some storage jars from the Early Roman period were retrieved as well as twenty-five coins from the lower room, among them seven silver coins from the reign of Emperor Nero, the latest from the year 64 ce. Also found were a ballista stone; an arrowhead; animal bones, including some bones and teeth of a leopard; and some human bones. Southeastern Wall Another section of the wall was excavated on the southeastern side. Here, as well, the method of building the wall alternates from casemates to solid wall. While cleaning the surface of the wall in this area, we discovered that the wall was built over a pottery kiln. It was clear to us that if we were to dig carefully enough we would be able to find evidence that for the first time would enable us to assign a precise date to the wall. Our efforts uncovered a pottery kiln of 3.2 m in diameter that was destroyed and half covered by a new solid wall 1.75 m wide in the south and 2.75 m to the north. In the kiln and around it, we found large fragments of the “vessels floor” (the floor on which the “leather-dried” vessels were placed for firing; the lower floor is the “fire floor”) of the kiln as well as much pottery and a large number of wasters, including one from a rim and neck of a storage jar. These allowed us to compare the jars that were produced in the kiln with those found on the destroyed, burned, and abandoned floors of the houses in the town; they are of the same type, what we named “ribbed-neck jar,” a very common type in first-century Galilee. In salvage excavations at Karm er Ras at Kafr Kanna, southeast of Yodefat, two pottery kilns were discovered that produced the same type of storage jars.8 The results from this careful digging in and around the kiln prove that the potter who owned this kiln produced storage jars for the residents of Yodefat before the town was destroyed in a battle against the Roman army (ballista balls, catapult arrowheads, and caliga nails), and before the town was destroyed and a wall was built around it, covering and destroying the kiln, as part of a project to fortify the entire town. We made another interesting discovery near the destroyed kiln. A much smaller kiln was built beside the former large kiln. This smaller kiln was dug through the debris of the former one, proving it was built after the abandonment of the large kiln. Its entrance faces to the same open area as does the entrance of the large kiln. This small kiln, in contrast to the large one, carries no remains of fire or ash. It seems that the owner did not have time to operate it before the town was conquered and abandoned. 8.  Oral information from the excavator Yardena Alexandre.

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Our conclusion concerning the walls of Yodefat is now very clear. Shortly before the town was attacked by a strong force of the Roman army, a wall was built surrounding the entire perimeter of the hill. In the north, right above the topographical saddle, the wall was built by merging earlier remains of the Hasmonean walls and creating a massive fortification at the most accessible point. In our opinion, there was no gate in the wall. In a time of emergency, there was no reason to create a gate, which would have been the weakest point of the fortifications. There probably was a small wicket or a narrow gap in the wall that could be filled up in a hurry. The only other fortification from the First Revolt that survived to a high level in the Galilee is the wall on Mount Nitai, where there is no gate as well, only a tiny wicket.9 All the evidence points to a fortification project done in a hurry and under pressure. The wall does not have strong and deep foundations. Sometimes it is built directly on the bedrock with no foundation trench, and sometimes it does not even get down to bedrock but is “floating” in the soil. The wall-building method changes from casemate wall into a solid wall with changing width. The builders of the wall destroyed existing houses to make place for the wall along its line and used the stones of the destroyed houses to build the wall in the west and in the northeast. The wall led to the destruction of spaces, such as the pottery kiln and disconnected the oil-press cave from the (proposed) owner’s houses. All of these observations, as well as similarities to the situation at Gamla,10 and especially the precise dating, supports Josephus’s narrative of his operation to fortify nineteen (he claims) settlements in his government territory. As mentioned above, we discovered conclusive evidence proving the existence of the Roman army at the site of Yodefat and conclusive evidence for a massive bombardment of stones and the launches of catapults into the town. Josephus, who was an eyewitness to the events and commanded the battle, described the Roman attack. He described the building of the assault ramp on the northern slope, the 160 ballistas and catapults that fired on the entire area of the town, the strengthening of the wall against the Roman machine attacks, the burning of the town at the end, and the heavy massacre of its citizens (J.W. 3.166–171; 213–221; 324–339).11 Human Skeletal Remains For the first time in the research on the First Jewish Revolt, clear evidence for a mass slaughtering was unearthed. In almost every area where we excavated, we discovered human bones scat9.  Uzi Leibner, Uri Davidovich and Benyamin Arubas, “The Structure, Date, and Purpose of the Fortification on Mount Nitai” (in Hebrew), ErIsr 31 (Ehud Netzer volume [2015]: 236–46). 10.  Danny Syon, “Gamla: City of Refuge,” in The First Jewish Revolt: Archaeology, History, and Ideology (ed. Andrea M. Berlin and J. Andrew Overman; London: Routledge, 2002), 136–37. 11.  Mordechai Aviam, “Yodefat/Jotapata: The Archaeology of the First Battle,” in The First Jewish Revolt: Archaeology, History, and Ideology (ed. Andrea M. Berlin and J. Andrew Overman; London: Routledge, 2002), 121–33.

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tered in the houses and the streets. In the corner of the fresco house, we found on the frescoed floor two bones of a man’s leg and around it five arrowheads. In two cisterns, we discovered mass graves. The first cistern was in a corner of the courtyard of a house with a mikveh, which we fully excavated. It is bell-shaped with a narrow mouth, about 5 m deep and fully plastered. It was discovered full of soil and debris from mouth to bottom. On the plastered floor, there was a narrow and high semicircular wall that was one stone wide. Behind the wall there was a heap of human bones and skulls. This discovery was carefully excavated and checked by our anthropologists. The heap contained the gathered bones of a man, a woman, and a child; not full skeletons. It was a puzzling discovery. Who were they? Why were they in a cistern? Why are they not full skeletons? After a few more seasons, and after digging in two openings of cisterns where we discovered more scattered bones, we excavated another cistern. This was a different type of cistern, having its entrance from the side. The water-drawer stood on one of two or three steps and lowered his or her jar into the depth of the cistern. When we entered it, on the slope of the soil that penetrated from the opening and filled it up, we discovered a human skull. Soon after we began digging in the fill, we met a narrow, simple, unstable wall, one stone wide; behind it we found a large pile of human bones mixed with soil. We did not dig deep in this pile, but from the small area that we cleaned behind the wall, our anthropologists identified more than twenty individuals—men, women, and children. No full skeletons were identified; the collection was all gathered bones. Two skulls bore violent marks that probably caused their deaths. Some of the tibia bones found in the town carried cut marks likely caused by swords. Collecting all the evidence from the cisterns and the houses, we had a clearer view that is similar to Josephus’s narrative of the last days of Yodefat. After the Romans broke through the walls, in one way or the other, a heavy massacre took place in the streets and the houses, as well as in the underground shelters that the citizens built and used. The cut marks on the arm bones are evidence of an instinctive gesture of protection against the thrust of a sword. I think that the only explanation for the human burials in the cisterns is that they were buried there a year or more after they were killed. As it was the first battle between the Roman army and Jewish rebels in the First Revolt, and as the siege lasted (according to Josephus) for forty-seven days, and as the Romans suffered many casualties (Vespasian himself was wounded), I suggest that the Romans punished the Jews by not allowing the survivors to bury their dead. We may imagine that slaughtered bodies were lying in the streets being scavenged by fowl and beasts of the field. There was probably a Roman garrison stationed nearby to prevent Jews from neighboring villages from coming back to the destroyed town to bury the dead. After a year or more and after the Roman garrison left the town, we may imagine that Jews came back and searched the debris. It would have been difficult or impossible to find complete skeletons; they were searching among the fallen walls and ceilings and extracted bones, mainly the long ones, as well as skulls, carrying them into the open cavities of the town, which were mainly the empty cisterns. There was no time to dig tombs or to cut them in the rock, as was common in this period, but mainly there was no way to identify the victims for their orderly burial. Therefore the burial places were arranged in the cistern and caves: and the bones were

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piled up, a supportive wall was constructed in front of the pile, soil was added to the growing heap, and finally the entire cistern was filled up. These were mass graves built in a hurry. We can hypothesize that the burial of the gathered bones of the man, the woman, and the child in the cistern of the mikveh house was an identified burial. The searchers probably knew that the family was killed in their home, or they were found together and therefore they were buried together. The bones and skulls uncovered through our explorations in the houses and the streets probably were not found by the searching Jews of the first century. In any case these discoveries illuminate an important issue concerning Galilean Jewish religious practices. There is no doubt that it was very important for the Galilean survivors of the war to bury their relatives and friends as quickly as possible under the Jewish law of not withholding the dead from their proper burial. In addition, we may imagine that Galilean neighbors could not endure the painful awareness of permanently exposed remains, which they understood from ancient times to be a horrific curse. Inscriptional Drawing One of the most interesting finds of the dig, reflecting the last hard days of the battle, is a 15 x 15 cm flat natural fieldstone, found in the debris of one of the Yodefat houses. On both sides of the stone were drawings made by etching the face of the stone with a sharp object. On one side, very clearly one can identify a mausoleum, similar in shape to the “Tomb of Zachariah” in the Kidron Valley in Jerusalem. It is a rectangular building with a pyramid on top, erected on a three-step stylobate. The entire etched building is covered with crisscross lines to indicate that it is a solid structure and not a building to live inside. Two lines, one on each side of the mausoleum, likely describe the rock-cut from which the mausoleum was carved. On each side there is a depiction of a tree that could resemble the “tree of life,” a common symbol of death, or trees that grew beside the remembered mausoleum. Depicted on each of the upper sides are lyres, probably another symbol of death and mourning. On the other side is a depiction of what looks like the astrological sign of Cancer. Although the figure itself does not look like a natural crab, it has an oval body, eight legs, and two lines that rise from its head, which can resemble its claws or its lifted eyes. Cancer is the zodiac symbol of the Hebrew month of Tamuz, and, according to Josephus, Yodefat fell to Roman hands on the first of Tamuz, or July 20. I have suggested that what is depicted on the stone is a rare example of feelings expressed in drawing instead of writing. I think the message comes from a person in the besieged town, while death surrounds him, probably communicating that here “we (or I) will die in July.” Not only is it a rare find, but it also carries symbols of death and symbols of time. The mausoleum appears as a symbol on Jewish ossuaries from Jerusalem as well as on oil lamps, probably oil lamps that were used in burials. The symbol of Cancer appears on Jewish zodiacs on the mosaic floors of later (fifth- to sixth-century) synagogues. Some scholars have suggested that there was no Jewish symbolism during the Second Temple period, but this stone suggests otherwise.

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Seven seasons of excavations at the site of Yodefat have contributed greatly to our understanding of first-century Jewish Galilee. Here is a summary of some key findings. Social Structure Until recently, the excavations of Yodefat were measured as the largest area in which firstcentury Galilean dwellings were uncovered. In the excavations at Nazareth, Capernaum, and Sepphoris or Tiberias, the first-century remains were covered with later layers. It was Gamla in the Golan, “Yodefat’s twin town,” where a larger area was uncovered, and more recently at Migdal (Magdala). Most of the houses were simply built and reflect the simple life of most of the people in towns and probably most of Galilee. We also have evidence for local workshops and free occupations (oil producers, potters, spinners, weavers, dealers). The discovery of the wealthy mansion proved that the social structure in first-century Jewish Galilee was much more complicated than “wealthy people in the city and peasants in the villages.” There was wealth in the city and there was wealth in the towns and villages. The same situation is reflected at Gamla and Magdala.12 Religious Customs Ritual baths. The finds in the Yodefat houses point to the religious behavior of some its citizens. In each of two houses, a ritual bath was discovered. These installations are small, fully plastered pools with steps leading down to a small basin that is deep enough to contain the bathing of the entire body of an adult. It is quite common today to identify these installations as Jewish ritual baths—mikva’ot. As these mikva’ot are in the houses closest to the oil press in the cave, I suggest that these are the houses of the people who owned or operated the oil press. This idea is consistent with the conclusions of research on late Second Temple Judaism that special care was given to purification while producing liquids like oil and wine. Stone vessels. About 110 fragments of stone vessels were retrieved from the excavated domestic areas. Most of them belong to identifiable types of mugs, both small and large, some of which were spouted, and hemispheric bowls. The Galilean cups were made by a lathe from the inside and knife-pared from the outside. The bowls were made on a lathe only. There is one stone lid 12.  Recently, David A. Fiensy published an article concerning the social life of the Galilee in the late Second Temple period in relation to the archaeological discoveries (“The Nature of the Galilean Economy in the Late Second Temple Period: The Sociological-Archaeological Debate,” in A City Set on a Hill [ed. Daniel A. Warner and Donald D. Binder; Mountain Home, Ariz.: Borderstone, 2014], 78–97). However, Fiensy did not discuss all the new evidence that was brought to light in the excavations of Yodefat and related studies and was published in Aviam’s article “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First-Century Galilee and Its Origins” (see n. 8 above); the latest reference in Fiensy’s article is from 2008.

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of a cup and one fragment of a stone table from the wealthy house and one rectangular basin, probably to prepare dough. Yitzhak Magen suggested that the cups were used for ritual hand washing.13 It is very interesting to see that some types of stoneware do not exist among the ceramic types, and this could hint that they were not used for regular daily activity. I would like to suggest that the cups were used to decant oil into the oil lamps. The design of the spouted cup with its handle perpendicular to the spout allows one to pour the liquid slowly and gently into the container. The capacity of the small pitchers is similar to the capacity of the regular oil lamps, and the large pitcher is similar to the capacity of the large oil lamps or the multinozzle ones. It is possible that the stone vessels were used to fill the Shabbat oil lamp and therefore were considered holy and pure. The stone cups could have been used to drink wine for Shabbat.

Figure I. Stone cup fragments. Photo by Howard Smithline.

Lamps. An interesting phenomenon was identified while we were analyzing the oil lamp fragments from the residential areas. There are mainly two types of oil lamps: a locally made “bootshape” and a “knife-pared” spatulated nozzle, which is usually named “Herodian oil lamp.” In the past, two studies proved that the provenance of the clay of most of the “knife-pared” oil lamps found in first-century Jewish sites was the Jerusalem area. The results of our petrographic study of this type of lamp from Yodefat showed that the lamps were produced in Jerusalem, while the “boot-shape” oil lamp was probably manufactured on site. The surprising find is that 78 percent of the oil lamps in the residential areas are imported from Jerusalem! The potters of Yodefat knew how to make oil lamps; their lamp products were as good as their cooking vessels. Regardless, they preferred more expensive oil lamps imported from Jerusalem. The same picture comes from Gamla. Although I have no support from any written sources, we can surmise that the only reason for such an unusual phenomenon would be religious behavior. 13.  Yitzhak Magen, The Stone Vessel Industry in the Second Temple Period: Excavations at Hizma and the Jerusalem Temple Mount (Judea and Samaria Publications 1; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society and Israel Antiquities Authority, 2002), 98.

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Figure J. Black knife-pared oil lamp. Photo by Ron Rabinowitz.

I think that the light that came from “Jerusalemite” oil lamps inspired people, especially on Shabbat night, and let them feel and believe that they were directly connected to Jerusalem, the temple, and the menorah. Animal bones. Animal bones were found everywhere, and they were analyzed by our archaeozoologist, Carol Cope. According to her report, there are 92 percent kosher animal bones: 48.8 percent small cattle, 31 percent cattle, 6.8 percent chickens, 2.9 percent partridges, 1.9 percent gazelles. Only 2 percent belonged to pigs, and of these close to 50 percent came from the northern areas and are mostly from the Hellenistic period. The appearance of 1 to 2 percent of pig bones is common at ancient Jewish sites. We have to remember that there is no prohibition on raising pigs, only on eating them. Coins. Another group of finds that reflects religious behavior is Jewish coins. It is very clear that Jews could not avoid the use of Roman imperial and city coins, as it was the most important currency of that time. Nevertheless, on the floors of the dwellings, we discovered not only Roman coins but also a large number of Hasmonean coins. It looks as if “old” Hasmonean coins were in use by Jews as “inner circle currency,” and these coins were, as a matter of fact, “ethnic” or “national currency,” not carrying any imagery and containing paleo-Hebrew script. Pottery types. The last archaeological finds that point to religious behavior are the types of pottery vessels. An important change took place in the transmission from the Hellenistic period to the Hasmonean period. The local GCW ware, as well as coastal and imported types of pottery, ceased and mainly local vessels took their place. The typical Hellenistic figurative oil lamps also disappeared. During the Early Roman period, we do not have even one piece of imported pottery. It seems as if there was a complete avoidance of coastal or imported vessels. The fact that we have a house that was decorated with frescoes of which some of the ingredients were imported indicates that the avoidance was specifically about food vessels, which fits very well Jewish kashrut laws.

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The Excavations and Josephus Finally, the finds from the excavations display some hints of the social behavior of the Galileans on the eve of the war and illuminate some of Josephus’s narratives.14 The precise dating of the wall to the days before the siege of Yodefat not only proves that Josephus’s report on building a wall around Yodefat (as well as other towns and cities in the Galilee) but also hints at the collaboration of the citizens with the new authority. According to Josephus’s narratives, he had some opposition in the Galilee, mainly at Sepphoris, Giskala, Gabara, and at the beginning also at Tiberias. During the half year he governed this region, he succeeded in controlling Tiberias, and he moved freely through the entire Lower Galilee. Building almost 2 km of a defensive wall around Yodefat was not a task that citizens and farmers could undertake by themselves. It needed planning, organizing manpower, and money. Therefore, it looks as though the citizens of Yodefat obeyed the governance of Josephus. The discoveries at Gamla are not vastly different, and the fact that the wall was also built in a hurry while destroying private houses and reusing the stones points to collaboration of the citizens. Recently, another solid fortification with a strong wall and semicircular towers in the Galilee on Mount Nitai was dated to the First Revolt.15 These three sites, and especially the details from Yodefat, suggest that most of the Galileans cooperated with Josephus in his attempt to fortify the Galilee before the Roman attack. In another place, I have tried to prove that the system of fortifying many towns, villages, and cities was not Josephus’s own idea but rather an order from the central organization or government in Jerusalem, and the same acts were undertaken in every Jewish self-governed region. As a result of the large-scale excavations, the war itself on the town of Yodefat became very clear: an assault ramp was built on the northern slope; the walls were strengthened during the actual war; Roman siege machines were shooting at the town from all sides; the war ended with a heavy massacre of its citizens—men, women, and children—and the town was destroyed, set on fire, and abandoned. Bibliography Aviam, Mordechai. “The Fortified Settlements of Josephus Flavius and Their Significance against the Background of the Excavations of Yodefat and Gamla.” In The Great Revolt in the Galilee, edited by O. Guri-Ramon, 39*-42*. Haifa: Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, 2008.

14.  For a detailed study of this issue, see Mordechai Aviam, “The Fortified Settlements of Josephus Flavius and Their Significance against the Background of the Excavations of Yodefat and Gamla,” in The Great Revolt in the Galilee (ed. O. Guri-Ramon; Haifa: Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, 2008), 39*–42*. 15.  See n. 10 above

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———. “Kefar Hananya Ware Made in Yodefat.” In Roman Pottery in the Levant: Local Production and Regional Trade, edited by B. Genz, Y. Gerber, and H. Hamel, 139–46. Roman and Late Antique Mediterranean Pottery 2. Oxford: Archaeopress, 2014 ———. “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First-Century Galilee and Its Origins: A Comprehensive Archaeological Synthesis.” In The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus, edited by David. A. Fiensy and Ralph. K. Hawkins, 5–48. Early Christianity and Its Literature 11. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013. ———. “Yodefat: A Case Study in the Development of the Jewish Settlement in the Galilee during the Second Temple Period.” In Hebrew. Ph.D. diss., Bar-Ilan University, 2005. ———. “Yodefat/Jotapata: The Archaeology of the First Battle.” In The First Jewish Revolt: Archaeology, History, and Ideology, edited by Andrea M. Berlin and J. Andrew Overman, 121–33. London: Routledge, 2002. Corbo, Virgilio.Gli edifici della reggia-fortezza. Herodion 1. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1989. Farhi, Yoav. “Stucco Decorations from the Western Quarter.” In Gamla. Vol. 2, The Architecture, edited by Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor, 175–87. IAA Reports 44. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority 2010. Fiensy, David A. “The Nature of the Galilean Economy in the Late Second Temple Period: The Sociological-Archaeological Debate.” In A City Set on a Hill, edited by Daniel A. Warner and Donald D. Binder, 78–97. Mountain Home, Ariz.: Borderstone, 2014. Frankel, Rafael, Nimrod Getzov, Mordechai Aviam, and Avi Degani. Settlement Dynamics and Regional Diversity in Ancient Upper Galilee. IAA Reports 14. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority 2001. Leibner, Uzi, Uri Davidovich, and Benyamin Arubas. “The Structure, Date, and Purpose of the Fortification on Mount Nitai.” In Hebrew. ErIsr 31 (Ehud Netzer volume) (2015): 236–46. Magen, Yitzhak. The Stone Vessel Industry in the Second Temple Period: Excavations at Hizma and the Jerusalem Temple Mount. Judea and Samaria Publications 1. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society and Israel Antiquities Authority. 2002. Reich, Ronni. Miqwa’ot (Jewish Ritual Baths) in the Second Temple, Mishnaic, and Talmudic Periods. In Hebrew. Jerusalem: Yad Ben Zvi; Israel Exploration Society 2013. Syon, Danny. “Gamla: City of Refuge.” In The First Jewish Revolt: Archaeology, History, and Ideology, edited by Andrea M. Berlin and J. Andrew Overman, 136–37. London: Routledge, 2002.

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5 Khirbet Qana C. Thomas McCollough Khirbet Qana (“the ruins of Cana”) is located in the center of Lower Galilee along a critical east–west corridor, the Beit Netofa (Battauf ) Valley. The site is on a 100 m hill on the north side of the valley at the mouth of the Wadi Yodefat, 2 km from the village of Yodefat/Jotapata itself, 7 km south-southeast of the ancient city of Sepphoris, and 13 km north of Nazareth (fig. B) While it appears that before the end of the Great Revolt in 70 ce the village was connected to nearby villages only by way of footpaths that followed the contours of the hills above the valley, after the revolt an imperial road was constructed that connected Acco/Ptolemais and Tiberius and ran along the western edge of the Beit Netofa Valley and connected the site to a larger network of villages and towns. After the University of South Florida (USF) survey of 1982,1 no systematic survey or excavation of the site occurred until 1997, when Douglas Edwards initiated the University of Puget Sound survey and excavations. The survey in 1997 revealed plentiful evidence of human activity from the Neolithic through the Ottoman periods, with the most extensive and significant occupation occurring in the Early Roman period and again in the Byzantine through Crusader periods. Excavations were initiated in 1998 and are ongoing.2 1.  The USF team located remains of villages on the top of the hill and on the southern slope (which they identified as a later village), a public building on the west side, a wall around the village that was too narrow to be considered a defensive wall, and a section of aqueduct on the northeast side. Pottery identified ranged from small amounts of Iron II, Persian, and Hellenistic wares and suggested that the main periods of occupation were the first through the sixth centuries ce, with the highest quantities coming from the fourth and fifth centuries. The single coin found (a surface find from the southeast side of the hill) was identified as a half follis of Justinian I (527–538 ce). See James F. Strange, Thomas R. W. Longstaff, and Dennis E. Groh, Excavations at Sepphoris, vol. 1, University of South Florida Probes in the Citadel and Villa (Brill Reference Library of Judaism 22; Leiden: Brill, 2006), 37–38. 2.  An overview of the results of the excavations from 1998 to 2000 are set forth in D. Edwards, “Khirbet Qana: From Jewish Village to Christian Pilgrim Site,” in The Roman and Byzantine Near East: Some Recent Archaeological Research (ed. J. H. Humphrey; JRASS 49: Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002), 3:101–32.

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Figure A. Aerial view of the hill on which Khirbet Qana was established overlooking the Beit Netofa Valley. Balloon photo by SkyView. Used by permission.

Figure B. Lower Galilee and road connections to Khirbet Qana. Drawing by J. Rosenberg. Used by permission.

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Literary References to Ancient Cana A discussion of relevant literary texts is dependent on some assurance that Khirbet Qana is to be identified with the Cana of Galilee that is referenced in the New Testament and in Josephus. There are four other sites that have over time been identified as Cana of Galilee. Three of the possible sites are, as expected, located in Lower Galilee, while one is found in what is today southern Lebanon. The location of this latter contender is certainly odd, but its pedigree goes back to Eusebius of Caesarea’s Onomasticon (114,116). Eusebius noted that there were two Canas, one near Sidon (“Greater Cana”) and another in Galilee. Eusebius associates the waterto-wine miracle with Greater Cana, and this identification continues on in a few texts and maps into the medieval period. Given the biblical references (near Capernaum; see below) as well as the references in Josephus (Life 86: near Yodefat/Jotapata), Cana in Lebanon is no longer considered a viable candidate. The three sites in Galilee include Ain Qana, Kafr Kanna, and Karm er-Ras. Ain Qana, or the spring of Cana, located 1.5 km north of Nazareth, is a site we know little about, as no excavations have been undertaken. Given that some of the pilgrim’s reports mention a spring in association with Cana of Galilee, it is a site that has some viability, but in the absence of more data, it does not bear further inclusion in the list of possible candidates. Kafr Kanna is a large village located 5 km northeast of Nazareth. It is the site most often visited by pilgrims and tourists today as Cana of Galilee. The absence of substantive evidence for a first-century village and the dearth of literary evidence for Christian pilgrimage identification of the site as biblical Cana until the late seventeenth century make it an unlikely candidate.1 Just north of Kafr Kanna is the site of Karm er-Ras. The salvage excavation of Karm er-Ras revealed a first-century Jewish village that its excavator is certain should be identified as Cana of Galilee.2 This conclusion is problematic, however, because the location does not align well with Josephus’s identification (see below) of the location of Cana, and the site has no sign of Christian pilgrimage. In terms of Khirbet Qana, there are several factors that make a compelling argument for its identification as Cana of Galilee. Its location on the edge of the Beit Netofa Valley just north

1.  Bellarmino Baggati excavated beneath the nineteenth-century Franciscan church and in his report noted that there was little evidence of first-century occupation (“Le antichità di Kh. Qana et di Kefr Kenna in Galilea,” SBFLA 15 [1964–1965]: 251–92). E. Alliata’s more recent work (“I recenti scavi a Kefer Kenna,” La Terra Sancta 1 [1999]: 16–17) recovered artifacts of possible first-century habitation (e.g., Herodian lamp fragments) but no substantive architecture. In Denys Pringle’s work on Crusader churches (The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem: A Corpus, vol. 1, A–K (excluding Acre and Jerusalem) [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993], 285), the identification of Cana of Galilee with Kafr Kanna is accepted. John Wilkinson comments, “Cana of Galilee where Jesus turned water into wine (John 2.1/11) might have been located at Khirbet Qana or at Kafr Kanna” (Jerusalem Pilgrims before the Crusades [2nd ed.; Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 2002], 291). 2.  See Yardenna Alexandre, “The Archaeological Evidence of the Great Revolt at Karm er-Ras (Kfar Kanna) in the Lower Galilee,” in The Great Revolt in the Galilee (ed. O. Guri-Ramon; Haifa: Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, 2008), 73–79.

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of Nazareth and east of Sepphoris correlates well with the references in Josephus (Life 86).3 Josephus states that he made Cana his headquarters during the Jewish War but later indicates that he was stationed near the Beit Netofa Valley (Life 206). The excavations have made it evident that it was a substantial Jewish village in the first century, and there is evidence of continuous Jewish presence until at least the sixth century. Moreover, a thorough study of Christian pilgrims’ texts referring to visits to Cana of Galilee leads to the conclusion that until the seventeenth century there was only one Cana visited by pilgrims and that Cana correlates with the location of Khirbet Qana.4 The excavations of Khirbet Qana have further solidified the link between the Christian pilgrims’ reports and Khirbet Qana. The excavations uncovered an extensive veneration cave complex that dates from sixth century through the twelfth century (fig. C).

Figure C. Plan of veneration cave complex. Drawing by A. Sönderlund. Used by permission.

The excavation of one of the four caves revealed a room that was roughly circular, approximately 6 m in diameter, 2.5 m in height (at the center point), and oriented on an east–west axis. The interior of the cave was covered with several layers of plaster and Greek graffiti (“Kyrie 3. See Steve Mason’s Flavius Josephus: Translation and Commentary, vol. 9, Life of Josephus: Translation and Commentary (Leiden: Brill, 2001). Mason remarks (p. 69) that Khirbet Qana has become the consensus location for Josephus’s Cana; its “central location in Lower Galilee, with easy access routes, the nearby fortress [Iotapata/ Yodefat], and a commanding view of both the main valley and the access to Iotapata, [make] Cana an ideal location for Josephus.” The claim that the identification of Khirbet Qana with Cana of Galilee is aligned with the consensus of scholarship is cited also in J. F. Strange, “Cana of Galilee,” ABD 1:827; R. Mackowski, “Scholar’s Qanah: A Rexamination of the Evidence in Favor of Khirbet Qana,” Biblische Zeitschrift 23 (1979): 278–84, and C. Conway, “Cana,” NIDB 1:531–32. 4. Julián Herrojo, Cana de Galilea y su localización: Un examen crítico de las fuentes (Paris: J. Gabalda, 1999).

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Figure D. Sarcophagus lid as altar in Cave 1. Photo by M. Schwartz. Used by permission.

Jesu,” “Lord . . . enter . . . deign to”) written on the ceiling and walls. A portion of the floor was excavated, revealing three layers of lime plaster surfaces that were dated by way of carbon-14 dating to range from the Byzantine (415–654 ce) to the Crusader period (1024–1217 ce). On the west side of the cave, a bench was exposed that could seat eight to ten persons. On the east side, there was an apse-like structure, and directly opposite what was now a blocked entrance we found a reused sarcophagus lid that had been turned up on its side (fig. D). It appears to have been used as an altar or a screen. Directly behind the sarcophagus lid, a shelf had been constructed to hold stone vessels. Two of the vessels were in situ, and there was space for six vessels. The sarcophagus lid/altar had been covered by several layers of plaster. Removal of some of the plaster revealed that on the surface facing the visitors to the cave a Maltese-style cross had been chiseled. It is likely that there were three crosses covering the

Figure E. Architect’s reconstruction of altar area with stone vessels. Drawing by A. Sönderlund. Used by permission.

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s­urface of the lid turned into an altar, and this decorative effect would have been associated with the first use of the cave as a veneration site. The top edge of the lid was worn smooth, suggesting that pilgrims placed their hands on top while praying or perhaps while dipping water from the jars. Directly above the altar were holes cut into the cave walls that appear to function as beam holes. We presume this was to hold a curtain or some other apparatus to cover the altar area (fig. E). In the very narrow area between the altar and the cave wall, we recovered several interesting artifacts that appear to be associated with the veneration structure and rituals. Two small pieces of marble were recovered, both decorated with gold leaf. One piece had an acanthus leaf design and the other a design of uncertain meaning. As the piece with the acanthus leaf design has plaster attached to it, it is presumed to be part of a marble wall panel. The other piece is perhaps from a chancel screen. In both cases, the presence of gold leaf is notable as such an ornate decorative element is very rare for this period. Both of these pieces were recovered in Byzantine fill. In this same fill, a griffin also covered in gold leaf was uncovered (fig. F).

Figure F. Bronze griffin with gold leaf covering. Photo by M. Schwartz. Used by permission.

The griffin has a spike attached to it that suggests it was part of a piece of ornate furniture. In the upper or Crusader level of fill, a large piece of round, clear window glass was found that may have been connected to the viewing of relics. The cave that has been fully excavated is connected to the other caves by stairs creating an ambulatory or a processional path through the caves, coming in at one end and exiting at the other. Pilgrims would apparently enter the shrine from the south and proceed to the altar or screened area and there pray and/or obtain water or wine. They would then proceed to the east and exit through the last of the caves. This layout and the structures within the cave connect with the pilgrims’ descriptions of their visits to Cana, especially with the elaborate description offered by the Piacenza Pilgrim in the late sixth century.5 The ensemble of evidence makes a strong case for the identification of Khirbet Qana as Cana of Galilee and thus warrants a discussion of the literary traditions about Cana of Galilee in conjunction with Khirbet Qana. The Gospel of John is the only Gospel to refer to Cana of Galilee, and it does four times on three separate occasions. In fact, it seems evident that the narrator intentionally elevates the stature of Cana above other locales of Jesus ministry (e.g., 5.  Piacenza Pilgrim, Travels, translation in Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrims, 129–51.

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Capernaum).6 One notes, for example, that the narrator of the Gospel purposefully locates the first two “signs” or miracles of Jesus in Cana. In the second chapter of John, Jesus initiates his ministry in Cana, and, by way of his miraculous changing of water to wine during a marriage feast, Cana becomes the location where Jesus first “revealed his glory.” On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.” Jesus said to her, “Woman what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not come.” His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” Now standing there were six stone water jugs for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim. He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.” So they took it. When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until know.” Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him. (John 2:1-11 NRSV) Cana is also identified as the remote location from which Jesus healed a royal official’s son in nearby Capernaum. The he came again to Cana in Galilee where he had changed the water into wine. Now there was a royal official whose son lay ill in Capernaum. When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. Then Jesus said to him, “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.” The official said to him, “Sir, come down before my little boy dies.” Jesus said to him, “Go; your son will live.” (John 4:46-50 NRSV) In addition, Cana is identified as the hometown of the disciple Nathaniel when Jesus appears to the disciples after his resurrection. After these things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberius; and he showed himself in this way. Gathered there together were Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathaniel of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples. (John 21:1-2 NRSV) 6.  Peter Richardson, “What Has Cana to Do with Capernaum,” NTS 48 (2002): 314–31.

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Outside of the New Testament, the only reference to Cana in the Early Roman period occurs in the previously cited text from Josephus (Life 86), where he states, “At that time, I was living in a village of Galilee that is known as Cana.”7 In terms of rabbinic texts, there are no conclusive references. One possible reference to Cana surfaces in the mishnaic tractate ’Ohalot (18:9). In a discussion about the ritual purity or cleanliness of the dwelling places of gentiles, the text declares, “The dwelling places of gentiles [in the land of Israel] are unclean” (18:7b). The commentary that follows attempts to clarify what is covered by the mandate, and in this context particular places are referenced to include one named “Qeni.” Colonnades are not subject to the law applying to the dwellings of gentiles.   Rabban Simeon b Gamaliel says, “A city of gentiles which was laid waste is not subject to the law applying to the dwellings of gentiles.”   East of Qisrin and west of Qisarion [Caesarea Phillipi] are graveyards. [The area] east of Acco was in doubt, and sages declared it clean.   Rabbi and his court voted concerning Qeni )‫ (קיני‬and declared it clean.8 If this is in fact a reference to Cana of Galilee, it would suggest that it had not become a mixed village by the time of composition of the Mishnah. Such purity of place would be consistent with the identification of Cana as one of the locations for the resettlement of the priestly courses following the Great Revolt of 70. The full list of the twenty-four priestly courses appears in piyyut, or liturgical poetry, and the one that locates the priestly family of Eliashib at Cana (‫ )קנה‬is that composed by Eleasar Qalir in the ninth century. The credibility of the poet as accurately depicting earlier traditions has been given support by the discovery of a thirdcentury mosaic at Caesarea that has a list indicating the location of the twenty-four priestly courses after 70 that coincides with Eleazar’s lyrical poetry.9 The Excavations of Khirbet Qana The excavations of Khirbet Qana, which began in 1998, established five fields that focused on the ancient village itself and on the veneration cave complex that was discovered on the south slope (fig. G). No evidence of substantial remains from the Hellenistic period has been uncovered. There is significant numismatic material from the Hasmonean period, but there are no structures to connect this village with local representatives of Hasmonean power. The predominance 7.  Translation by Mason, Life of Josephus, 69. 8.  Jacob Neusner, The Mishnah: A New Translation (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988). 9.  For Eleazar, see Samuel Klein, Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas (Leipzig: R. Haupt, 1909); and for the list from Caesarea, see Michael Avi-Yonah, “A List of Priestly Courses from Caesarea,” IEJ 12 (1962): 137–39.

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Figure G. Aerial view with fields of excavations. University of Puget Sound Excavations. Used by permission.

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Figure H. Aerial photo with reservoir and ­possible road. University of Puget Sound ­Excavations. Used by permission.

Figure I: Architect’s drawing of ­domestic structures along north, east, and west slopes. Drawing by A. Sönderlund. Used by permission.

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of Hasmonean coins within the total corpus of coins dating to the Early and Middle Roman periods led the excavation’s numismatist, Danny Syon, to comment, “The six Maccabean coins are by themselves sufficient evidence of a Jewish presence at Qana in this period [HellenisticRoman] as these coins were in use almost exclusively by Jews.”10 The village does begin to emerge architecturally in the Early Roman period. In terms of size, the Early Roman village covered approximately 5 hectares (determined primarily by location of tombs). Presuming a relatively dense population coefficiency (similar to Gamla), the Roman-period population would be approximately 1,200. No natural supply of water has been located. The village seemed to be entirely dependent on cisterns. Sixty cisterns have been found within the confines of the village (see village plan in Galilee, 1:191). The main approach road to the village has not been firmly established. The remnants of what may be a retaining wall along a roadbed can be discerned in a small wadi east of the village. If this is the approach road, then it appears to have doubled back and entered the village from the northeast, running next to a reservoir that became an area for quarrying stone (fig. H).11 Cana was an unwalled village in the Early Roman period, as was the norm for most towns and villages of the first century.12 Josephus makes no reference to Cana in terms of military conflict, and no material evidence of conflict (e.g., ballista stones, arrowheads) has been found. One would have to presume that Vespasian found it nonthreatening during the Great Revolt of 66–74 ce even as he marched by it on the way to the assault on Yodefat/Jotapata.13 The excavations have revealed a “quasi-Hippodamian” street pattern that follows the contours of the hill. The excavations have also shown that the domestic quarters were concentrated on the north, east, and west slopes (fig. I). The south slope was apparently too steep to accommodate housing units. A combination of carbon-14 dating of plaster and mortar and ceramic evidence verifies that this area was used for domestic purposes from the Early Roman through the Byzantine periods. Three types of domestic structures have been revealed.14 On the steeper eastern and western slopes, the houses were small, modest terrace-type, built into the slope. They are typically two-floor houses that, while lacking separate courtyards, do make use of the roof of each successive lower house as a type of terrace. Such house design is similar to that at Gamla at least as described by Josephus.

10.  Danny Syon, “The Coins,” appended to Edwards, “Khirbet Qana,” 129–32. 11.  The west side of the reservoir-like feature had plaster adhering to the interior face of the vertical stone. Carbon-14 testing of the plaster dated it to the Early Roman period. Further excavations of the feature found no evidence of expansion of the reservoir to the west and instead showed that the area had been used for quarrying. 12.  See the discussion and comparison with the cities (e.g., Sepphoris) in Peter Richardson, “Khirbet Qana (and Other Villages) as a Context for Jesus,” in Jesus and Archaeology (ed. James H. Charlesworth; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006), 127. 13.  On Galilee during the Great Revolt, see O. Guri-Ramon, ed., The Great Revolt in the Galilee (Haifa: Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, 2008). 14.  On differentiated housing types, see the discussion and drawings in Richardson, “Khirbet Qana (and Other Villages),” 133–35.

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Figure J: Pilaster with carved capital. Photograph by M. Schwartz. Used by permission.

The northern slope is flatter, and the houses built there are also simple but have extended the living space by the inclusion of a side courtyard. These courtyards were found to have cisterns, and in one case a stepped bath (possible mikveh) was connected to the cistern. There were clear indications that the bath had been in use in the Byzantine period, but carbon-14 dating of plaster samples demonstrated that its construction dated to the Early Roman period. On the acropolis, a large structure was exposed that appears to be third type of domestic structure: a house with a central courtyard. While this house also showed sure signs of being occupied into the Byzantine period (e.g., walls added and altered) plaster samples from the floor and walls gave carbon-14 readings that dated the earliest use of the house to the Early Roman period. The courtyard was covered with flagstones. One room of the house had an interior pilaster with a nicely carved capital (fig. J). This interior column was part of an arch that supported a second floor. The size of this house and the quality of the plaster suggest that this was an “elite” house similar to one exposed at Yodefat/Jotapata.15 A second pattern of use of space in the Early Roman village was exposed on the eastern and southeastern slopes. The excavations in these areas uncovered evidence of industrial activity. On the eastern slope, a bell-shaped plastered dovecote or columbarium hewn into the bedrock was exposed (fig. K). This type of dovecote is similar to others found in Roman sites in Palestine and in terms of form is typical of the first centuries bce/ce. 16 A second industrial area was uncovered on the southeastern slope (fig. L). The excavations revealed a set of installations partially cut into bedrock, partially constructed with stone and mortar and covered with plaster. 15.  David Adan-Bayewitz and Mordechai Aviam, “Iotapata, Josephus and the Siege of 67: Preliminary Report on the 1992–94 Seasons,” JRA 10 (1997): 131–65. 16.  Mordechai Aviam, “Columbaria in the Galilee,” in Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys. Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods (Land of Galilee 1; Rochester, N.Y.: Institute of Galilean Archaeology, University of Rochester, 2004), 31–35.

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Figure K: Drawing of columbarium. Drawing by A. Sönderlund. Used by permission.

Figure L. Photo of Early Roman industrial area. Photo by J. Garland. Used by permission.

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Figure M. Photo of steps leading to underground chamber near Early Roman industrial area. Photo by J. Garland. Used by permission.

A stepped structure that had five steps leading to a small (1 m x 1.7 m [east–west] x 2 m) underground plastered chamber was connected to these installations. A second and larger stepped structure (fig. M) was uncovered two and a half meters to the south of these installations. In this case, the five plastered steps led to a circular underground chamber that measured 3 m high and 4 m in diameter. The function of these installations and connected stepped structures is not clear. It is possible that the stepped structures were ritual baths (mikva’ot) connected either to dealing with flax or with tanning animal hides. It is clear that the uses of these installations is distinct from the industrial activity exposed at the nearby village of Yodefat/Jotapata (olive oil presses and ceramic kilns), which suggests an intentional effort at complementarity as these villages moved beyond subsistence agriculture to industrial production.17 It is also worth noting that the numismatic evidence does not suggest that the presence of industry necessarily connotes significant commercialization or monetization. Beyond the Maccabean coins noted earlier, the coin finds from the Early Roman context include ten Seleucid coins, one Herodian coin, and only four Early Roman coins. No coins from Sepphoris have been found despite its proximity and the large number of coins minted by the city in the period after 70 ce. There was a significant number of Tyrian coins (and two from Acco/Ptolemais), suggesting that the village was connected to larger trading networks but either was excluded from or intentionally eschewed interconnections with the Herodian network in Galilee.18 17.  See Richardson, “Khirbet Qana (and Other Villages),” 131–32. 18.  For an argument that the latter might be the case, see T. McCollough, “City and Village in Lower Galilee: The Import of the Archaeological Excavations at Sepphoris and Khirbet Qana (Cana) for Framing the Eco-

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A third type of use of space exposed at Khirbet Qana is that related to public gatherings. On the southwestern quadrant of the acropolis a 20 m x 15 m building was uncovered. On the northeastern corner of this building a 3 m x 5 m room was attached (see figs. N and O). The fully exposed western wall of the main building is 1.5 m wide. Probes to foundation level made evident that the structure was founded in an area that had previously served as a place for quarrying stone. The stones used at founding level had been mortared, and there was plaster adhering to the exterior and interior surfaces of this wall. Ceramic evidence recovered at foundation level (having been founded on quarried stone—there was no foundation trench) dated to the first and early second centuries ce. Carbon-14 testing of the mortar and wall plaster yielded a date range of 4–235 ce. This result, when combined with the ceramic evidence, suggests a founding date in the last decades of the first or early second century ce. The building is oriented north–south, and an entry on the southern wall was uncovered. The interior of the building is divided into a central nave and two side aisles by way of eight interior columns (fig. P). Footers for the columns were recovered, along with column and stylobate fragments. A capital was uncovered in reuse. The capital’s decorative elements place it in the Ionic order with recessed volutes. There were carvings of fruit hanging from the volutes. The capital is similar to ones found at Gamla and Beth Shearim, and the parallels suggest a dating to the Early or Middle Roman period. As was the case with the synagogue at Gamla, the aisle floors are covered with plaster, while the central nave area was not plastered. Evidence of benches along the interior walls was exposed. A bench composed of stone was found plastered against the western wall, and benches carved from bedrock and covered with plaster were found along the eastern and northern walls. The size of this building and its interior configuration of space are consistent with other structures identified as synagogues. We conjecture that this putative synagogue may have been built as a result of the influx of refugees from the south after the Great Revolt of 70 ce. The small room attached at the northeast corner of the putative synagogue had plastered walls and floor and benches on three sides. While the foundation of this structure had been disturbed by later (Byzantine) rebuilding, the overwhelming number of Hellenistic and Early Roman sherds found at foundation level argues strongly for dating the construction in correlation with the synagogue. This room could then serve the larger structure as a place for storage of texts or perhaps as a bet ha-midrash. This structure (possible synagogue) continued to be used as a large public space into the Byzantine period. In the late fifth or sixth century, a rectangular platform was constructed against the south wall (see fig. N). The platform has the appearance of a bema. The addition of a bema to a synagogue-type structure in the Byzantine period can also be seen in the case of Gush Halav and Wadi Hamam.19 nomic Context of Jesus,” in The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (ed. David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins; Early Christianity and Its Literature 11; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013), 49–74. 19.  See Eric Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and James F. Strange, Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush Halav (Meiron Excavation Project 5; Winona Lake, Ind.: Published for the American Schools of Oriental Research

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Figure N. Aerial photo of possible synagogue with bema indicated. Balloon photo by Skyview. Used by permission.

Figure O. Plan of possible synagogue. Drawing courtesy University of Puget Sound Excavations. Used by permission.

Figure P. Architect’s reconstruction of possible synagogue with interior columns. Drawing by A. Sönderlund. Used by permission.

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In addition to the mikveh, the distribution of coins, and the presence of a possible synagogue, the religious identity of the village as a Jewish village has been established by tombs and by artifacts. In terms of the former, the excavations of Khirbet Qana have also exposed “twelve or thirteen undecorated tombs with between fifty and one hundred loculi . . . which may represent the largest village or town necropolis in Galilee.”20 The tombs have not been excavated, but they have been surveyed and drawn, and the interior design is typical of loculus-type Jewish tombs of the Early Roman period, especially those found in Jerusalem (fig. Q).

Figure Q. Photo of interior of tomb with loculi. Photo by J. Garland. Used by permission.

There are, however, no arcosolia, no ossuaries, and, as noted, no decorative elements. Moreover, the entrance courtyards are dissimilar to those found in Jerusalem. In all cases but one, the entrance was at the bottom of a vertical shaft (about 1.5 m deep), and there were no steps down or for that matter any means of accessing the courtyard from ground level. Without further exploration, the social status of the tomb owners cannot be established.21 In terms of artifacts, the excavations have recovered several examples of stoneware both turned and chiseled. In addition, an ostracon was recovered near the mikveh uncovered in Field III. Three letters had been incised on the rim of a Roman cooking pot with a pin prior to the pot being fired (fig. R). The three Aramaic letters are bet, gimel, and dalet. The inscription is written in formal script and, on paleographic grounds, should be dated to the late first or early second century ce. The paleographer identified the artifact as an abecedary and if so, it is the first abecedary found in a Jewish village in Galilee.22 by Eisenbrauns, 1990); and Uzi Leibner, “Excavations at Khirbet Wadi Hamam (Lower Galilee): The Synagogue and the Settlement,” JRA 23 (2010): 220–38. 20. Richardson, “Khirbet Qana (and Other Villages),” 136. 21. On the tombs and questions of identity and social realities, see Peter Richardson, “Khirbet Qana’s Necropolis and Ethnic Questions, “ in The Archaeology of Difference: Gender, Ethnicity, Class and the “Other” in Antiquity. Studies in Honor of Eric M. Meyers (ed. Douglas Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough; AASOR 60–61. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2007), 257–66. 22. E. Eschel, “An abecedary Inscription,” appended to D. Edwards, “Khirbet Qana: From Jewish Village to Christian Pilgrim Site,” in Humphrey, Roman and Byzantine Near East, 3:116.

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Figure R. Ostracon with Aramaic letters. Photo by H. Eshel. Used by permission.

Khirbet Qana offers a complex and important Jewish village site with origins in the Late Hellenistic, Early Roman period and a continuous occupation through the late Byzantine period. The excavation of the site has brought to life material culture that sheds light on villageurban relations in Galilee; social, economic, and religious development of villages; and the interplay between Christian pilgrimage and Jewish villages in the Byzantine and later periods. Bibliography Adan-Bayewitz, David, and Mordechai Aviam. “Iotapata, Josephus, and the Siege of 67: Preliminary Report on the 1992–94 Seasons.” JRA 10 (1997): 131–65. Alexandre, Yardenna. “The Archaeological Evidence of the Great Revolt at Karm er-Ras (Kfar Kanna) in the Lower Galilee.” In The Great Revolt in the Galilee, edited by O. GuriRamon, 73–79. Haifa: Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, 2008. Alliata, E. “I recenti scavi a Kefer Kenna.” La Terra Sancta 1 (1999): 16–17. Aviam, Mordechai Jews, Pagans, and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys. Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods. Land of Galilee 1. Rochester, N.Y.: Institute of Galilean Archaeology, University of Rochester, 2004. Avi-Yonah, Michael. “A List of Priestly Courses from Caesarea.” IEJ 12 (1962): 137–39. Baggati, Bellarmino. “Le antichità di Kh. Qana et di Kefr Kenna in Galilea.” SBFLA 15 (1964– 1965): 251–92. Conway, C. “Cana.” NIDB 1:531–32. Edwards, D. “Khirbet Qana: From Jewish Village to Christian Pilgrim Site.” In The Roman and Byzantine Near East: Some Archaeological Research, edited by J. Humphrey, 3:101–32. JRASS 49. Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002.

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Eschel, E. “An abecedary Inscription.” Appended to D. Edwards, “Khirbet Qana: From Jewish Village to Christian Pilgrim Site.” In The Roman and Byzantine Near East: Some Archaeological Research, edited by J. Humphrey, 3:1116. JRASS 49. Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002. Herrojo, Julián. Cana de Galilea y su localización: Un examen crítico de las fuentes. Paris: J. Gabalda, 1999. Klein, Samuel. Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas. Leipzig: R. Haupt, 1909. Leibner, Uzi. “Excavations at Khirbet Wadi Hamam (Lower Galilee): The Synagogue and the Settlement.” JRA 23 (2010): 220–38. McCollough, T. “City and Village in Lower Galilee: The Import of the Archaeological Excavations at Sepphoris and Khirbet Qana (Cana) for Framing the Economic Context of Jesus.” In The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus, edited by David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins, 49–74. Early Christianity and Its Literature 11. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013. Mackowski, R. “Scholar’s Qanah: A Rexamination of the Evidence in Favor of Khirbet Qana.” Biblische Zeitschrift 23 (1979): 278–84. Mason, Steve. Flavius Josephus: Translation and Commentary. Vol. 9, Life of Josephus: Translation and Commentary. Leiden: Brill, 2001. Meyers, Eric M., Carol L. Meyers, and James F. Strange. Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush Halav. Meiron Excavation Project 5. Winona Lake, Ind.: Published for the American Schools of Oriental Research by Eisenbrauns, 1990. Neusner, Jacob. The Mishnah: A New Translation. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988. Pringle, Denys. The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem: A Corpus. Vol. 1, A–K (Excluding Acre and Jerusalem). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. Richardson, Peter. “Khirbet Qana (and Other Villages) as a Context for Jesus.” In Jesus and Archaeology, edited by James H. Charlesworth, 120–44. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006. ———. “Khirbet Qana’s Necropolis and Ethnic Questions.” In The Archaeology of Difference: Gender, Ethnicity, Class and the “Other” in Antiquity. Studies in Honor of Eric M. Meyers, edited by Douglas Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 257–66. AASOR 60–61. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2007. ———. “What Has Cana to Do with Capernaum?” NTS 48 (2002): 314–31. Strange, J. F. “Cana of Galilee.” ABD 1:827. Syon, Danny. “The Coins.” Appended to D. Edwards, “Khirbet Qana: From Jewish Village to Christian Pilgrim Site.” In The Roman and Byzantine Near East: Some Archaeological Research, edited by J. Humphrey, 3:129–32. JRASS 49. Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002. Wilkinson, John. Jerusalem Pilgrims before the Crusades. 2nd ed. Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 2002.

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6 Karm er-Ras near Kafr Kanna Yardenna Alexandre The site of Karm er-Ras, meaning “the top orchard,” is located on a low hill partially planted with olive groves (220 m above sea level), on the western side of the present-day village of Kafr Kanna (220 m above sea level). It is situated in central Lower Galilee at the meeting point of the northern edge of the Nazareth hill ridge and the southern margins of the expansive Beit Netofa and Bet Rimon/Tur’an valleys. The valleys provide fertile agricultural land, and the surrounding slopes are well suited for sheep and goat pasture, fruit orchards, and olive groves, while the local limestone is amenable for hewing building stones and installations. The copious Kanna spring emerges half a kilometer to the southwest, its waters flowing along a streambed about one hundred meters southwest of the site. The ancient west–east route from the Mediterranean coast to Syria ran inland along the southern margins of the Beit Netofa Valley, just north of Karm er-Ras. This major highway from ‘Acco to Ptolemais to Tiberias was paved by the Romans in the early second century ce. Excavations at Karm er-Ras Several small salvage excavations were carried out between 1999 and 2011, prior to the construction of houses by Kafr Kanna plot owners.1 Twenty-two small excavations (25–100 sq m), Areas A–Z, were excavated at the site, two on the hilltop and the others on the northern, eastern, and southern lower slopes.2 The exposure of the archaeological remains was always 1.  The first single-square excavation was actually carried out in 1990 but was not published, and I did not have access to the records. 2.  The excavations were carried out for the Israel Antiquities Authority predominantly under the direction of Yardenna Alexandre. Two areas (H, J) were directed by Karen Covello-Paran and one (K) by Abdallah Mouqary, both of the IAA, who kindly gave me the material for publication. The excavations are due to be fully published

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limited by the constrictions of salvage excavations, and consequently, the understandings often remain tentative. The processing of the accumulated wealth of architectural remains and artifacts enabled the establishment of a cross-site stratigraphy constituting ten archaeological strata dating from the Iron IIA (late tenth century bce) to the Byzantine period (late fifth century ce). Stratum

Period

Centuries Approximate Dates

Nature of settlement and ethnic/political affiliation

X

Iron IIA

10th–mid-9th bce c. 1000–845 bce

Israelite fortified town on hilltop Ends in destruction

IX

Iron IIB

Mid-9th–8th bce c. 845–732 bce

Rebuild of Israelite town on hilltop Ends in final destruction and abandonment

VIII

Post-Iron IIB

Late 8th bce c. 732–700 bce

Small-scale, short-lived squatter-type occupation on lower slope

VII

Persian

Mid-5th–4th bce c. 450–332 bce

Pit-like structures on hilltop, possibly part of Achaemenid storage facility. Ends in abandonment

VI

Early Hellenistic

3rd–early/mid-2nd bce c. 300–160 bce

Ptolemaic/Phoenician/Seleucidcontrolled building complex on lower slope. Ends in destruction and abandonment

V

Late Hellenistic Hasmonean

Late 2nd–mid-1st bce c. 130–63 bce

Small Jewish village

IV

Early Roman

Mid-1st bce–1st ce c. 63 bce–67 ce

Jewish village grows

III

Middle Roman

2nd–mid-3rd ce c. 67–250/300 ce

Jewish village continues

II

Late Roman

4th ce c. 300–360 ce

Decline of village and mostly occupation gap

I

Early Byzantine

End 4th–5th ce c. 380–500 ce

Rebuild of probably Jewish village, ending in final abandonment of site

Figure A. Table showing the ten excavation strata at Karm er-Ras.

as an IAA Report, where credit will be given to the many colleagues who contributed to the excavations and the publication. See also Yardenna Alexandre. Cana of Galilee, Excavations at Karm er-Ras 1999–2011 (forthcoming).

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Karm er-Ras was first settled in Iron Age IIA, when a small fortified town was built on the hilltop (Stratum X; Areas G and W, upper left; fig. B). The town underwent destruction, was immediately rebuilt, and was finally destroyed at the end of Iron IIB (Stratum IX). In historical terms, the Iron Age town was an integral part of the Solomonic kingdom and subsequently of the northern kingdom of Israel. Its final destruction is attributed to the Assyrian conquest of the Galilee under Tiglath-pileser III in 733/732 bce. Apart from a minimal, short-lived squatter presence (Stratum VIII; Area M), the hilltop was abandoned for about three centuries, until “pit-like” structures containing many Persianperiod, smashed storage jars were dug into the Iron Age destruction debris layers (Stratum VII; Area G). The many storage jars and the similarity of the pottery and the few Aegean imports to the repertoires of Phoenician coastal Dor hint that these ephemeral remains may have been part of a fifth- to fourth-century bce Achaemenid Persian agricultural storage facility, indicating that this area may have been part of the agricultural hinterland (χῶρα, chōra) of the thriving Phoenician coastal cities, possibly of Dor itself. The Persian hilltop occupation was destroyed and abandoned. In the Early Hellenistic period, third-century bce stone walls of large new buildings (Stratum VI) were constructed on the lower slopes (main remains in Areas S, T, U, Y). The Early Hellenistic building remains exhibited a thick burnt destruction layer that contained large quantities of buff storage jar sherds and a variety of imported Mediterranean and Aegean ware pottery sherds, as well as a few Ptolemaic and some Seleucid coins,3 the finds pointing to the interpretation of the site as a coastal Phoenician-affiliated, agricultural storage complex, the issue of Seleucid control remaining unknown. The pottery and the numismatic evidence suggest that the violent destruction may have occurred around 160 bce and was followed by the abandonment of the site. The historical context for the destruction of the Phoenician pagan settlement may have been the early Hasmonean campaigns to the Galilee.4 A subsequent Late Hellenistic phase on these lower slopes was designated as Stratum V, although few architectural remains could be attributed unequivocally to this stratum. In effect, it was predominantly the presence of many small, Late Hellenistic potsherds and several Hasmonean coins in the Stratum IV Early Roman houses that led to the understanding that the new village was actually founded in the Late Hellenistic Hasmonean period. The continued occupation of the houses without a break into the Early Roman period indicates that the Early Roman inhabitants must have been the immediate descendants of the original Late Hellenistic settlers. The similarity of some of the pottery to Judean forms, the Hasmonean coins—the earliest of which dates to John Hyrcanus I (129–105 bce)—and the clear Jewish attributes of the Early Roman village point to the identification of the founders as Jewish immigrants from

3.  The numismatic report by Donald T. Ariel will appear in the IAA report on Karm er-Ras. 4.  A possible context is Simon the brother of Judah Maccabee’s military exploit into Lower Galilee in 164 bce in response to a call for help from the Jewish population who were under attack from the pagan population of Acco-Ptolemais and the Phoenician coast (1 Macc. 5:14-24).

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Figure B. Map of Karm er-Ras showing the excavated areas, Areas A–Z. Map by IAA ­Surveying Separtment. Used by permission.

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Judea. The new village at Karm er-Ras was probably established at an early stage of the Hasmonean colonization of the Galilee in the last third of the second century bce.5 The Stratum IV Early Roman remains (first century bce to first century ce) comprise parts of several terraced houses with interconnecting rooms, courtyards, and beaten-earth floors reflecting the fully fledged village that covered the lower slopes. Noteworthy is the reuse of some of the still-standing Early Hellenistic walls, seemingly by clearing out the destruction debris layer between the old walls. The new dwellings contained some installations, such as pits and tabuns, and equipment, such as basalt mortars and loom weights, reflecting the household activities of food preparation and wool weaving. The bone remains found in the Early Roman contexts reflect a diet of cattle, goat, sheep, and their secondary products, but no pork.6 The significant quantities of pottery found in the rooms consisted of local Galilean wares, specifically Kefar Hananya cooking wares, Shikhin storage jars, kraters, juglets, Karm er-Ras manufactured jars and other vessels, as well as Jerusalem-manufactured knife-pared lamps.7 The production of the Early Roman storage jars within the village was evident by the discovery of a pottery workshop in Area Y comprising two large pottery kilns (see fig. C) containing many storage jars of a single type.8 Several additional features in the village point to its specifically Jewish character. Three mikva’ot (ritual baths) were excavated, two being small mikva’ot in private houses (Areas C and H), while a third, larger one may possibly have belonged to a communal building (fig. D) that was not excavated (in Area S). An additional exposed rock-hewn mikveh in a cave on the northern hill slope may have served an outdoor agricultural processing area. The mikva’ot thus reflect the observance of ritual purity in the private and public domain, as well as in the context of the production of olive oil or wine. Fragments of chalkstone vessels (or stoneware vessels) were uncovered in many of the houses, including mugs, lids, small bowls, and large basins (qalal), characteristic finds in Judean and Galilean Jewish contexts also reflecting a broad observance of ritual purity issues. While the observance of ritual-purity issues was originally the prerogative of the priests who served in the Jerusalem temple, by the late Second Temple period it may have become the concern of many lay Jews.9 Noteworthy is the reconstructed list of the twenty-four priestly courses settled 5.  Josephus’s account of Ptolemy Lathyrus’s attack on Shikhin and Sepphoris in 103 bce is evidence for a significant, established Jewish settlement in the immediate vicinity of Karm er-Ras by the reign of Alexander Jannaeus (Ant. 12.4). 6.  The faunal report by Guy Bar-Oz and Noa Raban-Gerstel will appear in the IAA report on Karm er-Ras. 7. Samples of the Karm er-Ras lamps were examined by David Adan-Bayewitz et al., “Preferential Distribution of Lamps from the Jerusalem Area in the Late Second Temple Period (Late First Century bce–70 ce),” BASOR 350 (2008): 37–85. 8.  Florentino Díez Fernández, Cerámica común romana de la Galilea: Aproximaciones y diferencias con la cerámica del resto de Palestina y regiones circundantes (Madrid: Biblia y Fé, 1983), 135, Storage Jar Type T1.3. 9.  David Amit and Yonatan Adler “The Observance of Ritual Purity after 70 ce: A Reevaluation of the Evidence in Light of Recent Archaeological Discoveries,” in Follow the Wise (B. Sanhedrin 32b): Studies in Jewish History and Culture in honor of Lee I. Levine (ed. Zeev Weiss et al.; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010), 122 n. 3.

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Figure C. The Early Roman pottery workshop in Area Y (see fig. B). Photo by Assaf Peretz. Courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority.

in the Galilee that gives the eleventh course of Eliashib, priest in Cana, but the date and the historical reality of the compiled list are questioned.10 The characteristically Jewish and ritual-purity-conscious material culture of Early Roman Karm er-Ras is similar to that of contemporary Jewish Galilean villages—for example, Yodefat11—and to that of the Jewish residential quarter in the city of Sepphoris, the administrative capital of Galilee located four kilometers to the west.12 Two carefully constructed, underground hideout complexes were uncovered in the Early Roman village, both camouflaged below the ground floor stories of houses. In Area T, a narrow

10.  Regarding priestly courses, see also the article on “Khirbet Qana” in this volume pp. 127–45. 11.  Mordechai Aviam, “Yodefat: A Case Study in the Development of the Jewish Settlement in the Galilee during the Second Temple Period” (in Hebrew; PhD diss., Bar-Ilan University, 2005), 107–35. 12.  Eric M. Meyers. “Sepphoris on the Eve of the Great Revolt (67–68 ce): Archaeology and Josephus,” in Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures (ed. Eric M. Meyers; Duke Judaic Studies 1; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999), 109–22; and Jonathan L. Reed, Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus: A Re-examination of the Evidence (Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000), 125–28.

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Figure D: The Early to Middle Roman mikveh in Area S (fig. B). Photo by Yardenna Alexandre. Reprinted courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority.

vertical shaft led down into a small gabled room (fig. E), and another led into a low corridor. A covered-over stone lid revealed a deep water cistern. In Area W on the hilltop, three very small igloo-like units were interconnected by small corridors that cut through the old, still-standing Iron Age walls. One corridor led into a wellcamouflaged, rock-hewn, bell-shaped chamber in which were discovered eleven carefully stacked, intact Early Roman storage jars.13 The discovery of first-century ce pottery and coins in the complexes and of two coins in Area W dated to the second year of the Great Revolt led to the secure attribution of these hideouts to the preparations undertaken in the village in the wake of the Great Revolt.14 The archaeological evidence of in situ pottery in the Karm er-Ras houses points to a hurried abandonment of the village, without any evidence for a military confrontation. In the context of the preparations for the revolt, Josephus records an intriguing sentence in Life: “At the time my headquarters were at Cana” (86). Following this statement, Josephus 13.  Díez Fernández, Cerámica común, 137: Storage Jar Type T1.5. 14.  A list of Early Roman hideaway complexes in the Galilee appears in Mordechai Aviam, Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods (Land of Galilee 1; Rochester, N.Y.: Institute of Galilean Archaeology, University of Rochester, 2004), 123–32.

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Figure E: The Early Roman underground hideout in Area T (see fig. B). Photo by Yardenna Alexandre. Reprinted courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority.

reports that he left for Tiberias. It is possible that Josephus was camped at Cana in 66 ce when the Sepphoreans opted for a pro-Roman stance, that a Roman garrison was installed in the city to protect it, and that Cana was consequently too close to Sepphoris to be a safe location. In 67 ce, Josephus records that the advancing of the Roman army under Vespasian toward Sepphoris from the west caused Josephus’s troops, who were camped at Garis, east of Sepphoris, to retreat to Tiberias, following which Vespasian burned all the villages in his path (Josephus J.W. 3.128–131). A likely location for Garis has been proposed at Khirbet Kenna (also preserving the name Kanna), a round hill with Roman-period remains located between Sepphoris and Karm er-Ras.15 It is in this historical context that the village of Karm er-Ras must have been abandoned, although the archaeological evidence here exposed no signs of burning. The subsequent reoccupation of all the houses occurred after a short break, indicating that many of the villagers survived to return after the war. The underground hideouts were not accessed, and the damaged pottery kilns were not repaired. The Stratum III, second- and third-century ce Middle Roman village exhibited the resettlement in all the old houses and the mikva’ot, as well as the continued use of chalkstone vessels and local Galilean pottery manufactured at the Shikhin and the Kefar H|ananya potteries. No synagogue has yet been excavated at Karm er-Ras. It may have been located just south of Area H where monumental blocks were once exposed. The cemetery of Karm er-Ras, 15.  Ibid., 129.

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however, has been located. Roman kokhim burial caves (including one traditionally attributed to Rabbi Simeon ben Gamliel II, nāśî’ of the Sanhedrin in the second century ce), have been located to the south and to the east of Karm er-Ras, including in the old Kafr Kanna village nucleus area, indicating that this area served as a burial ground until the fourth century ce.16 The archaeological remains at Karm er-Ras, including the infrequent appearance of specific mid-fourth-century ce pottery types, indicate that the Stratum II village waned in the course of the fourth-century ce Late Roman period and was practically unoccupied at the time of the 363-ce earthquake that destroyed neighboring city of Sepphoris.17 The phenomenon of a widespread fourth-century settlement decline was observed in the Jewish rural settlements of eastern Lower Galilee and was attributed to the heavy Roman taxation that led to the nonviability of the working of the land.18 While this factor may have led to the decline and abandonment of Karm er-Ras, the village was resettled again at the very end of the fourth or the beginning of the fifth century. The excavations exposed the stone-wall remains of the new Stratum I village that was built here, directly overlying and partially reusing some of the Roman houses. The Byzantine village exhibited new local Byzantine pottery and imported Late Roman Red Wares but exhibited no specifically Jewish or Christian attributes. The in situ pottery and a small “emergency” coin hoard indicate that the Stratum I village was hurriedly abandoned in the late fifth or early sixth century ce, this final abandonment hinting at the villagers’ Jewish identity. A possible scenario is that if it was economic pressure that led to the fourth-century abandonment of the village, the villagers may have moved to the adjacent city of Sepphoris. The aftermath of the 363-ce earthquake and the increased presence and dominance of the Christians in Sepphoris may have pressured the Karm er-Ras villagers to leave the city. They subsequently resettled the village. Further Christian persecution may have finally forced the villagers to leave Karm er-Ras at the end of the fifth century, after which the site was never resettled. Identification of Ancient Cana It is proposed here that the Late Hellenistic, Roman, and Early Byzantine village of Karm er-Ras was the ancient Cana mentioned in the Gospel of John, or “Cana of Galilee.”19 Cana of Galilee 16.  Burial caves in the village nucleus area have been excavated by Hana Abu-‘Uqsa, “Three Burial Caves at Kafr Kanna” (in Hebrew), in Eretz Zafon: Studies in Galilean Archaeology (ed. Zvi Gal; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2002), 152–61. 17.  Marva Balouka, “The Evidence for the Existence of an Earthquake in the Year 363 and the Transition from the Roman Period to the Byzantine Period according to the Archaeological Finds in Sepphoris” (in Hebrew; MA thesis, Hebrew University, 1999). 18.  Uzi Leibner, Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee (TSAJ 127; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), 367–72. 19.  The credit for the original identification of Karm er-Ras as Cana of Galilee is due to Bellarmino Bagatti, who on the basis of sherd collecting and the observation of column bases in secondary use in terrace walls proposed

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is cited in the Gospel of John in the New Testament as the site of Jesus’ first miracle: Jesus and his mother attended a Jewish wedding in Cana, and when the wine ran out, Jesus turned the water in six large stone jars to wine (John 2:1-11). Cana is mentioned also in the account of Jesus healing the centurion’s son, and as the birthplace of Nathaniel (John 4:46-54; 21:2). The identification of Karm er-Ras as the Roman Cana of the New Testament is supported by the compilation of the archaeological, textual, and geographical-historical considerations. First, the excavations exposed a full-fledged Jewish village from the Late Hellenistic, Roman, and Early Byzantine periods. Second, the earliest pilgrim accounts in the Byzantine period record Christian pilgrims visiting the site of the wedding miracle at Cana in the immediate vicinity of Nazareth, Sepphoris, and Mount Tabor, at a site located near a spring.20 Third, Karm er-Ras is located just northwest of the ancient village nucleus of Kafr Kanna, which preserves the name of Cana but was a burial ground and an agricultural area rather than a residential quarter in the Roman period. Our understanding is that sometime between the late fourth and the late fifth century, when the village of Karm er-Ras/Cana waned, was resettled, and was finally abandoned, a new Jewish neighborhood was established half a kilometer to the southeast in the area that later became the village nucleus of Kafr Kanna, and that this new neighborhood also adopted the name of Cana. The long history of the veneration of Kafr Kanna as the site of the water-to-wine miracle lies beyond the scope of this article. Deserving mention, however, are the significant, although fragmentary, Roman- and Byzantine-period archaeological remains exposed beneath the Latin (Franciscan) Wedding Church constructed in the 1890s on the traditionally venerated spot in the village nucleus. The excavators21 record fragmentary Early and Middle Roman domestic remains that consist of a wall and rock-hewn, agricultural installations on the bedrock. Overlying these remains, an atrium with a columned portico, the walls of a large hall to its north, and patches of a mosaic floor exhibiting an Aramaic inscription—reading “Blessed be the memory of Yoseh, son of Tanhum, son of Butah and his sons, who made the tabella (mosaic)”—all belonged to an Early Byzantine synagogue attributed stylistically to the late fourth to fifth century. The overlying remains of a single, north-facing apse with a tomb were understood as a fifth- to sixth-century Christian funerary edifice, and a medieval columned building was built that the Roman village of Cana was at Karm er-Ras (“Le antichità di Kh. Qana e di Kefr Kenna in Galilea,” SBFLA 15 [1964–1965]: 251–92). 20.  A very brief summary of the pilgrim accounts may be found in Denys Pringle, The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem: A Corpus, vol. 1, AK (Excluding Acre and Jerusalem) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 285. 21.  Some of the remains below the church, including the mosaic inscription, were originally uncovered incidentally in the course of construction of the new church at the end of the nineteenth century. In 1969, excavations were carried out in the church courtyard by Stanislao Loffreda, and in 1997 an excavation beneath the church was carried out by Eugenio Alliata. Only preliminary reports have been published. A summary of the successive building phases was accessed on the Internet: Eugenio Alliata, “Archaeological Excavations at Cana of Galilee,” Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, http://198.62.75.1/www1/ofm/sbf/SBFCana97en.html (accessed 02/09/14).

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over the Byzantine remains. The Early Byzantine synagogue reflects a Jewish presence in the new neighborhood, and the sixth-century Byzantine pilgrim accounts of an altar commemorating the miracle raise the possibility that the site may have been appropriated by Christians. An alternative tradition identifies Cana of Galilee at the site of Khirbet Qana on the northern side of the Beit Netofa Valley.22 From our examination of the pilgrim records, it seems that this was a later tradition first adopted by the Frankish pilgrims arriving in the Beit Netofa Valley on the road from Acco in the Crusader period.23 Although no church stood at Kafr Kanna in the Crusader period, the Eastern Christians probably preserved the earlier tradition in the village. Bibliography Abu-‘Uqsa, Hana. “Three Burial Caves at Kafr Kanna.” In Hebrew. In Eretz Zafon: Studies in Galilean Archaeology, edited by Zvi Gal, 153–61 (Hebrew; English summary, p. 183). Jerusalem: Israeli Antiquities Authority, 2002. Adan-Bayewitz, David, Frank Asaro, Moshe Wieder, and Robert D. Glauque. “Preferential Distribution of Lamps from the Jerusalem Area in the Late Second Temple Period (Late First Century bce–70 ce).” BASOR 350 (2008): 37–85. Alliata, Eugenio. “Archaeological Excavations at Cana of Galilee.” Studium Biblicum Franciscanum. http://198.62.75.1/www1/ofm/sbf/SBFCana97en.html. Amit, David, and Yonatan Adler. “The Observance of Ritual Purity after 70 ce: A Reevaluation of the Evidence in Light of Recent Archaeological Discoveries.” In “Follow the Wise” (B. Sanhedrin 32b): Studies in Jewish History and Culture in Honor of Lee I. Levine, edited by Zeev Weiss, Oded Irshai, Jodi Magness, and Seth Schwartz, 121–43. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010. Aviam, Mordechai. Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods. Land of Galilee 1. Rochester, N.Y.: Institute of Galilean Archaeology, University of Rochester, 2004. Aviam, Mordechai. “Yodefat: A Case Study in the Development of the Jewish Settlement in the Galilee during the Second Temple Period.” In Hebrew. PhD diss., Bar-Ilan University, 2005. Bagatti, Bellarmino. “Le antichità di Kh. Qana e di Kefr Kenna in Galilea.” SBFLA 15 (1964– 1965): 251–92. Balouka, Marva. “The Evidence for the Existence of an Earthquake in the Year 363 and the Transition from the Roman Period to the Byzantine Period according to the Archaeological Finds in Sepphoris.” In Hebrew. MA thesis, Hebrew University, 1999. 22.  For the identification of Cana of Galilee at Khirbet Qana, see the article by McCollogh in this volume, pp. 127–45. 23.  See Bagatti, “Le antichità di Kh. Qana.”

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Díez Fernández, Florentino. Cerámica común romana de la Galilea: Aproximaciones y diferencias con la cerámica del resto de Palestina y regiones circundantes. Madrid: Biblia y Fé, 1983. Leibner, Uzi. Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee. TSAJ 127. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Meyers, Eric M. “Sepphoris on the Eve of the Great Revolt (67–68 ce): Archaeology and Josephus.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 109–22. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. Pringle, Denys. The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem: A Corpus. Vol. 1, A–K (Excluding Acre and Jerusalem). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. Reed, Jonathan L. Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus: A Re-examination of the Evidence. Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000.

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7 Kafr Kanna (The Franciscan Church) F. Massimo Luca, OFM The Gospel of John refers to a village that the Fourth Evangelist calls “Cana of Galilee,” possibly to distinguish it from “Cana of Asher” (Josh. 19:28). Cana of Asher can be identified with Qana, a village located twelve kilometers southeast of Tyre. The village Cana of Galilee would have belonged to the territory of Zebulun. Yet where the book of Joshua reports the list of cities and boundaries assigned to the tribes of Israel (Josh. 19:10-16), Cana is not mentioned. If it existed in that period, Cana would likely have been a small village. Josephus also refers to a “village of Galilee called Cana” as the location of his headquarters during the Great Jewish War (66–73 ce; Life 86). But elsewhere when he refers to his headquarters, he indicates that he is stationed near the Beit Netofa Valley (Life 206); thus he would seem to have referred to the village today called Khirbet Qana located on the north side of the Beit Netofa Valley and not to Kafr Kanna, which is located near Nazareth (see fig. A and Map 3 in the gallery in the front of this volume). In the earlier part of his Gospel, John assigns an important role to Cana, a village of Galilee. The Gospel recounts the story of a wedding in Cana where Jesus turned water into wine (2:1-11) and a story of Jesus’ healing (while in Cana) of the royal official’s son who lived in Capernaum (4:46-54); and there is a reference at the end of the Gospel to Nathaniel’s being born there (21:2). The identification of the village of Cana has been disputed because over the centuries tradition has located this village in different places.1 It was only during the seventeenth century ce that pilgrims found an underground chamber accessible from the interior part of a columned building in Kafr Kanna (= Kefar Kana and Kefer Kenna). The underground chamber was deemed to be a church, built by the emperor Constantine and his mother Helena (fourth century ce) in the place where tradi1.  See James F. Strange, “Cana of Galilee,” ABD 1:827.

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Figure A. Lower Galilee and road connections showing proposed location of Kfar Kanna. Drawing by J. Rosenberg. Used by permission.

tion set the famous wedding narrated in John 2. Currently in Kafr Kanna three ecclesiastical buildings recall two of these Gospel events: the first one, set in the middle of the three, is a Catholic church built in memory of the wedding; the second, located to its north, was built by Franciscans in 1889 on the spot where the house of St. Bartholomew allegedly stood; the third, located to its south, is a Greek Orthodox church (also dedicated to the wedding feast). In the third location, Greek monks show two jars that relate to that event. The “remote” healing of the centurion’s son has never been commemorated by pilgrims visiting this site. Pilgrim References to Kafr Kanna From the first centuries of the Christian era onward, pilgrims left many written testimonies related to Cana. These testimonies seem to indicate, because of geographical allusions, that the pilgrims thought Kafr Kanna was the ancient Cana of John’s Gospel. St. Hieronymus (Jerome)2 in the fourth century ce recounts that Sancta Paula, his disciple, moving from Nazareth to Capernaum, visited Cana, specifying “where the Lord turned water into wine” (Peregrinatio S. Paulae). Sancta Paula, in her own writings to Marcella, confirms that she visited Cana located next to Nazareth; then she went to Mount Tabor (Epistula 35, 46, 108). 2.  Jerome. Personal names are quoted in Latin according to Donato Baldi, Enchiridion locorum sanctorum (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1955), xiv–xxvi.

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Theodosius, in 530 ce, states that Cana of Galilee is located eight kilometers (five miles) distant from Sepphoris (cited under its new Roman name Diocaesarea) and eight kilometers from Nazareth.3 Theodosius gives the first information regarding distance between the two well-known localities and Cana. The Anonymus Placentinus (Italy), visiting Cana in 570 ce, writes: Departing from Sepphoris (Zippori), after three miles (five kilometers) we came to Cana, where the Lord was at the wedding, and we sat on the same seat, where I unworthily wrote the name of my parents . . . of the six hydrias (jars) two are still remaining; I filled one of them with wine and carried it on my shoulder to the altar as an offering. In the same spring we devotionally washed. Then we went to the city of Nazareth.4 S. Willibaldus in the eighth century, moving from Nazareth in the direction of Mount Tabor, saw on the altar of “the great church of Cana” one of the six hydrias (jars) that the Lord filled with water.5 Information given by these pilgrims can be divided into two categories. The first group of pilgrims, passing by Cana during fourth and fifth centuries, refers to a place where the memory of the wedding was celebrated. In this spot a church was not yet built, but there probably was an appropriate room or something similar where pilgrims remembered the event narrated in chapter 2 of the Gospel of John. The writings of the second group of pilgrims, starting from the sixth century, indicate the presence of an ecclesiastical building (altar, church). These writings allow us to locate the village in the area between Nazareth, Sepphoris, and Mount Tabor. The equidistance between Nazareth and Sepphoris places the village northeast of Nazareth, because Sepphoris is located northwest of Nazareth. Cana, according to these testimonies, is to be found near Mount Tabor along the Nazareth–Tiberias route (see the maps 3 and 4c in the front of this volume). Pilgrims’ detailed accounts are particularly interesting. They saw “two jars” toward the end of the sixth century and a single jar was left in the site, as evidenced by Willibaldus. None of them mentioned what happened to the jars.6 Second, the Anonymus Placentinus’s report is peculiar, because he claims to have carried a jar on his shoulders. The observation contrasts with the Gospel story, because to carry a “hydria [ὑδρία, jar] on his shoulders” means that the hydria had to be lightweight. According to John’s Gospel, each jar (not even considering that it was made of stone) could hold eighty liters of water (two or three μετρητάς, metrētas, John 2:6).7 Putting these indications together, it is reasonable to assume that each jar would have had to weigh much more than a single person could lift. 3.  Ibid., 241. 4. Ibid., 242. 5. Ibid., 243. 6.   For the traditional history of the six jars, see A. Geissler, “Dove si trovano le vere urne di Cana?” Diarium Terræ Sanctæ 5 (1912): 2–3, 113–14. 7.  The metrētēs is an ancient Greek unit of measurement corresponding to 37.4 liters. In houses excavated in

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According to the Commemoratorium de casis Dei8 in the early ninth century, after two centuries of Arab domination, a few monks were living in Cana. In those days in Cana there was still a church with an adjoining monastery attesting to its continuous veneration.9 In the ninth century, Epiphanius traveled from Mount Tabor to Cana. Contrary to what other pilgrims before him reported, Epiphanius indicates that the distance of a day’s walk was required to go from Mount Tabor to Cana, which therefore may locate Cana in a different spot.10 The daily distance walked by travelers was estimated at between twenty and twentyfive kilometers (12.5 to 15.5 miles). In this case he would have gone to Khirbet Qana, located north of Nazareth. Johannes Phocas visited Cana (Khirbet Qana) and the holy places in 1177 ce. After him pilgrims began to identify the nuptial spot of John 2 with Khirbet Qana.11 Burchardus de Monte Sion visited Cana in 1283 ce. His important geographical indications started to be registered on maps from this period, when Cana was well identified with Khirbet Qana.12 Excavations In 1641, the Franciscans of the Custody of the Holy Land acquired part of the ruins where there was an ancient sanctuary located in Kafr Kanna. In 1654, a French canon named Jean Doubdan, in his description of the site, reports the existence of a chapel under the church (crypt), built on the site where the miracle was performed. He writes: The church that St. Helen built on the site where the house was honored by the first miracle of the Lord. It is a very old building, built with hewn stone, consisting of two large bodies. The right one is a vaulted church, about forty steps long and twenty wide, supported in the middle by a row of columns and lit by few windows. It is abandoned but still standing and serves as a mosque to the inhabitants of the country. Below it, there is a chapel which is said is found in the exact place where the Lord made the wonder.13 the Jewish quarter of Jerusalem, many first-century ce stone jars were found. These jars are smaller than the ancient Greek ones, capable of holding eighty liters each as reported by G. Hamel: “The capacity of the largest lathe-turned chalk kraters found at H|isma or in Jerusalem is of about 80 liters, as can be deduced from the figures and drawings” (“Notes on the Wedding of Cana,” http://humweb.ucsc.edu/gweltaz/courses/gospels/john/notes/Cana.html (retrieved November 3, 2013). 8.   This document was redacted in 808 ce and lists all monasteries and churches of Palestine. 9. Baldi, Enchiridion locorum sanctorum, 244. 10. Ibid., 245. 11. Ibid., 251. 12. Ibid., 255. 13.  Jean Doubdan, Le voyage de la Terre-Sainte (Paris: Clousier, 1666), 584; cf. Baldi, Enchiridion locorum sanctorum, 263.

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A. Geissler, a parish priest of the village, began the construction of the church with its boundary wall in 1879. The church was built in a hurry, without previous archaeological excavations. Despite the rush, just below the floor of the new building, he found many archaeological artifacts and especially a dedicatory inscription in Aramaic (fig. B). This inscription is five written lines long and goes back to the fourth or fifth century ce.14 The inscription is visible in the pavement floor of the nave of the modern church. The inscription is: Blessed be the memory of Yoseh son of Tanhum, son of Butah and his sons who have made the table.15 May it be blessing for both of them. Amen

‫דכיר לטב יוסה‬ ‫בר תנחום בר בוטה‬ ‫בניו דעבדון הטבל‬ ‫תהי להון ברכה‬ ‫אמן‬

Figure B: Photograph of the synagogue inscription. Photograph by E. Alliata, Studium ­Biblicum Franciscanum. Used by permission.

P. B. Meistermann makes mention of Karm er-Ras, which was part of ancient Kafr Kanna, where he found “scattered on the ground five bases of columns belonging to an ancient synagogue.”16 The monumental remains are part of a synagogue from the Roman period, when the village was largely extended. In the Roman and Byzantine periods, at least two religious communities were operating in the village. These two communities were probably organized 14.   Each line is 85 cm long; characters are 5 cm high. 15.  This Aramaic word means a wooden tablet (for writing) or a stone plank for building. See Marcus Jastrow, Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature (1950; repr., New York: Judaica, 1975). Zev Vilnay translates the word as “mosaic” (The Guide to Israel [Cleveland: World, 1960] 428). L. I. Levine (“H|orvat ‘Ammudim,” NEAEHL 1:56) maintains that the word means “pavement.” According to Levine, it appears in one other inscription at Kafr Kanna and one at H|orvat ‘Ammudim. Z. Weiss and E. Netzer translate it “panel (of a mosaic)” (Promise and Redemption: A Synagogue Mosaic from Sepphoris [Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1996], 42). 16.  P. B. Meistermann, Guida di Terra Santa (Florence: Alfani e Venturi, 1925), 549.

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around the two synagogues, the one with the Aramaic inscription (Kafr Kanna) and the one with the monumental ruins (Karm er-Ras). The presence of two sacred buildings is an index of the village’s importance. Guided by experience and by analogy with other Galilean villages, Bagatti held that the two communities in the village could have belonged to two streams of Judaism, a Jewish community living next to the synagogue of Karm er-Ras and a JudeoChristian community living next to the other synagogue. In this second community, Christian memories were transmitted. Successively, the Judeo-Christian synagogue building was transformed into a church similar to Nazareth, where, during the fifth century ce, the previous Christian meeting room was transformed into a basilica.17 In 1997 the Custody of the Holy Land decided to renovate the sanctuary of Cana. During the operations, Eugenio Alliata was commissioned for an archaeological survey. His work brought new light on the history of this village.18 Geissler built the first Franciscan chapel in 1881. The nave of this chapel corresponds to the first part of the present church. The crypt was considered the authentic place of the miracle. Originally, a staircase entered the crypt from the back of this first chapel. In 1901, the chapel was enlarged to its current size. The entrance was rebuilt and the access to the crypt was placed from the center of the church. Underneath the modern church, remains of a medieval building (fourteenth century) were found. In this place there was originally a large room with a row of columns at the center. Pilgrims in the seventeenth century describe this building as an old church transformed into a mosque by the Muslims, as canon Doubdan reported. In an underground chamber, pilgrims identified the place of the miracle of Jesus. On the strata below the medieval one lay an atrium built in the fifth or sixth century. In the center was a cistern, and the atrium was surrounded by a pillared portico. It extends to the north and covers almost the entire area under the medieval building. Mosaics appear to have covered the area. The Aramaic inscription (fig. B above) was part of the mosaic floor and is located under the portico next to the eastern wall. Archaeological analysis of the atrium reveals two constructional phases, an ancient phase and a later one. The columns and capitals of the building appear to be reused material. The style of this material is reminiscent of synagogues of third and fourth centuries ce. The findings confirm that the atrium was part of a Jewish religious building, identified in 1969 by Stanislao Loffreda as a synagogue when he excavated the courtyard located along the northern side of the church.19 On the outer eastern side of the atrium are a few ruins of a fifth- to sixth-century ce apse of a chapel containing a tomb. The apse is north-oriented and is part of the tomb. The tomb

17.  Bellarmino Bagatti, Ancient Christian Villages of Galilee (Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Collectio minor 37; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 2001), 41. 18.  Eugenio Alliata, “Cana di Galilea: La ricerca dell’archeologia,” La Terra Santa (Italian Edition) 75, no. 1 (1999): 11–18. 19.  Stanislao Loffreda, “Scavi a Kafr Kanna,” SBFLA 19 (1969): 328–48.

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has an east–west axis, typical of Christian tombs. Therefore, the funerary chapel seems to be considered a monument of Christian origin. Geissler had identified the apse and the tomb: With the help of benefactors Fr. Geissler bought part of the land where are lying ruins of a church built by St. Helen. The place is behind the current chapel. After careful researches, he was persuaded that there he surely would have had to find the old building; excavations have confirmed the correctness of his idea. He found not only the place of the miracle, where stood the stone jars, and a silo for wheat, but also a number of valuable archaeological remains: the base of a large column, the capital of a column and the tomb of Tanchum, a famous Jewish man converted to Christianity.20 Geissler reports that the tomb was already partially destroyed in ancient times and that inside there were no human remains. Probably the abnormal orientation of the apse was the reason that he did not publicize his discovery. In 1901, the first church building was enlarged to its present form with three apses, setting the northern apse above the ancient one. The 1997 excavations partially proved Geissler’s theory confirming that the apse is part of the funerary chapel facing north. Alliata did not find the bases of the other two apses that would have identified the church and confirmed Geissler’s hypothesis.

Figure C: Photograph of the monolith after removal of pavement floor, excavation 1999. ­Photograph by E. Alliata, Studium Biblicum Franciscanum. Used by permission.

Below the fifth-century ce strata, Alliata reached dwelling debris that had been in use between the first century and the fourth ce. The debris was found mainly in the southern portico of the atrium underneath the former sacristy. The very few objects found date from two periods, the Hellenistic period (one object only) and the period starting in the second half of the first century ce, particularly the period following the First Jewish Revolt. These dwellings suffered violent destruction (war, fire, or earthquake) during the late second or early third century ce. In exhibition at the center of the crypt is a monolith (fig. C) carved in the middle in the form of a jar or a tank. On the outside are traces of plaster. 20.  As reported anonymously in “Wiederherstellung der alten Kirche zu Kana in Galiläa,” Der Kreuzfahrer Kalender 6 (1898): 68.

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Figure D. Plan of the Franciscan Church with Archaeological Remains. Drawing by F. Massimo Luca. Used by permission.

KEY TO CHURCH PLAN 1. Franciscan church (1901) 2. First Franciscan church (1881)

4. Byzantine funerary apse (fifth–sixth century) 5. Synagogue and atrium with mosaic pavement (fourth–fifth century) 3. Medieval building (fourteenth century) 6. Domestic dwellings (first–second century)

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The monolith was incorporated into the floor formed by large ashlars, part of the dwellings from the late first century. The monolith served as a tank and could have been for the collection of an oil-water emulsion obtained from an olive press. The emulsion collected in appropriate tanks, produced the separation of water (heavier) from oil (lighter). On the top edge of the tank the small drainage channel is a clear indication of the use of this carved monolith. Conclusions The excavations of Kafr Kanna describe the detailed recent history of the sanctuary between the seventeenth and the twentieth centuries. They also allow us to date the famous Aramaic inscription in its Jewish context. The presence of tombs from the Byzantine period in the area of the sanctuary suggests a Christian presence during fifth and sixth centuries. Although there are a few Hellenistic and Early Roman remains, the identification of Kafr Kanna with Cana mentioned in John’s Gospel is doubtful. Bibliography Alexandre, Yardenna. “Kafr Kanna (Jebel Khuwweikha): Iron II, Late Hellenistic and Roman Remains.” HA-ESI 125 (2013): 1–21. http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/images//Kafr_ Kanna_English.pdf. Alliata, Eugenio. “Cana di Galilea: La ricerca dell’archeologia.” La Terra Santa (Italian edition) 75, no. 1 (1999): 11–18. Anonymous. “Wiederherstellung der alten Kirche zu Kana in Galiläa.” Der Kreuzfahrer Kalender 6 (1898): 68. Bagatti, Bellarmino. Ancient Christian Villages of Galilee. Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Collectio minor 37. Jerusalem: Franciscan, 2001. Baldi, Donato. Enchiridion locorum sanctorum. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1955. Geissler, A. “Dove si trovano le vere urne di Cana?” Diarium Terræ Sanctæ 5 (1912): 2–3, 113–14. Jastrow, Marcus. Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature. 1950. Reprint, New York: Judaica, 1975. Levine, L. I. “H|orvat ‘Ammudim.” NEAEHL 1:55–56. Loffreda, Stanislao. “Scavi a Kafr Kanna.” SBFLA 19 (1969): 328–48. Meistermann, P. B. Guida di Terra Santa. Florence: Alfani e Venturi, 1925. Strange, James F. “Cana of Galilee.” ABD 1:827. Quaresimus, F. Elucidatio Terræ Sanctæ. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1989. Vilnay, Zev. The Guide to Israel. Cleveland: World, 1969. Weiss, Z., and E. Netzer. Promise and Redemption: A Synagogue Mosaic from Sepphoris. Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1996.

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8 Nazareth James F. Strange Introduction Nazareth: Hebrew nas irat or nôs irat (‫נַ צרת‬, ‫ ;)נוצרת‬Aramaic nas ierî (‫ ;)נצרי‬Arabic en-nasira (‫اصرة‬ ِ َّ‫ ;)الن‬Greek of the New Testament nazaret or nazareth (ναζαρέτ, ναζαρέθ), nazara (ναζαρά), iēsous ho nazarēnos (Ιησους ὁ Ναζαρηνός, “Jesus the Nazarene”), and the variant iēsous ho nazōraios (Ιησους ὁ Ναζωραῖος).1 “Nazareth” is apparently derived from the Hebrew root nsr (“branch” or “bud”). Some scholars hypothesize that the ending in –t reveals that the name is most likely postexilic.2 Others argue that the name is formed on a rare pattern beginning in the Old Testament in a few toponyms such as dabrat (‫ ;דברת‬Josh. 19:12) and s iarphat (‫;צרפת‬ 1 Kgs. 17:9).3 Location Ancient Nazareth occupied a small valley on top of the Nazareth fault, which thrusts upward from the Jezreel Valley to about 392 m above sea level (1,286 ft) at the Mount of the Precipice, or “Mount of the Leap” (Latin: Saltus Domini; Arabic: Jabal al-Qafza).4 Excavations west of this point in a natural basin revealed remains of houses and ancient agricultural installations 1.  See the linguistic discussion in Yoel Elitzur, Ancient Place Names in the Holy Land: Preservation and History (Jerusalem: Hebrew University, Magnes Press; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2004), 227–28, 334. 2.  Ibid., 11. 3. Ibid., 228. 4.  Willibald Bösen, Galiläa als Lebensraum und Wirkungsfeld Jesu: Eine zeitgeschichtliche und theologische Untersuchung (Biblisches Sachbuch; Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 1991); Gustaf Dalman, Sacred Sites and Ways: Studies in the Topography of the Gospels (trans. Paul P. Levertoff; New York: Macmillan, 1935), 99.

167

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Figure A. A view of Nazareth c. 1920. From a stereograph view. Photo © Granger, NYC. All rights reserved.

nestled in mountains that extend east to the Sea of Galilee and west almost to Mount Carmel.5 The extent of the village varied with the period but by 1871 had reached nearly 117 dunams or 29 acres,6 not counting the fields, orchards, and terrace agriculture. The earliest part of Nazareth inside the area outlined by tombs may be about 65 dunams or 16 acres.7 The elevation of

5. Bösen, Galiläa als Lebensraum, 97–98; and Dalman, Sacred Sites and Ways, 64. 6.  Charles Warren and Claude R. Conder, The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology, vol. 1, Galilee (London: Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881). Area computed by the author. One dunam is 1,000 sq m in modern Israel. 7.  Yardenna Alexandra, Mary’s Well, Nazareth: The Late Hellenistic to the Ottoman Periods (IAA Reports 49; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2012), fig. 1.5.

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the village varies from 335 to 380 m (1,099 to 1,247 ft) above sea level.8 Immediately north of Nazareth stood the peak of Neby Se’ir at 488 m (1,601 ft) above sea level.9 Natural Resources The soil of Nazareth was fertile, suited for wheat, barley, grapes, olives, and fruit trees. Excavations in modern Nazareth reveal evidences of ancient agriculture in a narrow valley about one-half kilometer west of the Church of the Annunciation on the grounds of the YMCA.10 Archaeologists recovered three watchtowers constructed of fieldstones from the first century ce to the fifth century, which allowed farmers to guard their valuable crops. Since some of the land was quite steep, hand-built, stepped terraces allowed exploitation of the rich slopes for grains, olives, fruits, nuts, and likely vegetables. Archaeologists uncovered olive presses and wine presses, showing that Nazareth participated in the legendary richness of the land. Cisterns used for irrigation dotted the landscape. The pottery sherds stemmed from mid-first century bce and later. This is the same profile as that from beneath the Church of the Annunciation and the Sisters of Nazareth. Rainfall was plentiful and still varies between 50 and 80 cm (20 to 32 in) annually.11 There was only one spring in Nazareth, called today “The Spring of the Virgin.” (The “Spring of the Apostles” is a pious fiction.)12 Some scholars believe that ascribing the spring to Mary follows the Protevangelium of James, because Joseph tells Mary he is taking her “into my house” (ch. 9: ἐν οἶκῳ μου, en oikō mou), assumed to be in Nazareth. Mary “went out to draw water” (ἐξῆλθεν γεμίσαι ὕδωρ, exēlthen gemisai hydōr). In the eyes of the faithful, she drew from the spring of Nazareth.13 8.  Maps of the Survey of Western Palestine, Sheet 6. 9. Ibid. 10.  Stephen Pfann, Ross Voss, and Yehudah Rapuano, “Surveys and Excavations at the Nazareth Village Farm (1997–2002): Final Report,” BAIAS 25 (2007): 19–79. 11.  Adrian Curtis, Oxford Bible Atlas (4th ed.; New York: Oxford University Press, 2007), map titled: “Mean Annual Rainfall.” 12. Bellarmino Bagatti, Antichi villaggi cristiani di Galilea (Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Collectio minor 13; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1971), 30–32. Ken Dark maintains that a spring once flowed in the Byzantine period in the basement of the Sisters of Nazareth (“Early Roman-Period Nazareth and the Sisters of Nazareth Convent,” Antiquaries Journal 92 [September 2012]: 37–64], published online, 29 August 2012 [see p. 43], http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0003581512001308). It does not flow today, but perhaps Adomnan saw this spring (see n. 16 below). Tzvi Shacham also thinks there were two weak springs once in Nazareth (“Bathhouse from the Crusader Period in Nazareth,” in Spa: Sanitas per Aquam. Tagungsband des Internationalen FrontinusSymposiums zur Technik- und Kulturgeschichte der antiken Thermen. Aachen, 18.–22. März 2009 = Proceedings of the International Frontinus-Symposium on the Technical and Cultural History of Ancient Baths (ed. R. Kreiner and W. Letzner; Babesch. Supplement 21; Leuven: Peeters, 2012), 319–26. 13. Bagatti, Antichi villaggi, 30.

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Figure B. The traditional site of Mary’s Well in Nazareth.

This spring emerges from bedrock about 34 m north of St. Gabriel’s Church, the Greek Orthodox Church of the Annunciation. The water flows in a channel under a paved road, and pilgrims dip the water inside the church. The water flows a total of 150 m (492 ft) south to “Mary’s Well” (see fig. B)14 This may be the same place misidentified as the spring of Mary by Egeria about 381 ce.15 Adomnan, writer of Arculf ’s journeys in about 700 ce, cited a spring under a church, perhaps the Byzantine Church of St. Gabriel. Adomnan thought that the water beneath the church was the spring itself.16 The spring is dependent on rainfall and is therefore limited after the rainless summer. Villagers relied on cisterns.17 The natural forest or maquis around and within Nazareth was primarily olive trees, kermes oak, Mount Tabor oak, terebinth, and occasionally Aleppo pine. The storax shrub often grew in close association with Mount Tabor oaks. Researchers have recovered ancient remains of the lentisk or mastic tree and laurel quite near Nazareth, evidently a part of the ancient Galilean forest.18 A yellow-flowered low bush, called Spanish broom in the United States, is native to the region. Nazareth could not be seen from afar, because the site lay in a depression in a forested, mountainous area in southwestern Galilee. The valleys between the Nazareth mountains tend to run in an east–west direction. The broken terrain yielded good natural security. Nazareth was not walled.

14. Alexandre, Mary’s Well, 5; Clemens Kopp, “Beiträge zur Geographie Nazareth,” JPOS 19, nos. 3–4 (1941): 253–85. 15.  John Wilkinson, Egeria’s Travels: Newly Translated with Supporting Documents and Notes (3rd ed.; Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1999), 96. 16.  John Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrims before the Crusades (Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1977), 109. 17. Alexandre, Mary’s Well, 2. 18.  Nili Lipschitz, Timber in Ancient Israel: Dendroarchaeology and Dendrochronology (Tel Aviv University Sonia and Marco Nadler Institute of Archaeology Monograph Series 26; Tel Aviv: Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University, 2007), 22, 35.

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Figure C. Map of modern Nazareth with key sites. Created by author.

Nazareth stands only five Roman miles south of Sepphoris-Diocaesarea, but the early paths to Sepphoris are hard to trace in the topography.19 Nazareth seems better connected to other ancient villages, such as Ilut to the northwest, Mahalol to the west, Yafia to the southwest, Exaloth and the Jezreel Valley to the southeast, and Dabritta to the east.20 The main road from Tiberias passed six kilometers to the north and therefore missed Nazareth, but it was only a two-hour walk to the road. The Via Maris passed Nazareth at the foot of the Nazareth fault,

1–9.

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19. The footpaths of Nazareth visible in 1871–1878 appear in maps of the Survey of Western Palestine, sheets 20. Editor’s note: see Maps 4C and 4D in the gallery in the front of this volume.

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skirting Yaphia on top of the fault and several kilometers away. Yaphia was a much larger and more important locality than Nazareth (Josephus J.W. 3.289–306). Josephus claims to have fortified Yaphia (J.W. 2.573) but never mentions Nazareth, even when he writes of his visit to Yaphia (Life 230).21 The lack of mention in Josephus has led some to conclude that Nazareth did not exist in Josephus’s day.22 Summary History Excavations beneath the Sisters of Nazareth,23 the Latin Church of the Annunciation,24 the Church of St. Joseph (The “Nutrition”),25 the International Marian Center across the street from the Latin church,26 in the grounds of the YMCA,27 at Mary’s Well,28 and the discovery and excavation of various tombs in Nazareth and vicinity by the Israel Antiquities Authority show that human occupation in the region of Nazareth begins in the Neolithic and Chalcolithic periods. An Early Bronze II (3000–2750 bce) pithos, or large jar, was found near Mary’s Well. A relatively permanent population with tombs appears in Nazareth in the Middle Bronze I and II periods. A small population appears again in the Iron Age and continuously from the Late Hellenistic period to modern times.29 The floruit of occupation is from the Early Roman to the Byzantine periods, and a substantial occupation is known to the modern period. Nazareth in Ancient Literature Nazareth is not mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, in the intertestamental literature, in Josephus, or in the Mishnah. Yet the gentilic “Jesus the Nazarene” or “Jesus of Nazareth” occurs three

21.  Yardenna Alexandre, “Yafi‘a,” HA-ESI 124 (2012): A-5700. 22.  Robert Eisenman, James the Brother of Jesus (New York: Penguin, 1997), 952. 23.  Dark, “Early Roman-Period Nazareth.” 24.  Bellarmino Bagatti, Gli scavi di Nazaret, vol. 1, Dalle origini al secolo XII (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1969); Eng. trans. by E. Hoade, Excavations in Nazareth, vol. 1, From the Beginning until the Twelfth Century (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1969). 25.  Bellarmino Bagatti, “B. Note Archeologiche. I.–gli scavi presso Le Dame di Nazaret,” Studi Franciscani 4 (1937): 253–66; Bagatti, Excavations in Nazareth, 222–26; Dark, “Early Roman-Period Nazareth.” 26. Alexandre, Mary’s Well, 7. 27.  See n. 8. Walid Atrash, “Nazareth West,” HA-ESI 121 (2009): A-4444. 28. Alexandre, Mary’s Well, 8. 29.  Yardenna Alexandre, “An Iron Age IB/IIA Burial Cave at Har Yona, Upper Nazareth,” Atiqot, English Series 44 (2003): 183–89. An excavation 100 ft (30.5 m) south of the Church of the Annunciation yielded a modern school and pottery from the Late Hellenistic to the modern period. See Yotam Tepper, “Nazareth,” HA-ESI 121 (2009): A-3953.

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times in one uncensored manuscript of the Babylonian Talmud (b. Sanh. 43a) as Yeshu HaNotsri (‫ישו הנוצרי‬, yšu hnws irî).30 The town is mentioned about twenty-three times in the Gospels and Acts (if we do not count “his hometown” in Mark 6:1 and Matt. 13:54). This includes six times in Acts as “Jesus (Christ) of Nazareth” (Ἰησοῦς [Χριστός] τοῦ Ναζωραίου, Iesous [Christos] tou Nazōraiou), but once as Ιησοῦν τὸν ἀπὸ Ναζαρέθ, Iesoun ton apo Nazareth. Sextus Julius Africanus (170–243 ce) knows Nazareth as Nazara (ναζαρά) in his Epistula Aristidem V and as quoted by Eusebius (260–340 ce).31 Origen of Caesarea (c. 185–254 ce) knows the spellings Nazara (ναζαρά) and Nazaret (ναζαρέτ).32 In his Onomasticon, Eusebius cites the name as Nazareth (Ναζαρέθ) and explains that “Nazarene” (Ναζωραῖος, nazōraios) comes from “Nazareth.”33 Jerome (a.k.a. Hieronymos, 347–420 ce), who translated Eusebius’s Onomasticon into Latin in the fifth century, uses Nazareth in Latin and renders “Nazarene” as nazaraeus.34 In the nineteenth century, certain scholars doubted that Jesus was from Nazareth because of its apparent omission in Jewish literature.35 Other nineteenth-century scholars understood the fourth-century Greek phrase “Jesus the Nazarene” or “the Nazorean” to refer to his membership in a pre-Christian sect by that name occurring in Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis (wrote about 375) (Pan. 29.9.2).36 Count Joseph of Tiberias, a Jewish convert to Christianity, told Epiphanius that he (Joseph) petitioned the emperor Constantine for permission to build a church in Sepphoris-Diocaesarea, Tiberias, Capernaum, and Nazareth, which implies they had none (Epiphanius Pan. 30.11.9–10). He may have succeeded in part after the Gallus Revolt of 351–352 ce. The Christian pilgrim Egeria nearly fifty years later reports that in Nazareth an altar stood inside “truly the great and most splendid cave where she [Mary] lived, in which an altar is placed” (spelunca vero, in qua habitavit, magna est et lucidissima, ubi est positum altarium).37 That is, if the sentence actually stems from Egeria and not Peter the Deacon, 30.  David Instone-Brewer, “Jesus of Nazareth’s Trial in the Uncensored Talmud,” TynBul 62, no. 2 (2011): 262–94. “Yeshu Ha-Notsri” in late Hebrew means “Jesus the Christian.” 31. Eusebius Eccl. Hist. 1.7.14; Sextus Julius Africanus Epistula Aristidem, in Walther Reichardt, ed., Die Briefe des Sextus Julius Africanus an Aristides und Origenes (Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur 34.3 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1909), 53–62. 32. Origen Comm. Jo. vol. 10 (Migne, PG 80:308–9). 33. Eusebius Onomasticon; and Jerome (Hieronymos), De situ et nominibus locorum Hebraeorum, in Eusebius: Das Onomastikon der biblischen Ortsnamen (ed. Erich Klostermann; 1904; repr., Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1966), 138. 34. Klostermann, Eusebius, 140. 35.  Albert Schweitzer, The Quest of the Historical Jesus (ed. John Bowden; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001), reprint of 1906, chs. 22 and 23. But see n. 30 above. 36. In Onomasticon 138, Eusebius says, “Nazarenes of old now known as we, the Christians” (Nazarēnoi to palaion hēmeis hoi nyn Christianoi, Ναζαρηνοι τὸ παλαιὸν ἡμεῖς οἱ νῦν Χριστιανοí). 37. Wilkinson, Egeria’s Travels, 96. For the Latin text, see Kopp, “Beiträge zur Geographie Nazareth,” 202 n. 4.

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Joseph may have built his monastery church incorporating the cave. According to his itinerary, the Bordeaux Pilgrim did not visit Nazareth.38 Neither does Nazareth appear in the Tabula Peutingeriana, but Yafia and Sepphoris-Diocaesarea are also missing from it.39 Jerome briefly mentions Paulina’s visit to Nazareth about 404 ce.40 By 570 ce there was a church in Nazareth, according to the Piacenza Pilgrim, who saw a “synagogue.” He also recounts that the house of St. Mary “is now a basilica.” This Pilgrim mentions the beauty and kindness of the Jewish women of Nazareth, which implies that Nazareth still had a significant Jewish population in the sixth century. He also reports that Jews and Christians in Nazareth did not always get along but that it is a paradise of grain and fruit.41 Nazareth may appear in Ecclesiastes Rabbah 2:8, which is later than the Babylonian Talmud and perhaps contemporary with the Piacenza Pilgrim. This Midrash appears to know Nazareth in the phrase “debates from Nazhanah” (nazh\nh, ‫)נזחנה‬. The misspelling may be censorship. “Debates” means “Torah disputations,” which suggests that the village was a Jewish town.42 Nazareth, spelled ‫( נַ צרת‬nas irat), also appears in a Hebrew poem of Kalir, one of the Jewish piyyut \im (liturgical poems of the sixth century). This poem names the Galilean villages to which the twenty-four priestly courses or divisions (mišmārôt, ‫ )משׁמרות‬fled for refuge after the destruction of the Second Temple. Two fragments of this list carved in marble with “Nazareth” in line 18 are known from excavations in the Caesarea synagogue, and one fragment was found earlier at Ashkelon.43 These fragments date to about 300 ce. Some have proposed that this list was posted on the façade of synagogues in Caesarea, Ashkelon, and elsewhere. The priestly family of hpys is i, perhaps vocalized as “Hapitsets,” settled in nas irat, or Nazareth, which 38.  John Wilkinson, “The Pilgrim of Bordeaux,” in Wilkinson, Egeria’s Travels, 22–34. 39.  Ekkehard Weber, “The Tabula Peutingeriana and the Madaba Map,” in The Madaba Map Centenary, 1897–1997: Travelling through the Byzantine Umayyad Period, Proceedings of the International Conference Held in Amman, 7–9 April 1997 (ed. Michele Piccirillo and Eugenio Alliata; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1999), 41–46. 40.  St. Jerome, “Letter 108 to Eustochium-Extracts,” in Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrims before the Crusades, 47–52. 41. Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrims before the Crusades, 80–81. 42.  Adolf Neubauer, La géographie du Talmud (1868; repr., Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1967), 190–91 n. 5. 43.  Samuel Klein, Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas (Leipzig: R. Haupt, 1909), 75–76; Klein, Neue Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas (Vienna: Menorah, 1923), 47; Michael Avi-Yonah, “A List of Priestly Courses from Caesarea,” IEJ 12 (1962): 137–39; Avi-Yonah, “The Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses,” in The Teacher’s Yoke: Essays in Memory of Henry Trantham (ed. E. Jerry Vardaman and James L. Garrett Jr.; Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 1964), 46–57; Jack Finegan, The Life of Jesus and the Beginning of the Early Church (rev. ed.; Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 43–64; E. Jerry Vardaman, “Introduction to the Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses,” in Vardaman and Garrett, Teacher’s Yoke, 42–43. For further fragments from Nazareth (?), Kissufim, Tel Rehov, and Yemen, see Stuart S. Miller, “Priests, Purities, and the Jews of Galilee,” in Religion, Ethnicity and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition (ed. Jürgen Zangenberg, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin; WUNT 210; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007), 375 n. 3; Hanan Eshel, “Fragments of an Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses from Nazareth?” (in Hebrew), Tarbiz 61 (1992): 159–61.

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implies that it was an observant town, even priestly. Kalir is transmitting a tradition from 70 or 135 ce. Modern Excavations in Nazareth In 1955, modern archaeology in Nazareth began with the demolition of the Latin Church of the Annunciation followed by excavations directed by Bellarmino Bagatti. The site delivered up the foundations of a Crusader church and then a Byzantine monastery church beneath. Under these top layers were fragmentary masonry walls and cuttings in bedrock from the ancient village of Nazareth, including tombs, foundations, silos, underground work areas, storage areas, and passages. The earliest archaeological finds were in a tomb that contained pottery vessels and copper weapons and clothing pins of the Middle Bronze I (2400/2300–2000 bce). Two other tombs contained a collection of Middle Bronze II wares (2000–1400 bce).44 Apparently the village was lightly occupied in these early periods. The excavators recognized Late Bronze II and Iron I local vessels in silos north of the Crusader church.45 Somewhat later vessels from an Iron Age I and II tomb were excavated by the IAA.46 This would represent occupation from 1200 bce and perhaps as late as the sixth century bce. It seems that a small Israelite occupation was in Nazareth during part of the biblical period. At the current state of research there is a gap in occupation from the end of the Iron II period to the Late Hellenistic period. This picture may change with more excavation. The finds begin again in the Late Hellenistic and Early Roman periods. Pottery sherds appeared everywhere in rock-cut underground areas, representing mainly Galilean wares, but bases of a few amphorae from abroad also appear. This pattern appears over all Galilee from the second century bce forward, which accords with the general story related by 1 Maccabees and Josephus (1 Macc. 5:9-20; Josephus, Ant. 12.330–334) of the Maccabean repopulation of Galilee with Jews from Judea.47 The excavators also found many examples of pottery vessels, lamps, glass vessels, chalkstone vessels, and ossuaries from the first century bce to the first century ce. Archaeologists noticed fragments of limestone ossuaries south of the Church of the Annunciation at the traditional site of the “Tremor.” Fragments of a Hebrew inscription found read, “So’em the son of Menachem, may his soul find peace.” A Greek inscription, a “Decree of Caesar,” was sent from Nazareth to the Sorbonne in the nineteenth century, but it is doubtful that it could have

44. Bagatti, Excavations at Nazareth, 29–32, 250–60. 45. Ibid., 179, 260–64. 46.  Fanny Vito, “An Iron Age Burial Cave in Nazareth,” ‘Atiqot 42 (2001): 159. 47.  In the excavations at Mary’s Well, archaeologists have also found datable coins, the earliest of which dated from 175 bce. There were also ten coins of the Jewish king Alexander Jannaeus (103–76 bce). See Ariel Berman, “The Numismatic Evidence,” in Alexandre, Mary’s Well, 107–20.

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originated in Nazareth.48 Other finds from tombs are Hellenistic lamps of the first century bce and “Herodian” lamps of the first century ce. Hand-carved or lathe-turned chalkstone vessels, which are virtually markers for first-century bce and first-century ce Jewish occupation, were found beneath the Marian Center in Nazareth.49 Several of the limestone ossuary tombs contained “Herodian” lamps of the first century and discus lamps of the second century ce. Five tombs excavated in Nazareth contained three nearly intact clay ossuaries and many fragments. The excavators proposed that they were deposited by Jewish refugees from Judea after the Second Revolt in 135 ce. Items from other tombs dated from the third and fourth centuries ce. Ossilegium, or collection and reburial of human bones, is a well-known Jewish custom in the Late Hellenistic and Early Roman periods.50 But finds from tombs also include molded lamps with bow-shaped nozzles,51 usually dated 50 to 150 ce. The latest lamp found was Early Islamic, or seventh–eighth century ce.52 The excavators noticed the lack of Early Roman, imported terra sigilatta. That is not enough to argue that the village was poor, for too few houses have yet been excavated. Excavations underneath the Church of the Annunciation revealed a miqveh, or Jewish ritual bath, and another appeared under the Church of St. Joseph. These are usually dated to the first to third centuries ce.53 Archaeologists also excavated about two dozen architectural fragments, all cut in a similar style, beneath a floor of the fifth-century monastery. These included simple capitals, column drums, and well-preserved column bases, but also imposts for arches and other fragments. These finds resemble architectural fragments from Galilean synagogues of the third and fourth centuries ce. They reveal a contemporary Jewish population.54 One explanation is that the fifth-century Christians of the monastery were non-Jews who had permission to remove remnants of a synagogue and build their monastery. Yet they respected the fragments and were 48.  Franz Cumont, “Les ossuaires juifs et le Διάταγμα Καίσαρος,” Syria, 14, fasc. 2 (1933): 223–24. 49.  See also Yitzhak Magen, The Stone Vessel Industry in the Second Temple Period: Excavations at Hizma and the Jerusalem Temple Mount (Judea and Samaria Publications 1; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2002), 2–3. 50.  Nurit Feig, “Burial Caves at Nazareth,” ‘Atiqot 10 (Hebrew series; 1990): 67–79; Mordechai Aviam and Danny Syon, “Jewish Ossilegium in Galilee,” in What Athens Has to Do with Jerusalem: Essays on Classical, Jewish, and Early Christian Art and Archaeology in Honor of Gideon Foerster (ed. Leonard V. Rutgers; Interdisciplinary Studies in Ancient Culture and Religion 1; Leuven: Peeters, 2002), 151–85. 51.  Editor’s note: James Riley Strange refers to these as “Darom-style” lamps in the article “Kefar Shikhin” in this volume, pp. 88–108. 52. Bagatti, Excavations in Nazareth, fig. 235:20 and 236:1–9, 11–18. Two first-century tombs are known from the Sisters of Nazareth under a first-century ce house (Dark, “Early Roman-Period Nazareth,” 58–61). Another first-century burial cave surfaced about 2.7 km east of Nazareth (Arfan Najar and Nissim Najar, “Nazareth,” HA-ESI 16 [1995]: 49–50). 53. Bagatti, Excavations in Nazareth, 119–23, 228–33. Joan Taylor argues that a sickle blade on the top of the pool beneath the Annunciation suggests that the pool was a collecting vat for grape squeezings (Christians and the Holy Places: The Myth of Jewish-Christian Origins [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993], 244–53). 54. Bagatti, Excavations in Nazareth, 233–34; Lee I. Levine, The Ancient Synagogue: The First Thousand Years (2nd ed.; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005), 45–49.

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unwilling simply to reuse or destroy them. An alternative hypothesis is that the Christians of the monastery were Jewish by birth and represented a “Jewish-Christian” minority in Nazareth. The scholarly consensus favors the gentile Christian hypothesis.55 These are not fragments of the synagogue in Luke 4:16-30. The setting in Luke does presuppose architecture, for Jesus “stood up to read” (anestē anagnōnai, ἀνέστη ἀναγνῶναι), which implies that all were seated. An attendant or hypēretēs (ὑπηρέτης) handed him the scroll of Isaiah, which implies that it was the Sabbath to read Isaiah. Jesus holds the scroll, which suggests that readers were allowed to handle such scrolls. There may have been a chest or box for the scrolls. Some have argued that Luke knew of synagogues in his own day, but there were as yet no buildings in Jesus’ lifetime, as synagōgē can simply mean “gathering.”56 Scholars now, however, identify first-century buildings at Gamla, Capernaum, Khirbet Cana, Magdala, Shuafat, Jerusalem (the Theodotos inscription), Jericho, Masada, and Herodium (and perhaps Khirbet Edrei). The current consensus rests with the archaeology, although no first-century synagogue remains have yet been found in Nazareth.57 The Jewish population of Nazareth endured, as one inscription shows. A fragment of marble excavated in the Church of the Annunciation is inscribed on both sides in Hebrew letters. One side reads ‫( וביר גווי‬wbyr gwwy, “and a well within”) in Aramaic. The other reads ‫( נעצוץ‬n‘s iws i, “thorn bush”) in Hebrew, which occurs in Isa. 55:13.58 In the fourth century ce, large numbers of Greek and Syriac graffiti left by pilgrims began to appear in Nazareth. In this time, the Early Byzantine period or late fourth and fifth centuries ce, Nazareth was flourishing. Luxury pottery or Late Roman Red Wares were well represented. Nazareth had become a Byzantine Christian city, which included Mount Tabor and Dabrat, with the name Helenopolis in honor of Helen the mother of Constantine.59 Byzantine Nazareth is represented in coins. For example, a coin of Constantine was found in the plaster of the famous Cave of the Angel beneath the high altar of the Latin Church of the Annunciation. Three coins from 346–668 were among the finds at Mary’s Well.60 Thirteen coins were found under the floor of the southern rooms of the monastery or convent, which gave a fifth-century date to the floor. The same date pertained in the nave of the Byzantine church and elsewhere in soil layers in which Byzantine sherds were the latest datable remains.

55.  James F. Strange, “Archaeological Evidence for Jewish Christianity,” in Jewish Believers in Jesus: The Early Centuries (ed. Oskar Skarsaune and Reidar Hvalvik; Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2007), 710–41; Taylor, Christians and the Holy Places. 56.  Howard Clark Kee, “Defining the First Century ce Synagogue: Problems and Progress,” in Evolution of the Synagogue: Problems and Progress (ed. Howard Clark Kee and Lynn H. Cohick; Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 1999), 7–26. 57.  “The synagogue” shown to ancient pilgrims was likely a contemporary church at best. 58. Bagatti, Gli scavi di Nazaret, 1:112–16, 165–67. 59.  Michael Avi-Yonah, The Holy Land from the Persian to the Arab Conquests (536 B.C. to A.D. 640): A Historical Geography (rev. ed.; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1977), 123, 135, 137. 60.  Berman, “Numismatic Evidence.”

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There is a continuous record of human occupation in the Jewish village of Nazareth from the early first century bce through the Roman period, the Byzantine period, and extending to and beyond the coming of Islam in about 640 ce. Ample finds attest that Nazareth has perdured through the Early Islamic period (640–1187) and the Late Islamic period (1187–1917) to the present day. Bibliography Alexandre, Yardenna. Mary’s Well, Nazareth: The Late Hellenistic to the Ottoman Periods. IAA Reports 49. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2012. ———. “Yafi‘a.” HA-ESI 124 (2012): A-5700. Atrash, Walid. “Nazareth West.” HA-ESI 121 (2009): A-4444. Aviam, Mordechai. “Christian Galilee in the Byzantine Period.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence and Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 281–300. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. ———. “Regionalism of Tombs and Burial Customs in the Galilee during the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods.” In Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods, edited by Mordechai Aviam, 257–313. Land of Galilee 1. Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 2004. Aviam, Mordechai, and Danny Syon. “Jewish Ossilegium in Galilee.” In What Athens Has to Do with Jerusalem: Essays on Classical, Jewish, and Early Christian Art and Archaeology in Honor of Gideon Foerster, edited by Leonard V. Rutgers, 151–85. Interdisciplinary Studies in Ancient Culture and Religion 1. Leuven: Peeters, 2002. Avi-Yonah, Michael. “The Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses.” In The Teacher’s Yoke: Essays in Memory of Henry Trantham, edited by E. Jerry Vardaman and James L. Garrett Jr., 46–57. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 1964. ———. The Holy Land from the Persian to the Arab Conquests (536 B.C.to A.D. 640): A Historical Geography. Rev. ed. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1977. ———. “A List of Priestly Courses from Caesarea.” IEJ 12 (1962): 137–39. Bagatti, Bellarmino. Antichi villaggi cristiani di Galilea. Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Collectio minor 13. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1971. ———. Gli scavi di Nazaret. Vol. 1, Dalle origini al secolo XII. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1969. Eng. trans. Excavations at Nazareth. Vol. 1, From the Beginning until the Twelfth Century. Translated by E. Hoade. Jerusalem, Franciscan Printing Press, 1969. Cumont, Franz. “Les ossuaires juifs et le Διάταγμα Καίσαροϛ.” Syria 14, fasc. 2 (1933): 223– 24. Curtis, Adrian. Oxford Bible Atlas. 4th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2007.

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Dalman, Gustaf. Sacred Sites and Ways: Studies in the Topography of the Gospels. Translated by Paul P. Levertoff. New York: Macmillan, 1935. Dark, Ken. “Early Roman-Period Nazareth and the Sisters of Nazareth Convent.” Antiquaries Journal 92 (September 2012): 37–64. http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S000 3581512001308. Debir, Uri. Map: Israel National Trail, 1:50,000, Upper Galilee: Heights of Galilee, Western Galilee, Coast of Galilee, and the Routes of Israel, No. 2. Series: Tour Maps and Marked Trails, Jerusalem: Committee for the Routes of Israel, 1999 (Hebrew). Elitzur, Yoel. Ancient Place Names in the Holy Land: Preservation and History. Jerusalem: Hebrew University, Magnes Press, Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2004. Eshel, Hanan. “Fragments of an Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses from Nazareth?” In Hebrew. Tarbiz 61 (1992): 159–61. Feig, Nurit. “Burial Caves at Nazareth.” ‘Atiqot 10 (Hebrew series; 1990): 67–79. Finegan, Jack. The Life of Jesus and the Beginning of the Early Church. Rev. ed. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992. Goranson, Stephen. “Joseph of Tiberias Revisited: Orthodoxies and Heresies in FourthCentury Galilee.” In Galilee through the Centuries: Confluence of Cultures, edited by Eric M. Meyers, 335–43. Duke Judaic Studies 1. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1999. Grzybek, E., and M. Sordi. “L’Édit de Nazareth et la politique de Néron à l’égard des chrétiens.” ZPE 120 (2000): 279–91. Hartal, Moshe, and Edna Amos. “Nazerat ‘Illit, Har Nadav (East) 05-06-2006 Final Report.” HA-ESI 118 (2006): http://www.antiquities.org.il/article_Item_eng.asp?sec_ id=25&subj_id=240&id=1638&module_id=#as. Klostermann, Erich, ed. Eusebius: Das Onomastikon der biblischen Ortsnamen. 1904. Reprint, Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1966. Klein, Samuel. Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas. Leipzig: R. Haupt, 1909. ———. Neue Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas. Vienna: Menorah, 1923. Kopp, Clemens. “Beiträge zur Geographie Nazareth.” JPOS 19, nos. 3–4 (1941): 253–85. Levine, Lee I. The Ancient Synagogue: The First Thousand Years. 2nd ed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005. Lipschitz, Nili. Timber in Ancient Israel: Dendroarchaeology and Dendrochronology. Tel Aviv University Sonia and Marco Nadler Institute of Archaeology Monograph Series 26. Tel Aviv: Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University, 2007. Loffreda, Stanislao. Nazareth. Holy Places of Palestine. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1995. Magen, Yitzhak. The Stone Vessel Industry in the Second Temple Period: Excavations at Hizma and the Jerusalem Temple Mount. Judea and Samaria Publications 1. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2002. Najar, Arfan, and Nissim Najar. “Nazareth.” HA-ESI 16 (1995): 49–50. Neubauer, Adolf. Lagéographie du Talmud. 1868. Reprint, Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1967.

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Pfann, Stephen, Ross Voss, and Yehudah Rapuano. “Surveys and Excavations at the Nazareth Village Farm (1997–2002): Final Report.” BAIAS 25 (2007): 19–79. Raban, E. “Nazareth and Afula Maps, Survey.” HA-ESI 12 (1993): 19–21. Rahmani, L. Y. A Catalogue of Jewish Ossuaries in the Collections of the State of Israel. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority and the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1964. Reichardt, Walther, ed. Die Briefe des Sextus Julius Africanus an Aristides und Origenes. Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur 34.3. Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1909. Shacham, Tzvi. “Bathhouse from the Crusader Period in Nazareth.” In Spa: Sanitas per Aquam: Tagungsband des Internationalen Frontinus-Symposiums zur Technik- und Kulturgeschichte der antiken Thermen. Aachen, 18–22. März 2009 = Proceedings of the International Frontinus-Symposium on the Technical and Cultural History of Ancient Baths, edited by R. Kreiner and W. Letzner, 319–26. Babesch. Supplement 21. Leuven: Peeters, 2012. Strange, James F. “Archaeological Evidence for Jewish Christianity.” In Jewish Believers in Jesus: The Early Centuries, edited by Oskar Skarsaune and Reidar Hvalvik, 710–41. Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2007. Taylor, Joan. Christians and the Holy Places: The Myth of Jewish-Christian Origins. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. Tepper, Yotam. “Nazareth.” HA-ESI 121 (2009): A-3953. Vardaman, E. Jerry. “Introduction to the Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses.” In The Teacher’s Yoke: Essays in Memory of Henry Trantham, edited by E. Jerry Vardaman and James L. Garrett Jr., 42–43. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 1964. Vito, Fanny. “An Iron Age Burial Cave in Nazareth.” ‘Atiqot 42 (2001): 159. Wilkinson, John. Egeria’s Travels: Newly Translated with Supporting Documents and Notes. 3rd ed. Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1999. ———. Jerusalem Pilgrims before the Crusades. Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1977. ———. “The Pilgrim of Bordeaux.” In John Wilkinson, Egeria’s Travels: Translated with Supporting Documents and Notes, 22–34. 3rd ed. Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1999. Yavor, Zvi. “Nazareth.” ESI 18 (1998): 32. Zangenberg, Jürgen, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin, eds. Religion, Ethnicity and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition. WUNT 210. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007.

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9 Kefar H|ananya1 David Adan-Bayewitz Identification and Exploration Remains of the ancient village of Kefar H|ananya are located on the lower slope of a hill at the eastern edge of the H|ananya Valley, in northern Lower Galilee, along the route from Acco to the eastern Galilee, about 9 km southwest of Safed. The identification of ancient Kefar H|ananya with modern Kafr ‘Inan (Kufr ‘Anan) is based on geographic references in tannaitic literature, including mention of Kefar H|ananya as a boundary point between Upper and Lower Galilee (Mishnah Shev. 9:2); on archaeological and archaeometric evidence showing that the site was a pottery-production center during the Roman and Early Byzantine periods; on the mention in a twelfth-century ce text of a rock-cut synagogue at Kefar H|ananya; and on the phonetic similarity of Kafr ‘Inan to Kefar H|ananya. Rabbinic sources dating to the first/second–fourth centuries ce refer to Kefar H|ananya as a well-known pottery-production center, mentioning several of its products and attesting to their durability under conditions of thermal stress. Rabbi H|alafta of Kefar H|ananya (second century ce) is quoted several times in tannaitic texts. The medieval settlement is mentioned in Geniza manuscripts and in travelers’ accounts. The description by Jacob ben Nathanel, a twelfth-century (prior to 1187) traveler, of a synagogue at Kefar H|ananya “quarried from the hill with only one built wall,” seems to refer to more substantial remains, then visible, of the rock-cut structure at the site (see below). Menachem ha-H|evroni (c. 1215) mentions a synagogue in use by the residents of Kefar H|ananya. In two manuscripts from about the sixteenth century, and apparently also in a fragmentary third text (probably late fifteenth century), two synagogues are mentioned.

1.  This article and accompanying photos are from NEAHL 5:1909-1911. Reprinted by permission.

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J. Braslavsky identified remains of a rectangular rock-cut public structure (similar to that at Meiron) located east of the village of Kufr ‘Anan as an ancient synagogue. In the early 1980s, Z. Ilan published a plan of that building, found remains of another public building he suggested was a second synagogue, and traced remains of an aqueduct to the site, suggesting an early date for its construction (it is apparently medieval, however; see below). Parts of several installations for olive-oil production have been studied by R. Frankel. A bronze polycandelon, bearing an Aramaic dedicatory inscription mentioning the “holy place of Kefar H|ananya” and inscribed with two seven-branched menorahs, each flanked by a lulav and shofar, was found at el-Makr in the western Galilee and published by J. -B. Frey and subsequently by J. Naveh. Archaeometric Study The pottery-production center at Kefar H|ananya was studied as part of an interdisciplinary regional project investigating the production and local trade of common pottery in the Galilee and Golan in the Late Hellenistic, Roman, and Early Byzantine periods (figs. A and B). The ongoing project, directed by D. Adan-Bayewitz, was begun in 1981 by him and the late I. Perlman at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and has continued at Bar-Ilan University and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, with F. Asaro and R. D. Giauque of the latter institution, and M. Wieder of the former. This work has shown that Kefar H|ananya supplied most of the kitchen pottery of the Galilee, and a significant minority of the cooking vessels of the Golan, from the Early Roman through the Early Byzantine periods (second half of the first century bce–early fifth century ce). The evidence for this site-specific production provenance assignment and the distribution of the Kefar H|ananya pottery was provided by chemical analysis (instrumental neutron activation and high-precision x-ray fluorescence analyses) of about 250 examples of the cooking vessel types most prevalent in Roman Galilee, from 22 excavation sites in the Galilee and Golan; of soil samples from the H|ananya Valley, adjacent to Kefar H|ananya; and of waste from pottery production recovered in archaeological excavations at the site. Data from comparative micromorphological analysis of pottery and soil materials and evidence from archaeological excavations, as well as the information provided by the rabbinic texts of Roman date on pottery production at the settlement, were also consistent with this site-specific Kefar H|ananya production provenance. The main vessel forms made at Kefar H|ananya have been identified and dated, and their geographic and quantitative distribution described. Excavation Results In the wake of the initial provenance study, conducted between 1981 and 1985, Adan-Bayewitz directed three seasons of excavations at Kefar H|ananya (1986, 1987, 1989), on behalf of Bar-Ilan University. Unearthed were remains of a Late Roman pottery kiln with a stone-paved approach,

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Figure A. Kefar Hananya cooking bowls and pots from various sites in Galilee. Photo by Zev Radovan.

Figure B. Kefar Hananyana cooking pots and wide-bodied jugs with shoulder handles. Photo by Zev Radovan.

and remains of a contiguous outer structure supported by ashlar pillars, possibly a fuel store. All three components were built in a trench (3–3.5 m wide, culminating with the round kiln) cut into the bedrock slope (fig. C). A wall built of one row of hammer-dressed stones and fieldstones with some roof-tile fragments in the interstices separated this rock-cut trench from the slope to the east. Two successive plaster-lined structures that perhaps served as clay wetting tanks, each with a wall one course high and a sloping, thick plaster floor, were found about 10.5 m west of the kiln. A Tyrian coin dating to 41–42 ce was found below the lower floor.

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The kiln is a common Roman type, circular in plan (about 2.9 m in diameter) with a round central pillar (1 m in diameter). North (rear) and east of the furnace chamber, one or two courses of cut stones line the bedrock; other lining stones had apparently been robbed. The entrance to the furnace chamber is about 0.9 m wide, and its jambs are built of ashlars. Following the destruction in the fourth century ce of the apparently disused kiln and outer structure, the recessed area served as a dump for discarded vessels. The dump contained an estimated 9,500 to 13,000 whole vessel equivalents (based on a count and measurement by A. Sasson of the vessel fragments from a 1-cu-m sample of the dump). About 98 percent of these fragments belonged to two Kefar H|ananya cooking vessel subtypes (forms 1E and 4C, a cooking bowl and cooking pot, respectively), but virtually no examples showed signs of use. Recovered in the excavations was waste from production of Kefar H|ananya vessel forms dating to the Early, Middle, and Late Roman–Early Byzantine periods. The wasters include examples of unfired fragments, partially vitrified pieces, warped examples, vessels fused to one another, and pottery cracked during firing. Wasters from ceramic production were also found in a second excavation field, located several hundred meters northeast of the main settlement site, adjacent to Nah\al Tsalmon. The trench cut into the bedrock slope, in which the kiln and associated structures were built, also cut through an earlier roof-tile layer, above an Early Roman accumulation. A number of the tiles bore the impression of the Legio VI Ferrata (LEGVIF). No architectural remains associated with the roof-tile layer have been found. In addition to the conventional excavations conducted at three locations on the site, 68 squares of 2 by 2 m, 20 cm in depth, were excavated in all areas of the site of Kefar

Figure C. Remains of excavated kiln. Photo by Yoram Weinberg.

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H|ananya, with the goal of diachronically investigating settlement distribution and ceramic production. Ceramic waste from pottery production was found in 11 of these “shovel test” squares, located at different areas on the lower part of the slope of the site. This ceramic waste included examples of the same vessel subtypes from more than one location at the site, suggesting the presence of more than one workshop operating during the same period. The evidence from the excavations and shovel test showed that the settlement at Kefar H|ananya was founded in the Early Roman period and was inhabited during the Roman, Byzantine, medieval, and modern periods. Probes excavated against and below the final in-situ section of the Kefar H|ananya aqueduct demonstrated that this part of the aqueduct, as visible today, was not built prior to the medieval period. Rabbinic Sources, the Polycandelon Inscription, and the Medieval Texts L. Grünhut, Die Rundreise des R. Petachjah aus Regensburg, 1, Jerusalem 1904; J. -B. Frey, Corpus inscriptionum iudaicarum: recueil des inscriptions juives qui vont du IIIe siècle avant J.-C. au VIIe siècle de notre ère (Sussidi allo studio delle antichita cristiane 1), 2: Asie-Afrique, Citta del Vaticano 1952, 164–165; J. Naveh, IEJ 38 (1988), 36–43; N. Lissovsky, Cathedra 115 (2005), 236–237. Main Publication: Y. Shenkman, Excavation Survey as a Method for Clarifying Settlement History: Kefar Hananya as a Case Study (M.A. thesis), Ramat Gan 1999 (Eng. abstract). Other Studies: A. Engle Berkoff, CNI 21/4 (1971), 43–45; Z. Ilan, Israel—Land and Nature Winter 1981–1982, 61–69; id., IEJ 33 (1983), 255; id., EI 19 (1987), 77*–78*; id., The Aqueducts of Israel, Portsmouth, RI 2002, 445–449; D. Adan-Bayewitz (& I. Perlman), Archaeometry 27 (1985), 203–217; id., Manufacture and Local Trade in the Galilee of RomanByzantine Palestine: A Case Study (Ph.D. diss.), Jerusalem 1985; id., IEJ 37 (1987), 178–179; 39 (1989), 98–99; 41 (1991), 186–188; id., ESI 6 (1987–1988), 74; 7–8 (1988–1989), 108; 10 (1991), 80; id., Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Study of Local Trade (Bar Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture), Ramat-Gan 1993; id., OEANE, 3, New York 1997, 276–278; id., One Land—Many Cultures, Jerusalem 2003, 5–32; Z. Yeivin, EI 19 (1987), 74*– 75*; Y. Tsafrir et al., Tabula Imperii Romani: Iudaea-Palaestina: Eretz Israel in the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods—Maps and Gazetteer (Publications of the Israel Academy, Section of Humanities), Jerusalem 1994, 163; J. F. Strange et al., IEJ 45 (1995), 171–187; Sacred Realm: The Emergence of the Synagogue in the Ancient World (Yeshiva University Museum; ed. S. Fine), New York 1996, 34, 38–39, 167; B. Bagatti, Ancient Christian Villages of Galilee (SBF Collectio Minor 37), Jerusalem 2001, 185; M. Wieder & D. Adan-Bayewitz, Geoarchaeology 17 (2002), 393–415.

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10 Tiberias, from Its Foundation to the End of the Early Islamic Period Katia Cytryn-Silverman Introduction Tiberias is located on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, some 150 km north of Jerusalem via the Jordan Valley (or almost 200 km if traveling via the sea route), and approximately 160 km from Damascus. The city topography is best described by the Jerusalemite geographer of the tenth century, al-Muqaddasi: “Tabariyya is the capital of Jordan and a city of Wadi (the Valley of ) Kan‘an. It is situated between the mountain and the lake, cramped, with suffocating heat in summer, and unhealthy.”1 The foundation date of Tiberias is not certain. Named after Tiberius (reigned 14–37 ce), it is believed to have been founded by Herod Antipas, son of Herod the Great, as his capital sometime between 18 and 20. In 39 Antipas’s nephew, Agrippa I, gained control over the city and ruled it up to his death in 44 ce. Until 61 ce it was ruled by the procurators, when its political status changed when it was annexed to the kingdom of Agrippa II, whose capital was at Banias. In about 100 ce it came under direct Roman rule. During Hadrian’s reign (117–138 ce) there commenced the erection of a temple in his honor in the middle of the city, which, however, was never finished. In the third century, Tiberias flourished: not only was it granted the status of a Roman colony (under Elagabalus [reigned 218–222 ce]), but also it became the capital of the Jewish people, after the Sanhedrin, the Patriarchate, and the leader of the community all had moved 1. Al-Muqaddasī, Ah\san al-taqāsim fī ma‘rifat al-aqālim (ed. M. J. de Goeje; Leiden: Brill, 1906), 161.

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there from Sepphoris. Rabbi Yohanan, head of the Sanhedrin, established the bet ha-midrash ha-gadol, where the Palestinian Talmud was mostly written. From the sixth century on, Yeshivat Eretz Israel, the supreme religious institution for the Jews in Palestine and the Diaspora, was active in Tiberias, at least until the tenth century (of note is the fact that the Aleppo Codex was compiled in Tiberias at this time), when it finally moved to Jerusalem. Even then, Tiberias continued to serve as a center for the Masoretes, who dealt with the correct vocalization of the Holy Scriptures, for Hebrew grammarians, as well as for poets and ­preachers. The prominent Jewish character of Tiberias might have been the main reason the Christian community did not take off, at least until the fifth century.2 Yet, despite the slow penetration of Christianity into Tiberias, we know that by the mid-fifth century it is already a seat of a bishopric, as its bishop (John) is mentioned in the lists of the Council of Chalcedon (451 ce).3 Tabariyya, as it is named in Arabic, was conquered by Arab armies in 635 ce. According to al-Baladhuri (d. c. 892),4 the terms of surrender guaranteed a smooth and peaceful change of government. Eventually Tabariyya was chosen to be the capital of Jund al-Urdunn, ultimately to the detriment of Baysān/Scythopolis, capital of Palaestina Secunda. It is not clear, nevertheless, when exactly this shift of capitals took place. Three major earthquakes affected Tiberias during the Early Islamic period: 749 ce, 1033 ce, and 1068 ce. The first certainly caused much destruction, as we learn from the excavations at Galei Kinneret,5 but the earthquake was followed by renovation, building, and expansion. The earthquake of 1033, until recently thought to have brought Tiberias to an end, was not as dramatic for Tiberias. The account of the Persian traveler Nasir-i Khusraw of 1047 ce makes no reference to a devastated city, quite the opposite:6 The city has a strong wall that, beginning at the borders of the lake, goes all round the town; but on the water side there is no wall. There are numerous buildings erected in the very water, for the bed of the lake in this part is rock; and they have built pleasure-houses that are supported on columns of marble, rising up out of the water. The lake is full of fish. 2. The Panarion of Epiphanius (fourth century) includes a passage that seems representative of the Jewish sovereignty in Tiberias, despite being under Christian rule. The passage refers to Count (Comes) Joseph from Tiberias, a Jew converted to Christianity and protégée of Constantine (reigned 306–337 ce). He planned to build a church at the site of the unfinished Hadrianeum, but the local Jews often disrupted his works. So he eventually built a small church at the site of the temple, left the city, and settled in Beth She’an. See The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis (trans. F. Williams; Nag Hammadi Studies 35; Leiden: Brill, 1987), book 1, sections 1–46, §30.12,1–12,9. 3.  R. Price and M. Gaddis, trans., The Acts of the Council of Chalcedon (Translated Texts for Historians 45; Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2005), 1:360. 4.  Ah\mad ibn Yah\yā ibn Jābir al-Balādhurī, Futūh al-buldān (Leiden: Brill, 1866), 115–16. 5. License no. A-3607. Moshe Hartal, “Tiberias, Galei Kinneret,” HA-ESI 120 (2008): http://www. hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=773&mag_id=114. 6. Nās iir-i Khusraw, Safarnāma, ed., Yah\yā al-Khashshāb (Beirut: Dār al-Kitāb al-Jadīd, 1983), 52.

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Nasir-i Khusraw goes on, describing the Friday Mosque in the middle of the town, as well as another one called Jasmine Mosque, on the western side of the city. In addition to natural disasters, Islamic Tiberias was hit by invasions and sacking. In 906 ce the Ismaili Qarmatis, fighting against the Tulunids for the leadership of Syria, captured Tiberias, a major army base at the time. The sources tell that, following the resistance of its people, the city was plundered, women taken captive, and many people killed.7 The eleventh century was even harder for Tiberians, as in general for the people of Palestine. Even before the earthquake of 1033 ce,8 drought and unrest had struck the region. The Banu Jarrah Bedouin caused much instability. In August 1024 ce, their leader al-Hassan b. al-Mufarrij sacked ­Tiberias and killed its people mercilessly.9 Notwithstanding the unrest, southern Syria under the Fatimids—and especially its two capitals, Ramla and Tiberias—witnessed a golden age. Much building and commercial, cultural, and religious activities took place. But toward the 1050s–1060s, the situation changed again, this time creating a political vacuum from which it was difficult to recover. Jewish letters found in the Geniza are testimony to the stress under which the population of Syria lived.10 This situation, among others, made room for the Seljuq invasion of the 1070s, when Tiberias was made the Seljuq base against the Fatimids.11 In August 1098, the Fatimids managed to regain Jerusalem from the Seljuq Turks, putting an end to their rule over Palestine. Yet the Fatimids’ hold was short, and in July 1099 Palestine fell into the hands of the Crusaders. The old city center of Tiberias became a quarry for building material to the newly established Crusader fortification to the north of the city.12 Archaeological Research (see Map of Tiberias, p. 194) Despite the many inspections and excavations undertaken in Tiberias since the 1930s, little was published until the early 2000s, mainly preliminary reports and popular books.13 No thorough report of the seven-year excavation project of Tiberias’s ancient civic center by B. Ravani

7.  Moshe Gil, A History of Palestine, 634–1099 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), §468. 8.  A further earthquake, which took place in September 1015, is recorded by the sources, but apparently it was of little consequence, the main result being the collapse of the dome at the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. See ibid., §581. For the earthquake of 1033 and 1068, see ibid., §§595 and 602. 9.  Ibid., §585. 10.  Ibid., §596. 11. Ibid., §603. 12.  On this fortification, see Yosef Stepansky, “The Crusader Castle of Tiberias,”Crusades 3 (2004): 179–81. 13.  The entries in NEAEHL by Yizhar Hirschfeld (“Tiberias,” 4:1464–70) and Gideon Foerster (“Excavations South of the City,” 4:1470–73) were until 2005 the main summaries of the archaeological works at Tiberias.

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Figure A. Aerial view of ancient Tiberias, looking southwest. On the foreground remains of the basilical villa excavated by A. Druks and Y. Hirshfeld. To the west, the remains of the mosque and baths (under modern roof ). On the left, Berko Park with the remains of the Roman gate. On extreme right, Tiberias Sewage Treatment Plant, site of “The House of the Bronzes.” Photo by David Silverman, The New Tiberias Excavation Project.

(1952–1959) came to light, nor the works by A. Druks (1963–1968) to the east of the same site, where a Byzantine apsidal building and Early Roman layers were uncovered14 (fig. A). In 2004, David Stacey published the report on the excavations undertaken in 1973– 1974 by Gideon Foerster on the southern portion of Tiberias, by the Roman gate (fig. B).15 In that same year, Hirschfeld of the Hebrew University published the results from his excavations of the “Anchor Church” at Mount Berenice (fig. C), together with the results of his dig at the Salt Water Channel, where he excavated what he interpreted as the remains of the Great Study House, bet ha-midrash ha-gadol. In 2008, the publication of Hirschfeld’s joint excavations with Oren Gutfeld at the Sewage Treatment Plant, better known as “The House of the Bronzes,” 14.  The results of these excavations are currently being processed by K. Cytryn-Silverman and Y. Hirschfeld’s staff, respectively. 15.  David Stacey, Excavations at Tiberias, 1973–1974: The Early Islamic Periods (IAA Reports 21; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004).

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Figure B. Roman Gate and courtyard-house of the Fatimid period abutting the west tower at Berko Park. Photo by David Silverman, The New Tiberias Excavation Project.

Figure C. Remains of Byzantine wall and “Anchor Church” on top of Mount Berenice, overlooking the Sea of Galilee. Photo by David Silverman. Used by permission.

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Figure D. Roman theater, ­reconstruction. Image ­courtesy of Walid Atrash, Israel Antiquities Authority. Used by ­permission.

came to light. This publication deals with a domestic area crossed by an alley, in which a hoard of over a thousand fragments of bronze vessels was exposed. Following these publications, a series of preliminary reports on excavations by the Israel Antiquities Authority and Y. Hirschfeld have appeared and contributed important pieces of information to the archaeological puzzle. Among them stand out Moshe Hartal’s salvage excavations at Galei Kinneret Hotel, where remains of an Early Roman stadium as well as evidence of seismic activity during the eighth century were exposed; Hirschfeld’s work at Druks’s apsidal Byzantine building and surroundings; Hartal’s and Edna Amos’s work at the Salt Water Channel, where the northern aisle of a Byzantine church was uncovered, as well as their renewed works at the Roman gate together with Avner Hillman; and, finally, Walid Atrash and Hillman’s thorough excavations of the Roman theater on the footsteps of Mount Berenice (fig. D). In 2008, Yossi Stepanski, then of the Israel Antiquities Authority, published a revised entry in the Supplement to the New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land, in which he briefly describes the main sites.16 A year later, the author included a survey of excavations dealing with the Islamic period in the publication of the Early Islamic mosque of Tiberias.17 Recently Gideon Avni has included a discussion of the archaeology of Tiberias in his book The Byzantine-Islamic Transition in Palestine, emphasizing the features of the Islamizing city.18 16.  Yosef Stepansky, “Tiberias,” NEAEHL 5:2048–53; Yizhar Hirschfeld and Oren Gutfeld, “The ‘House of the Bronzes,’” NEAEHL 5:2053–54. 17.  Katia Cytryn-Silverman, “The Umayyad Mosque of Tiberias,” Muqarnas 26 (2009): 37–61. 18.  Gideon Avni, The Byzantine-Islamic Transition in Palestine: An Archaeological Approach (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 71–88.

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Since 2009, the author has been excavating at Tiberias’s ancient city center, adjacent to areas excavated by Ravani, Druks, and Hirschfeld. The work has been focused on exposing the mosque, as well as on the Islamization of the classical city.19 Archaeological Finds The Roman Period The archaeological knowledge of Roman Tiberias is still fragmentary, though many key features have come to light. In 1973–1974, Foerster excavated the southern gate of the city (fig. B), attached to the cardo with slabs laid diagonally, of which some 10 m long were exposed. This gate was composed of two rectangular towers (3.2 x 3.6 m) flanking a 4-m-wide passage, from which a pair of round towers (5.4 m in diameter) projected outward.20 In 2008, toward the opening of Berko Archaeological Park, new excavations were undertaken at the site, under the direction of Moshe Hartal, Edna Amos, and Avner Hillman. They excavated a little south of the gate and exposed the wadi channel, spanned by a vault dated to the Roman period (16 m long, 5 m wide), also used as a bridge leading to the gate. This vault was renewed during the Early Islamic period.21 A portion of the eastern round tower had been already revealed in 1935 by E. L. Sukenik (under the auspices of the Mandate Dept. of Antiquities),22 and in 1945 both towers were exposed when the wadi flooded.23 In addition, a portion of the Roman cardo (main north–south street) was found in the 1950s, when Ravani excavated c. 400 m north of the gate.24 David Stacey, in his publication of Foerster’s excavations, dated both gate and cardo to the early first century ce, following the ceramic finds recovered from underneath a few slabs.25 Yet recently (2013–2014), the excavations (fig. E), adjacent to those by Ravani,26 have proved this dating to be too early: a small probe under the Roman cardo has yielded sherds datable 19.  Katia Cytryn-Silverman, “Excavations at Tiberias (Spring and Autumn 2009): Remains of a District Capital,” in Proceedings of the 7th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, 12 April–16 April 2010) (ed. Roger Matthews and John Curtis; Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2012), 2:599–617; Katia CytrynSilverman, “Tiberias and Khirbat al-Minya: Two Long-lived Umayyad Sites on the Western Shore of the Sea of Galilee,” in Hirbet al Minya and the Archaeology of the Early Islamic Period (ed. R. Eichmann and H. P. Kühnen; Orient Archäologie Series; Berlin: Deutsches Archaeologisches Institut, forthcoming). 20. Stacey, Excavations at Tiberias, 1973–1974, 23–28. 21.  Moshe Hartal, Edna Amos and Avner Hillman, “Tiberias,” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http://www.hadashotesi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1574&mag_id=117. 22.  E. L. Sukenik, IAA Record Files/ Mandate File no. 185 (ATQ/82/6). License T-262/1935. 23.  The southern wall was exposed also when the wadi flooded in 1941. Two tombstones in secondary use, with Latin inscriptions of soldiers of the VI Legion (second half of the second century) were incorporated into the wall. Hartal, Amos, and Hillman, “Tiberias.” 24.  Unpublished field reports, IAA Record Files. 25. Stacey, Excavations at Tiberias, 1973–1974, 25. 26.  Unpublished. Three successive street levels: (a) Roman–Umayyad, (b) Abbasid–Fatimid (45 cm above the earlier street), and (c) Crusader–Ayyubid (c. 1 m above the Abbasid street) have been exposed in Area M6, supervised by R. Lavi.

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Figure E. Remains of Roman cardo and overlaying street of the Early Islamic street, leading to the mosque through a set of steps. On the left series of shops of the early Islamic period adjacent to the street exposed by B. Ravani in the 1950s. The New Tiberias Excavation Project, photo by David Silverman.

to the second century, allowing the redating of the cardo and its respective shops to that time. The project excavations also allow reconstructing the measurements of the cardo, based on the various sections exposed: the paved road is apparently 8 m wide, with sidewalks 4 m wide each, 30 cm higher than the street. Approximately 200 m to the northwest of the gate stood a Roman theater (fig. A top; fig. D), between the base of Mount Berenice and the cardo. Its foundation has been attributed by its excavators to the first century, with a continuous use—with modifications—until the Byzantine period.27 This theater, 78 m in diameter and 40 m wide, had its semicircular sitting area (cavea) facing south, while the stage was protected by a wall facing north. The capacity of 27.  Walid Atrash, “The Roman Theatre of Tiberias” (in Hebrew), Qadmoniot 144 (2012). The theater was first identified by Hirschfeld, who generally dated it to the second–third centuries. See Yizhar Hirschfeld, “Excavations at Tiberias Reveal Remains of Church and Possibly Theater,” BA 54 (1991): 170–71.

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Figure F. Map of Tiberias, main archaeological sites. Prepared by Leticia Barda (Israel Antiquities Authority), adapted by Daniel ­Leviathan, The New Tiberias ­Excavation Project.

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this theater has been estimated as five thousand to six thousand seats.28 During the second century, the theater underwent modifications, the main ones consisting of adapting the orchestra to be used also as an arena, expanding the stage, and building a proper scaena. Tiberias also saw the erection of a bathhouse, c. 150 m from the theater, around the end of the first or beginning of the second century.29 According to the report of its excavation, it was apparently erected over the remains of an agora with small shops provided with ovens dated to the first century (?), though these finds are yet to be confirmed. This early bathhouse, of which plastered water tanks and clay piping were exposed, was rebuilt a few times, until the structure that we still see today (further expanded in the Islamic period) was finally erected in the Byzantine period (see below). To the north of the bathhouse stood a monumental building attributed to the second century, of which so far only a 2.7-m-wide basalt wall running east–west has been excavated (see fig. F, and the area marked in red hatching on the mosque plan in the photo gallery, G-2). This wall, standing on a podium, runs from the cardo and its shops eastward. Ravani, followed by Hirschfeld and Galor,30 suggested that this wall might be part of the unfinished Hadrianeum mentioned by Epiphanius. Unfortunately no clear plan can be suggested so far for the building to which this massive wall belonged, and efforts to follow the building northward have failed so far. In the seventh century, its remains were reused as foundation for a prayer house (see fig. F and the area marked in green on the mosque plan in the photo gallery, G-2). To the east of this site, in 1964 Druks uncovered remains of a luxurious structure lying under a Byzantine apsidal building (see below), with remains of an opus sectile (marble inlaid) floor, painted and molded plaster, together with Early Roman ceramics. Hirschfeld suggested that this structure could relate to the time of the foundation of the city, perhaps to the first years of Herod Antipas’s rule.31 In 1989, Hirschfeld uncovered a building approximately 20 x 10.5 m at the foot of Mount Berenice, along the Salt Water Channel, consisting of a peristyle courtyard covered with mosaics and provided with a stepped pool. Despite its possible identification as a ritual bath (mikveh), its plan and mosaic floor single it out from contemporary mikva’ot.32 Still, Hirschfeld suggested that this structure was the seat of the Study House/bet ha-midrash, active from the early third to the fifth centuries. He saw this building as the possible location of the bet ha-midrash where Rabbi Yohanan, head of the Sanhedrin, used to teach in the mid-third 28.  Atrash, “Roman Theatre of Tiberias,” 80. 29.  Dating according to Ravani’s preliminary report of 1957. Hirschfeld and Katharina Galor did not corroborate Ravani’s dating (“New Excavations in Roman, Byzantine, and Early Islamic Tiberias,” in Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition [ed. Jürgen Zangenberg, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin; WUNT 210; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007], 217). Following Hirschfeld’s sudden death in 2006, his team is preparing the final report of his works in Tiberias, including a reappraisal of Ravani’s finds at the bathhouse. 30.  Ibid., 214. 31. Ibid. 32.  Yizhar Hirschfeld, Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994 (IAA Reports 22; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004), 10–11.

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century (see introduction), though no finds can be assigned with certainty to any of the Jewish institutions known from the sources.33 According to Hirschfeld’s archaeological results, from the Late Byzantine through the Early Islamic period, the building changed its character.34 No physical remains can tie the late structure to any specific use or to any specific ethnicity. Yet to be found, nevertheless, are remains of the city wall mentioned by Josephus (J.W. 2.572–573; 3.460–461). As the southern Roman gate was freestanding, and there is not much open space between the gate and the Roman structures excavated by Foerster in Areas D and D1 in 1973–1974, it is plausible that the wall hides under today’s Berko Archaeological Park (fig. B).35 As for the northern limits of the Roman city, there are two clear features that help determine the perimeter: the remains of a stadium36 and a Jewish cemetery of the Roman period (marked in dark gray at the top of the Tiberias Map) that continued into the Byzantine and Early Islamic periods. It spreads uphill northwest of the Ottoman city with more than 250 tombs exposed since the 1950s,37 and remains of a stadium. The remains of the Early Roman stadium were exposed during excavations toward a building extension at Galei Kinneret Hotel.38 The length cannot be estimated, but its width is c. 39 m. A 15-m section of its southern curved wall (9 m thick and 2 m height) was exposed at the northernmost trench of the excavations. A tether was found incorporated into this wall. The ceramic finds from outside the building contained pottery of the first century, believed to be the time of its erection. The ceramic finds from a large deposit of clay accumulated inside the building hints at its destruction during the third or beginning of the fourth century ce. In addition, works undertaken at the parking lot of the Plaza Hotel in 200539 revealed a section of the stadium’s western wall. A further monumental building worthy of mention is a large exedra (semicircular open structure—outer diameter 32 m, inner diameter 23 m) with mosaics and benches excavated by Druks in the 1960s, c. 100 m to the south of the basilical complex.40 Inscriptions, in both Greek and Aramaic, also help to reconstruct the city. Some of them apparently originate from a synagogue or synagogues, which provides the main evidence for remains—thus far hidden—of Tiberias synagogues of the Roman period.41

33.  Ibid., 12–13. 34.  Ibid., 13–18. 35. Stacey, Excavations at Tiberias, 1973–1974, 25. 36.  Stadia were usually erected on the outskirts of a Roman city. 37.  Stepansky, “Tiberias,” 2052–53; Leah de Segni, “Tiberiade romano-bizantina attraverso le sue iscrizioni,” in Hebraica: Miscellanea di studi in onore di Sergio J. Sierra (ed. F. Israel, A. M. Rabello, and A. M. Somekh; Turin: Istituto de studi ebraici--Scuola rabbinica, 1998) 127–39. 38.  Hartal, “Tiberias, Galei Kinneret.” 39.  License no. A-4445/05. Moshe Hartal, “Tiberias,” HA-ESI 125 (2013), http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/ Report_Detail_Eng.aspx?id=4350&mag_id=120&previewit=TrUe. 40.  Hischfeld, “Tiberias,” 1467. 41.  Di Segni, “Tiberiade romano-bizantina attraverso le sue iscrizioni,”115–27.

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Figure G. Carved basalt slab of the early Roman period, depicting two situlae and an aryballos.The New Tiberias Excavation Project, photo by David Silverman.

In addition, recently a unique Roman carved stone relief (fig. G) was found at the entrance to the Early Islamic mosque (fig. E). This basalt block, clearly not in situ, is 50 x 55 x 40 cm breadth and depicts two situlae (buckets) and what seems to be an aryballos (flask). This piece has been attributed by D. Leviathan to the second half of the first century to early second century. The proximity of the finding to the bathhouse as well as to the wide wall suggested as part of the Hadrianeum makes it tempting to attribute it to either of them.42 The Byzantine Period A series of monumental projects took place in Tiberias during the Byzantine period, proving its status as a major center in the Galilee continued under Christian rule. The far more important urban feature added to the city was the new enclosure wall, dated to Justinian’s reign (527–565 ce). Remains of this wall were examined as early as the late nineteenth century (by Victor Guérin and by Gottlieb Schumacher). Considerable portions of the eastern perimeter of this wall were uncovered by Druks in the 1960s, during salvage excavations toward the laying of the Salt Water Channel. Later on, in the 1970s, Foerster found the section abutting the southern Roman gate, where the wall starts climbing Mount Berenice. In 1980, Amos Harif conducted a salvage excavated toward the building of the Jordan River Hotel43 and found some 50 m of the northern section of the wall, together with a tower (5 x 2.5 m). Between 1990 and 1994, 42. Daniel Leviathan, “A Carved Stone Relief Block from Roman Tiberias,” forthcoming. This piece, together with a carved basalt voussoir of the Early Islamic period, have gone missing. In 2012, the project’s container, stored at the Sewage Treatment Plant, where the two heavy pieces were temporarily kept, was stolen and never retrieved. 43.  Amos Harif, “A Crusader Church in Tiberias,” PEQ 116 (1984): 107–8.

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Hirschfeld surveyed and excavated various sections of this wall on top of Mount Berenice, on the western and eastern hills (fig. C).44 On top of the western hill, he excavated two towers, the northern one 7.2 x 7.7 m and the southern one 7.8 x 8.4 m. The northern tower is preserved to a height of 6 m, and Hirschfeld believed it was originally 12 to 15 m high. About 35 m east from the northern tower is a quarter-circle-shaped piazza (radius of 7.4 m), provided with a bench, which connects to what seems to be a gate tower (8.3 x 8.4 m). A thick wall (3.1 m) connects the northern tower to the southern one. South of the latter runs the longest section of the exposed wall (c. 310 m), with a gate and three towers. It follows a steep incline. During works to the east of the gate in 2008, a further tower (5 x 5 m) was excavated.45 On the eastern hill, cutting the corner of the church’s atrium (see below), a 26-m-long section of the wall was exposed. It is also 2.5 m thick and built of dressed stones with a core of fieldstones bonded in cement, in accordance with the other sections of the wall.46 Approximately 80 m east of the eastern hill, a section of a narrow limestone wall (1.2 m) running north–south on the ridge of the slope was excavated. It seems to be of an earlier date, perhaps dating to the third century (see the Tiberias Map, fig. F, above).47 Altogether, the Byzantine wall runs for c. 2.8 km, surrounding the city from three sides and enclosing an area of 185 acres.48 In addition to the erection of the city wall, Tiberias witnessed the building of a monastery and a church at Mount Berenice, also excavated by Hirschfeld (1990–1994). Of the monastery, located at the western hill and bounded by the city wall, an olive press and a structure paved with a colorful mosaic floor were exposed.49 The three-apsidal church (fig. C),50 which survived until the Crusader period with modifications and additions, lies on the eastern hill and is provided with an atrium, a narthex connected to an oblong room to its north, a basilical prayer hall, and a northern wing consisting of two rooms. It has been dated to the sixth century according to ceramic finds. Its exterior dimensions are c. 48 x 27 m. The atrium, approached from the south, is almost square (17 x 19.5 m) surrounded by square pilasters interconnected by arches and provided with a large underground cistern in the center (7.5 x 7.5 m, 4.1 m deep) with a capacity of c. 220 cu m. It is paved with a mosaic floor composed of white concentric circles against a black background, not unlike a black-and-white mosaic found on the western hill. The narthex is 3.9 m wide and was originally paved with a colorful geometric mosaic. During the Abbasid period (750–969 ce), its southern half was occupied by a bell tower (5.1 x 6.8 m). The basilical prayer hall is 16 m wide and 23.5 m 44. Hirschfeld, Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994, 75–87. 45.  Hartal, Amos, and Hillman, “Tiberias.” 46. Hirschfeld, Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994, 97. 47.  Ibid, 92. 48. Ibid, 128; Yizhar Hirschfeld, “Tiberias,” 1470 49. Roni Amir, “Mosaics and Frescoes,” in Hirschfeld, Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994, 141–46; Hirschfeld, Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994, 87–92. 50. Hirschfeld, Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994, 97–112.

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long from east to west. The central apse, 5.8 m in diameter, is provided with a synthronon (bench) and preceded by a bema (platform) (6.2 x 6.8 m). The side apses, delimited by narrowed walls, are 3.1 m in diameter. The columns seen today in situ belong to a later phase, but seem to derive from the original sixth-century church. The capitals were simple, resembling upside-down bases. The floor of the nave was originally tiled (17 x17 cm arranged diagonally), while the side aisles were covered with colorful mosaics. The unique feature of this church is a large basalt stone (484 kg) found underneath the altar in the center of the bema. It is 1.1 m long, 0.35 m thick, with a round biconical hole pierced through it. It has been identified as an anchor, hence Hirschfeld’s naming of this church as the “Anchor Church.” Following the 749 ce earthquake, the church was repaired; the floors were plastered over; the atrium and narthex were joined together following the collapse of the partition wall, while a tower (see above) was added on the south; new rooms were added by blocking off some of the space on the south; and buttresses were added from the outside, against both the eastern and southern walls. In the prayer hall, the inner division was made by seven pairs of short columns found in situ. The main modification that took place during the Abbasid period was at the area opposite the bema: it was blocked off by walls and surrounded by benches, thus creating a small chapel.51 This church clearly continued in use at least until the twelfth century, though the only certain find that allows a post–eleventh-century dating for the final use is a figurative fresco (depiction of a saint?) found underneath the stones that overlaid the anchor stone underneath the altar.52 Recently a second multiphased church was found immediately to the east of the Sewage Treatment Plant, on the northern boundary of the excavations, only 20 m north of the monumental Early Islamic mosque (see below). Part of its northern aisle was exposed during salvage excavations directed by Hartal and Amos in 2008, when fine geometric mosaics, with crosses and inscriptions, were found. In 2011 and 2012, a number of trenches along the church were opened, clarifying some of its main features and its three different phases, two during the Byzantine period, the third during the Early Islamic period. So far the data only relate to the prayer hall and apparently to the narthex, while the extension of the atrium is unknown. The prayer hall is square (30 x 30 m) and has a single apse enclosed by a back wall. The earliest phase has been dated to the fifth century according to the fine mosaics found in 2008. It consists of a three-aisled church, of which sections of the northern stylobate (1.5 m wide) and a small portion of the southern one were exposed. It is not clear how many columns carried the upper structure. The northern wall of the church was exposed by Hartal and Amos, while the renewed excavation revealed a portion of the wall behind the apse, as well as a massive structural wall to which the early apse abutted. A small plastered installation to the immediate south of the apse might have been used as a baptismal font. During the church’s second phase, which apparently dates to the sixth century ce, the prayer hall was subdivided into five aisles, and a new apse erected (fig. H). The new apse was 51.  Ibid., 112–23. 52.  Ibid., 124; Amir, “Mosaics and Frescoes,” 148–49.

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Figure H. Apse of second phase of Byzantine church at Tiberias ancient city center. Remains of floral mosaic bearing stalks with heart-shaped leafs growing out of an amphora. The New Tiberias Excavation Project, photo by David Silverman.

Figure I. Joining fragments of an Arabic inscription found in a fill overlaying a Christian burial (360 ah/970 ce) at the Byzantine church of Tiberias. It suggests a continued use of the church, though reduced at least until the tenth century. The New Tiberias Excavation Project, photo by David ­Silverman.

Figure J. Byzantine mosaic depicting fish and birds, exposed at the west hall of Tiberias bathhouse in the 1950s by B. Ravani. Photo courtesy Israel Antiquities Authority.

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paved with a mosaic depicting stalks ending in heart-shaped leafs growing out of an amphora. Further refurbishing took place during the early seventh century, according to a coin dating to the reign of Phocas (602–610 ce) found under the upper course of the stylobate. This stage is mainly represented by the repaving of the prayer hall with irregular pieces of colored marble. Another change, probably also related to this stage, is the raising of the apse and bema’s floor, the repaving with a new mosaic, and its enclosure with a low wall with holes to receive a chancel screen. During the removal of an Early Islamic wall that blocked the bema, a basalt anchor (?) was uncovered, revealing what seems to be a close relationship between this church and that at Mount Berenice.53 During the Early Islamic period, most probably after 749 ce (as in the case of the church at Mount Berenice), the church seems to have been reduced to a single-aisled building. Two massive walls were built against the apse, blocking off the side aisles. To the immediate south of the new wall, a burial was dug deep into the ground. Two joining fragments of an Arabic inscription (fig. I) found in the fill overlaying this burial hint at the continuous use of the church of Tiberias. The inscription relates to a Christian man deceased in 360 ah (970 ce), in the very beginning of the Fatimid period.54 Among the thirteen synagogues mentioned by the sources as active in the city, only one has so far been excavated.55 This synagogue, excavated in 1978–1979 by Ariel Berman, was uncovered during a salvage excavation toward the erection of the Plaza Hotel (today Leonardo) in the area of Crusader Tiberias. It consists of a quadrangular building, 20 x 20 m, directed north–south toward Jerusalem, with a single entrance located at the northern wall. The prayer hall is divided into three aisles by means of two colonnades of five freestanding columns. The synagogue was dated by the style of the geometric mosaics exposed mainly on the western aisle, as well as by a Greek inscription contained within a garland (52 cm diameter) flanked by Jewish motifs—the ethrog and the lulav. It reads: “Proclo [son of ] Crispus founded/established (ektisen). . . .” The synagogue seems to have continued in use until the eleventh century, including a repair after the earthquake of 749, when walls and a new stone floor were introduced. It was later built over by Crusader structures, vaults of which are still visible today. The finding of a domestic unit nearby including a mikveh hints at the Jewish population living in these surroundings.56 53.  These two churches are in axis, probably intentionally, which hints at a possible holiness of Mount Berenice, not clear to us today. On this topic and the relationship between these two churches, see Katia CytrynSilverman, “The Byzantine Churches of Tiberias” (forthcoming). 54.  This Christian tombstone inscription in Kufic Arabic reminds us of that found by Nahum Slousch in 1921 at a cemetery next to the northern synagogue of Hammat Tiberias. See David Yelin, “A Kufic-Arabic Inscription from Tiberias,” Qovetz: The Hebrew Society for the Exploration of Israel in Jerusalem 1 (1921): 44–45. It will be republished, with some further elaboration, by Amikam Elad and myself. The inscription consists of a tombstone of a Christian woman, the mother of a certain Yuhahha b. Ishaq al-Hawrani. It is dated to 368 ah/978 ce. Apart from the use of Arabic, it points to the continuing use of a dual calendar among the Christian population. 55.  The two synagogues excavated at Hammat Tiberias should not be considered, as until the Islamic rule Hammat and Tiberias were two different entities. 56.  Ariel Berman, “First Discovery of a Synagogue at Tiberias” (in Hebrew), in Tiberias from Its Foundation

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Figure K. Column drum, base and capitals in secondary use at an underground pool (“Dwarf ’s Pool”) at Byzantine bathhouse at Tiberias ancient city center. Photo by the author. Used by permission.

Two further projects should be mentioned: the bathhouse to the east of the cardo and immediately to the south of the Early Islamic mosque and the basilical complex farther east, not far from the Sea of Galilee. The bathhouse was excavated by Ravani in the 1950s, and further surveyed by Hirschfeld in the early 2000s. According to Hirschfeld, the building we see today was apparently established in the fourth century over the remains of a Roman bath (see above). This structure was expanded and repaired many times, up to the eleventh century, when the city center was mostly destroyed and abandoned. The structure is 42 x 31 m, consisting of two main wings: to the west the bathing rooms, to the east dressing rooms and halls. The building was entered from the northeast, through a long hall 19 x 5.8 m, covered by figurative mosaics. Its ceiling was carried by arches lying on pairs of engaged pillars. This entranceway led to a pair of halls through two doors. The halls were also paved with mosaics, the one on the west hall (7 x 3.5 m) being well preserved and depicting fish and birds contained in medallions (fig. J). The pottery recovered from a trial sounding beneath its foundations is dated no later than the fourth century, though stylistically the mosaic seems rather later, most probably of the sixth century.57 The bathing rooms in the west were heated by a well-preserved hypocaust system and wall tubuli and served by marble-lined bathtubs and service rooms. Underneath the western section of the bathhouse is an underground pool, popularly known as the “Dwarf ’s Pool.” It is 3.50 x 9 m, c. 3.20 m below the floor level, with a ceiling to the Muslim Conquest (ed. Y. Hirschfeld; Jerusalem: Yad Ytzhaq Ben Zvi, 1988), 49–52; Hirschfeld, “Tiberias,” 1468–70; Di Segni, “Tiberiade romano-bizantina attraverso le sue iscrizioni,” 120–21. 57.  Rina Talgam, “Mosaic Floors in Tiberias” (in Hebrew), in Hirschfeld, Excavations at Tiberias, 1989– 1994, 123–32. See also Shulamit Miller, “The Mosaics of Tiberias and Hammat Tiberias during the Roman, Byzantine and Early Islamic Periods” (MA thesis, Hebrew University, 2011), 1:83–85.

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of basalt beams supported by twenty-four short columns, made out of column drums, bases, and capitals in secondary use (fig. K). This pool, with a floor of small pebbles set in thick plaster, was fed by a clay pipe at the northeastern corner. The overflow was conveyed westward by means of a channel at 1 m above the floor.58 A sizable apsidal structure was uncovered by Druks in 1963 c. 80 m northeast of the bathhouse. Hirschfeld resumed excavations at this very site in 1993, and then between 2004 and 2006, especially because he believed that in its main phase this building was used as the seat of the Sanhedrin,59 eventually dispersed in 358 by Roman emperor Theodosius, when it was adapted to serve administrative purposes of the government. The structure under discussion has not yet been fully excavated. It covers an area of some two thousand square meters, which includes a peristyle courtyard with a fully preserved underground built cistern, an apsidal hall 12.8 x 7.4 m to the east, and a series of rooms to the north and west.60 This building was still functioning during Islamic rule, perhaps even fulfilling some kind of administrative/governmental function. It was nevertheless adapted to the new city layout. It was cut short on the west to make space for a north–south street adjacent to the mosque, while a new apse was erected farther east of the original one. To the north, a spacious toilet complex was erected, to cater to those coming to pray at the congregational mosque (see below). The Early Islamic Period Early Islamic layers have been found in almost every excavation undertaken in Tiberias and immediate surroundings since the first archaeological works in the city.61 Following, are the main sites. In 1934, remains of dwellings dating from the Byzantine through the Fatimid periods were uncovered at the runoff channel at Wadi Ghazal.62 Between November 1971 and March 1972 Fanny Vito uncovered remains of stone paving at the Rosco Commercial Center near the Caesar Hotel, hinting at the stretching of the city northward during the Early Islamic period, beyond the Byzantine perimeter.63 Excavations at this area during 2005 and 2006 by Hartal clarified that this area was settled only after the 749-ce earthquake, which apparently destroyed part of the city. Furthermore, excavations at the parking lot at the Plaza Hotel, to the south of Harif’s dig at the Jordan River Hotel (see above), exposed a segment of a wall which Hartal identified as that 58.  IAA Record Files, report by B. Ravani, 14/7/1957. See also Hirschfeld, “Tiberias,” 1466. 59.  In their publication, Hirschfeld and Galor clarified their use of the term Sanhedrin by saying that the talmudic term employed in the context of Tiberias and other places in the Galilee is obviously anachronistic and that perhaps the expression beth din (rabbinical court) would be more appropriate. Hirschfeld and Galor, “New Excavations in Roman, Byzantine, and Early Islamic Tiberias,” 229. 60.  Hirschfeld and Galor, “New Excavations in Roman, Byzantine, and Early Islamic Tiberias,” 220–26. 61.  Cytryn-Silverman, “Umayyad Mosque of Tiberias,” 38–44. 62.  License W-30/1934. See Hirschfeld, Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994, 19–21. 63.  Fanny Vito, “HaShuk Ha’ironi” (The Municipal Market), HA-ESI 23 (1972).

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of the northern perimeter of the Umayyad city.64 In the south, Foerster’s excavations pointed to an expansion beyond the city wall only in the mid-ninth century,65 though recent excavations by Hartal, Amos, and Hillman south of the Roman gate suggest that the expansion southward started as early as the Umayyad period (661–750 ce).66 At this time, the Roman vault over the wadi channel was still in use, as was the cardo street level. An inscription in Kufic Arabic, reading liSulayman, was hammered onto one of the paving stones facing a shop.67 Following the earthquake of 749 ce, when the Roman vault/bridge seems to have collapsed, a new construction took place, though because of the accumulation in the wadi channel, it had to be higher, creating a gap of 1 m between the new bridge level and the gate. Arches to the east of the bridge attest to a probable plaza, while the presence of pillars made of ashlar at the foot of the waterfall to the west hint at another bridge.68 At this stage, buildings were erected to the south of the channel, and they seem to have continued well into the eleventh century. Sometime during the tenth century, the passage at the gate was narrowed and wooden doors introduced. The finding of grenade-shaped vessels, together with an iron ax and early-ninth-century coins at the eastern tower also confirm that the fortification was no longer of relevance.69 In addition to the many domestic buildings exposed in salvage excavations—including impressive neighborhoods at the slope of Mount Berenice (over the remains of the theater, for example,70 as well as at the Sewage Treatment Plant71), to the south of the bathhouse,72 and at the northern section of the city73—one should also list the expansion of the bathhouse excavated by Ravani, the raising of the cardo level (see above), as well as the creation of a new north–south street with shops west of the apsidal building (see above). In fact, following the project excavations, it seems that this new street was connected to two others running east–west (a narrow street to the immediate south of the bathhouse exposed by Ravani is little known and not clear in the plans), thus circumventing, together with the cardo, a large insula containing the bathhouse and the main building of Tiberias during the Early Islamic period: the Friday Mosque.74 64.  Hartal, “Tiberias.” 65.  Cytryn-Silverman, “Umayyad Mosque of Tiberias,” 40–41. 66.  Hartal, Amos, and Hillman, “Tiberias.” 67. Stacey, Excavations at Tiberias, 1973–1974, 30. 68.  Hartal, Amos, and Hillman, “Tiberias.” 69. Stacey, Excavations at Tiberias, 1973–1974, 37–38. 70.  Atrash, “Roman Theatre of Tiberias,” 86–88. 71.  Yizhar Hirschfeld and Oren Gutfeld, Tiberias: The House of the Bronzes I (Qedem 48; Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2008). 72.  Briefly excavated by B. Ravani before his sudden death, and continued by me in 2012 and 2013 (Area M4). 73.  Hartal, “Tiberias,” 2013. See also report of the 2006 dig at the municipal park (license no. A-4886), Moshe Hartal, “Tiberias,” HA-ESI 120 (2008): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=938&mag_ id=114. 74.  See Cytryn-Silverman, “Umayyad Mosque of Tiberias,” 44–56, for a description of the mosque and discussion prior to excavations. See Cytryn-Silverman, “Tiberias and Khirbat al-Minya,” for a preliminary discus-

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Figure L. Remains of Tiberias’s Early Islamic congregational mosque looking southeast, adjacent to Byzantine bathhouse (under modern roof ). Shops of north–south street on the right. On the foreground, remains of massive Roman wall, over which the mosque was erected. The New Tiberias Excavation Project, photo by David Silverman.

The mosque (see the Mosque Plan in the Photo Gallery, G-2), previously interpreted as a Byzantine market, consists of a large rectangle, 78 m wide by 90 m long. It is composed of a three-aisled covered hall (78 x 26 m) (fig. L) supported by pillars built atop reused Jewish tomb doors, a protruding prayer niche (mihrab), and a large courtyard enclosed by a portico. In the course of nine seasons (2009–2014), the main features of this mosque were exposed, while those already excavated by Ravani in the 1950s were put in context: long sections of the lower courses and foundations of the enclosure wall have been revealed; the four corners of the mosque have been exposed, that in the northwest standing out for the use of a twisted column of the second–third century as the “cornerstone” (fig. M), that on the southeast cutting a unique geometrical mosaic of the Late Byzantine–Early Islamic period (fig. N). Portions of the portico have also been exposed, including a column still in situ and column bases still in situ. A monumental entrance by steps from the cardo, right to the north of the covered hall (fig. E), seems to have been the main way of access during the Abbasid period. A further entrance seems to have been located on the eastern end of the covered hall, facing a complex of toilets excavated by Hirschfeld. So far no clear entrance has been detected on the northern sion of the phases of the mosque following excavations. See also Cytryn-Silverman, “Excavations at Tiberias (Spring and Autumn 2009),” 599–617.

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Figure M. Northwestern corner of the early Islamic mosque, displaying a twisted column of the Roman period at its “cornerstone,” abutting a paved street of the same period. On the back, basalt basin and column drum flank the entrance to a medieval structure, where high amounts of sugar-related vessels were retrieved. The New Tiberias Excavation Project, photo by David Silverman.

Figure N. Geometrical mosaic of a Late Byzantine–Early Islamic period building, cut by the southeastern corner of the mosque (left). On the right, remains of southern stylobate of Early Islamic mosque, parallel to the southern (qibla) wall of the mosque. The New Tiberias Excavation Project, photo by Sky View.

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Figure O. Brass chain (6.04 m long) to hold a mosque lamp, found in 2013 at the eastern side of the congregational mosque. The New Tiberias Excavation project, photo by the author.

Figure P. Coins of the type anonymous follis retrieved from the hoard of the “House of the Bronzes.” The latest coin dates to the reign of Michael VII (1071–1078). Photo courtesy Oren Gutfeld.

wall. An underground cistern was found in the middle of the courtyard, and perhaps a square structure at the northeastern corner of the mosque might be a minaret of the Abbasid period. On the basis of architectural comparisons with mosques of the region, it is possible to attribute the monumental mosque of Tiberias to the Umayyad period, perhaps even to the reign of Hisham b. ‘Abd al-Malik (724–743 ce) following the close similarities to his mosque in Qasr al-Hayr al-Sharqi in Syria. Prior to this mosque, a simple hypostyle structure was erected at this site (see area marked in green on the Mosque Plan in the Photo Gallery, G-2), reusing the remaining Roman wall (see above). It was of a modest size, ca. 48 x 21 m, 7 by 11 aisles, separated by columns in secondary use, erected over rustic round foundations, cast into a deep fill, a technique introduced into Palestine after the Muslim conquest.

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Figure Q. Fragment of Jewish tombdoor of the Roman period with carved menorah, reused as a step in a house of the medieval period. The New Tiberias Excavation Project, photo by David Silverman.

The covered hall of the Umayyad mosque was refurbished at some stage by the introduction of a row of columns in the middle of the aisles (see the area marked in dark blue on Mosque Plan in the Photo Gallery, G-2). This probably took place following the earthquake of 749, and aimed at giving extra support to the roof. The final stage of the mosque, apparently a renovation during the early eleventh century (perhaps following the earthquake of 1033?), canceled the extra row and returned the building to the monumentality of the Umayyad period. Long pieces of brass chains to hold mosque lamps have been found at this building since the 1950s. The two longest pieces recovered so far were found in 2013, measuring 7.39 m and 6.04 m (fig. O). These figures suggest a height of c. 10 m to the mosque. It seems these chains were produced in Tiberias by sand casting, for specific use at the mosque. That Tiberias was an important center for metal production is now clear from the finds at the Sewage Treatment Plant, excavated by Hirschfeld and Gutfeld in 1998 (popularly known as “The House of the Bronzes”).75 A hoard contained in three large storage jars listed almost a thousand pieces, as well as metal scraps and some eighty coins (fig. P), most of the type anonymous follis (without the emperor’s image or name), the latest dating to the reign of Michael VII (1071–1078 ce). The vessels are of domestic nature, mainly lighting devices, tableware, and kitchen implements. Some of the vessels were decorated, others also bearing inscriptions. The finding of bronze dirham barrel-type weights, a flat lead block, and bronze scraps and shavings deposited on the floor are evidence of the presence of an active coppersmith’s workshop. It is worthwhile also to mention the finding of an anvil used for jewelry production,76 which reminds us of the hoard contained in a jug unearthed by Foerster in 1973–1974, which contained sixteen Fatimid dinars, gold earrings of different types, as well as a gold ring.77 75.  Hirschfeld and Gutfeld, “‘House of the Bronzes,’” 2053–54; Elias Khamis, The Fatimid Metalwork Hoard from Tiberias (Qedem 55; Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2013). 76. Khamis, Fatimid Metalwork Hoard, 204, no. 566. 77.  Foerster, “Tiberias,” 1472.

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After the mosque was abandoned, most likely following partial destruction by the earthquake in 1068 ce, what remained of its northern section was reoccupied during the Crusader– Ayyubid period (twelfth–early thirteenth century). The debris was not removed, thus creating spaces in different levels, connected by steps when necessary. In one such room, a Jewish tomb door of the Roman period, most probably removed from the mosque and thus in tertiary use, was laid as a first step. It is unique, bearing a menorah contained in a round medallion (fig. Q). While it is not clear if its choice as a first step was intentional, its life cycle is clearly representative of the cultural and religious changes in Tiberias throughout the ages. Bibliography Amir, Roni. “Mosaics and Frescoes.” In Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994, edited by Y. Hirschfeld, 141–46. IAA Reports 22. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004. Atrash, Walid. “The Roman Theatre of Tiberias” (in Hebrew). Qadmoniot 144 (2012): 79–88. Avni, Gideon. The Byzantine-Islamic Transition in Palestine: An Archaeological Approach. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. Al-Baladhuri. Ah\mad ibn Yah\yā ibn Jābir al-Balādhurī, Futūh al-buldān. Leiden: Brill, 1866. Berman, Ariel. “First Discovery of a Synagogue at Tiberias.” In Hebrew. In Tiberias from Its Foundation to the Muslim Conquest, edited by Y. Hirschfeld, 49–52. Jerusalem: Yad Ytzhaq Ben Zvi, 1988. Cytryn-Silverman, Katia. “The Byzantine Churches of Tiberias.” Forthcoming. ———. “Excavations at Tiberias (Spring and Autumn 2009): Remains of a District Capital.” In Proceedings of the 7th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, 12 April–16 April 2010), edited by Roger Matthews and John Curtis, 2:599–617. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2012. ———. “Tiberias and Khirbat al-Minya: Two Long-lived Umayyad Sites on the Western Shore of the Sea of Galilee.” In Hirbet al Minya and the Archaeology of the Early Islamic Period, edited by R. Eichmann and H. P. Kühnen. Orient Archäologie Series. Berlin: Deutsches Archaeologisches Institut, forthcoming. ———. “The Umayyad Mosque of Tiberias.” Muqarnas 26 (2009): 37–61. Di Segni, Leah. “Tiberiade romano-bizantina attraverso le sue iscrizioni.” In Hebraica: Miscellanea di studi in onore di Sergio J. Sierra, edited by F. Israel, A. M. Rabello, and A. M. Somekh, 115–63. Turin: Istituto di studi ebraici—Scuola rabbinica, 1998. Foerster, Gideon. “Tiberias: Excavations in the South of the City.” NEAEHL 4:1470–73. Gil, Moshe. A History of Palestine, 634–1099. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Harif, Amos. “A Crusader Church in Tiberias.” PEQ 116 (1984): 107–8. Hartal, Moshe. “Tiberias.” HA-ESI 120 (2008): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_ eng.aspx?id=938&mag_id=114.

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———. “Tiberias.” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/Report_Detail_Eng. aspx?id=4350&mag_id=120&previewit=TrUe. ———. “Tiberias, Galei Kinneret.” HA-ESI 120 (2008): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/ report_detail_eng.aspx?id=773&mag_id=114. Hartal, Moshe, Edna Amos, and Avner Hillman. “Tiberias.” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http://www. hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1574&mag_id=117. Hirschfeld, Yizhar. Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994. IAA Reports 22. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004. ———. “Excavations at Tiberias Reveal Remains of Church and Possibly Theater.” BA 54 (1991): 170–171. ———. “Tiberias.” NEAEHL 4:1464–70. Hirschfeld, Yizhar, and Katharina Galor. “New Excavations in Roman, Byzantine, and Early Islamic Tiberias.” In Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition, edited by Jürgen Zangenberg, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin, 207– 30. WUNT 210. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007. Hirschfeld, Yizhar, and Oren Gutfeld. “The ‘House of the Bronzes,’” NEAEHL 5:2053–54. ———. Tiberias: The House of the Bronzes I. Qedem 48. Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2008. Khamis, Elias. The Fatimid Metalwork Hoard from Tiberias. Qedem 55. Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2013. Leviathan, Daniel. “A Carved Stone Relief Block from Roman Tiberias.” Forthcoming. Miller, Shulamit. “The Mosaics of Tiberias and Hammat Tiberias during the Roman, Byzantine and Early Islamic Periods.” MA thesis. Hebrew University, 2011. Al-Muqaddasī. Ah\san al-taqāsim fī ma‘rifat al-aqālim. Edited by M. J. de Goeje. Leiden: Brill, 1906. Nasir-i Khusraw. Yah\yā al-Khashshāb. Beirut: Dār al-Kitāb al-Jadīd, 1983. Price, R., and M. Gaddis, trans. The Acts of the Council of Chalcedon. Translated Texts for Historians 45. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2005. Stacey, David. Excavations at Tiberias, 1973–1974: The Early Islamic Periods. IAA Reports 21. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004. Stepansky, Yosef. “The Crusader Castle of Tiberias.” Crusades 3 (2004): 179–81. ———. “Tiberias,” NEAEHL 5:2048–53. Talgam, Rina. “Mosaic Floors in Tiberias.” In Hebrew. In Excavations at Tiberias, 1989–1994, edited by Y. Hirschfeld, 123–32. IAA Reports 22. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004. Vito, Fanny. “HaShuk Ha’ironi” (The Municipal Market), HA-ESI 23 (1972). Williams, F. The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis. Nag Hammadi Studies 35. Leiden: Brill, 1987. Yelin, David. “A Kufic-Arabic Inscription from Tiberias.” Qovetz: The Hebrew Society for the Exploration of Israel in Jerusalem 1 (1921): 44–45.

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11 Hamath Tiberias Carl E. Savage Hamath Tiberias is one of those places in the Galilee region that lie just outside the biblical record. That is to say, it is not geographically dispersed, but it is one of the “invisible” locations outside the written record of the New Testament text, unlike, for example, a nearby site such as Capernaum. This does not mean that Hamath Tiberias is not an important place to garner an understanding of the “world of Jesus” or the developing traditions of rabbinic Judaism. On the contrary, the site of Hamath Tiberias is significant for the study of early synagogues and the question of the extent of the hellenization or romanization of Jewish culture in the Galilee. Yet the site existed long before the establishment of any of the several synagogues that have been discovered. Located just south of the city of Tiberias, it was a separate town for many years preceding the founding of Tiberias. When Tiberias was built and became the capital city of the Galilee during the time of the ministry of Jesus and the reign of Herod Antipas as tetrarch of Galilee and Perea, the site of the hot springs of Hamath Tiberias was incorporated into that new city. Hamath Tiberias—for which Ammathus is the Greek derivation (see Josephus J.W. 4.11; Ant. 18.36)—means “hot springs of Tiberias.”1 It is an area of ruins near the hot springs south of Tiberias. The earliest reference to a place called Hammath appears in Josh. 19:35, where Hammath is listed among the fortified towns circling the Sea of Galilee along with Kinneret, Rakkat, and Zer or Zed (which may refer to the site now identified with Bethsaida).2 While Iron Age remains have not yet been found in the general vicinity of the site, surveys and exploratory trenches have found evidence for ancient Bronze and Chalcolithic Age settlements.3 So, 1. John J. Rousseau and Rami Arav, Jesus and His World: An Archaeological and Cultural Dictionary (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995), 317. 2.  Ibid., 317. 3.  Moshe Dothan, Hammath Tiberias (Ancient Synagogues Studies; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1983–2000), 3.

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while the exact location of biblical Hammath is uncertain, it remains plausible to assume that it is somewhere near Hamath Tiberias. The city of Tiberias was founded by Herod Antipas most probably in 18 or 19 ce and named in honor of the emperor Tiberius. Tiberias soon became the principal city on the Sea of Galilee and later a religious center of Judaism supplanting Sepphoris. Tiberias was said to be constructed of many monumental buildings of the type expected to be found in a Hellenistic polis, including a palace, baths, marketplace, council assembly hall, fortified walls, and so on.4 Very few of these, however, have been discovered dating to the first century ce. The only remains clearly defined so far are the southern gate and the cardo.5 The rest of the typical features of a polis are, however, assumed to have been present. The site of Hamath Tiberias itself is at the foot of the hills south of Tiberias within 100 m of the shore of the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret). The modern main road from Tiberias to Beth She’an passes along the lowest of the three artificial terraces that were the main topological features of the ancient site. The ancient road is presumed to have followed approximately the same route as the modern one, so ancient travelers on the north–south road would have been well acquainted with this settlement. On the middle terrace were the hot springs for which the site is named and the spring installations, which may number around seventeen separate structures, most likely continue to the north of the excavated areas.6 On its highest artificial terrace, the earliest buildings for the site are found, including the synagogues from Dothan’s 1960s excavations. In antiquity, there may have been a fourth terrace that has not been discovered, since it would be obscured by modern construction near the remains of the ancient city walls. The site has become a key location referred to in discussions about the rise of the synagogue. For example, the several synagogues found at various levels in the excavations at Hamath Tiberias are superimposed on one another and therefore contain important markers for the dating of similar structures. The earliest of the synagogues at Hamath Tiberias is of a broadhouse style, with four large rooms, that includes somewhat unique architectural features such as a Jerusalem-facing entrance and the placement of the ark for the Torah in one of its rectangular rooms.7 Perhaps, even more significant, though, is the synagogue that contains the mosaic pavement featuring the zodiacal ornamentation. This Hellenistic-Roman depiction on the floor of a synagogue raises a multitude of questions about the appropriation of such symbolism in a Jewish context. That feature, coupled with the inscriptions that mention persons who have connection to the patriarchs of the Sanhedrin, contributes greatly to what is known about rabbinic Judaism of the Byzantine period in the Galilee. 4.  Ibid., 3. 5.  Rousseau, and Arav, Jesus and His World, 318. 6. Dothan, Hammath Tiberias, 7. 7.  Ibid., 24–25.

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Excavations Both Tiberias and Hamath Tiberias were excavated for the first time in 1921.8 Those excavations made clear that Hamath Tiberias was founded earlier than Tiberias. While the founding date for Hamath Tiberias is not entirely certain, it seems from this first excavation that the settlement that continues into the Roman period dates from the Hellenistic period, perhaps from the first century bce. A large public building with Doric and Corinthian capitals lies two strata beneath the synagogue that displays the grand mosaic floor. That lower building’s function has not been determined with certainty, but among the most plausible suggestions is perhaps that it was a gymnasium.9 While Tiberias and Hamath Tiberias were originally two separate settlements, each surrounded by its own wall, by the time of Josephus in the latter part of the first century ce, the two were united. The Tosefta suggests that this was not the first time that the two became “one city.”10 That suggestion, though, may be speculation based on the assumption found in the Talmud that Hamath Tiberias was in fact the Hamath of Josh. 19:35, one of the fortified cities of the tribe of Naphtali located around the Sea of Galilee. As was noted earlier, excavations and surveys, however, have not been able clearly to discern remains of a city earlier than the Hellenistic period.11 Nahum Slouschz’s 1921 excavations uncovered a square basilica-style synagogue of approximately 12 x 12 m in size. This synagogue was divided by two rows of columns into a nave and two aisles with a courtyard situated to its eastern side.12 Several phases of construction and alteration of the building were discovered, but the sequencing of them was not clearly distinguished, which somewhat clouded the dating of the building. Slouschz identified this structure with the synagogue of Hammath mentioned in the Jerusalem Talmud and therefore dated it to the Roman period.13 L. H. Vincent, who finalized the plans of the 1921 excavation, however, dated the main phase of this building’s construction to a much later period, the fourth or fifth centuries ce.14 A nearby cemetery contained sarcophagi typical of the third and fourth centuries ce with the names of the interred written in Greek, which too may support this later dating of the complex. A much larger excavation of Hamath Tiberias was carried out in the early 1960s by Moshe Dothan, who uncovered another synagogue site. The mosaic floor and architecture of 8.  Moshe Dothan, “Hammath-Tiberias,” NEAEHL 2:574 (1993). 9.  Ibid., 574; Lee I. Levine, ed., Ancient Synagogues Revealed (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society; Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1982), 64. 10. Dothan, Hammath Tiberias, 4; Dothan, “Hammath-Tiberias,” 573. 11.  Dothan, “Hammath-Tiberias,” 573. For rabbinic references to the hot springs of Tiberias, see b. Šabb. 40a, b. Pesah\. 8b; b. Sanh. 107b; b. H|ul. 8a, 106a; b. Ta‘an. 13a; b. Naz. 51b; y. Šabb. 3:1; y. Ber. 1:3; y. Pe’ah 2:3; y. Ned. 1:2; y. ‘Abod. Zar. 1:1. The people used the hot springs not only for bathing but also for cooking. 12.  Dothan, “Hammath-Tiberias,” 574; Dothan, Hammath Tiberias, 5–6. 13. Dothan, Hammath Tiberias, 6. 14. Ibid.

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this sequence of synagogue buildings has been an important source for the discussion about the origins and cultural significance of synagogues of late antiquity in Israel. Its structural features show that by the late third or early fourth century the Torah had become an important element in synagogue worship. The change in design and orientation of architectural features show that this change in worship seemed to be important enough to alter this later synagogue building from its underlying earlier layout.15 The early synagogue at this location, Stratum IIb of Dothan’s excavation, was oriented almost exactly the same as an underlying Hellenistic-period public building that he describes as a palaestra (gymnasium) and that he presumes is associated with supposed “Herodian” thermae, or a hot springs installation of water reservoirs and conduits.16 Some components of a bathhouse installation were uncovered. Gymnasiums and bathhouses were commonly found together throughout the Greco-Roman world, and so it is reasonable to assume that this public building, which contained a court with a sand floor and was bordered by a series of rooms, was similar in design.17 The synagogue built over this earlier building was smaller in size than the gymnasium but nevertheless was also the focus of the later building complex. Mosaics While rabbinic sources speak of twelve or thirteen synagogues in the Hamath Tiberias/Tiberias urban area, only three have been discovered to date.18 Of these, the Stratum IIa synagogue of Dothan’s excavations in Hamath Tiberias, the second in a sequence of buildings that lie above the “gymnasium,” is perhaps the most impressive.19 The sanctuary in this stratum was of what Dothan called a “transitional-type” synagogue, and as such should be dated to the fourth century ce following the traditional typology of Galilean, transitional, and Byzantine basilical synagogal architectural dating.20 This upper synagogue building was oriented to the south toward Jerusalem and featured three rows of columns that effectively divided the square building into four aisles, creating a central nave flanked by one aisle to the east and two to the west. The most important change from the earlier underlying synagogue of Stratum IIb was the 15. Levine, Ancient Synagogues Revealed, 180–90. 16. Dothan, Hammath Tiberias, 16. 17. Ibid. 18. Levine, Ancient Synagogues Revealed, 190–91; Lee I. Levine, Visual Judaism in Late Antiquity: Historical Contexts of Jewish Art (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), 244–45. 19. Levine, Ancient Synagogues, 190-91. 20.  Dennis E. Groh, “The Stratigraphic Chronology of the Galilean Synagogue from the Early Roman Period through the Early Byzantine Period (Ca. 420 C.E.),” in Ancient Synagogues: Historical Analysis and Archaeological Data (ed. Dan Urman and Paul V. M. Flesher; StPB 47; Leiden: Brill, 1995), 1:53. Although this typology is now virtually abandoned, the other remains—pottery, oil lamps, and coins—attest to a fourth-century ce date for this synagogue. See Dothan, Hammath Tiberias, 62–64.

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placement of the entrance to the structure, changing it from the south side to the north side of the building. That change served to highlight the magnificent mosaic floor of the central nave that one would now walk on as one progressed from the northern entrance through the central hall to the southern bema. The nearly 108-sq-m mosaic floor consisted of three panels that were aligned with the eastern wall but, because of the somewhat asymmetrical nature of the room, did not correspond exactly with the north–south axis of the building. The panels in the central nave depicted first, in the northern panel, eight dedicatory Greek inscriptions that were flanked by lions and that listed the patrons of the building, then a central panel with a great circular zodiac with central anthropomorphic Helios (sun) having the four seasons represented at its corners, followed by a southern panel with a representation of the Torah shrine in a style reminiscent of the Jerusalem temple depictions replete with other Jewish symbols such as menorahs, shofars, and lulavs.21 Conclusions The excavations of the synagogues of the Hamath Tiberias allow some important insights into the culture of Late Roman Judaism in the Galilee. The ancient synagogues of Galilee were traditionally divided into three successive architectural types, and this architectural typology was used to date similar structures. Typically this dating fell as follows: the Galilean synagogue (e.g., Chorazim and Capernaum) was dated to the late second and early third centuries; the transitional, or broadhouse, type (e.g., Eshtemoa and Khirbet Shema‘) to the late third and fourth centuries; and the later, or basilica type (e.g., Beth Alpha) to the sixth and seventh centuries.22 However, recent work in archaeology has thrown the matter open once again.23 There seems to be no absolute chronological significance to architectural typological elements, and the Hamath Tiberias synagogues may add to this challenge to the traditional method of dating by typology of architecture.24 Yet, though the use of synagogue architectural typology has fallen out of favor for a multitude of reasons, the Stratum IIb Hamath Tiberias synagogue still remains an important structure for showing the appropriation of symbolism from the larger Hellenistic Roman society. The synagogue’s features highlight a deepening hellenization or, more accurately, the appropriation of symbol and form from the larger Greco-Roman cultural context that occurred most 21.  Marilyn Joyce Segal Chiat, Handbook of Synagogue Architecture (BJS 29; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1982), 108–10. 22.  Dan Urman and Paul V. M. Flesher, eds., Ancient Synagogues: Historical Analysis and Archaeological Data (StPB 47; Leiden: Brill, 1995), 1:xxvi. 23.  Jodi Magness, “Synagogue Typology and Earthquake Chronology at Khirbet Shema‘, Israel,” Journal of Field Archaeology 24, no. 2 (Summer 1997): 212, http://www.jstor.org/stable/530472. 24.  Urman and Flesher, Ancient Synagogues, xxvii–xxix.

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prominently during the Late Roman period for the developing rabbinic Judaism. Therefore, it shows that this “romanization” of Judaism is a process that may postdate altogether the firstcentury context of Jesus’ ministry rather than constituting a trajectory that continued into later centuries from the first century. Thus the Galilee of the first century would be quite different from that of the Late Roman and Early Byzantine periods. Bibliography Chancey, Mark A. Greco-Roman Culture and the Galilee of Jesus. SNTSMS 134. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Chiat, Marilyn Joyce Segal. Handbook of Synagogue Architecture. BJS 29. Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1982. Dothan, Moshe. “Hammath-Tiberias.” NEAEHL 2:573–77 (1993). ———. Hammath Tiberias. Ancient Synagogues Studies. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1983–2000. Groh, Dennis E. “The Stratigraphic Chronology of the Galilean Synagogue from the Early Roman Period through the Early Byzantine Period (Ca. 420 C.E.).” In Ancient Synagogues: Historical Analysis and Archaeological Data, edited by Dan Urman and Paul M. V. Flesher, 1:51–69. StPB 47. Leiden: Brill, 1995. Levine, Lee I., ed. Ancient Synagogues Revealed. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society; Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1982. ———. Visual Judaism in Late Antiquity: Historical Contexts of Jewish Art. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012. Magness, Jodi. “Synagogue Typology and Earthquake Chronology at Khirbet Shema‘, Israel.” Journal of Field Archaeology 24, no. 2 (1997): 211–20. http://www.jstor.org/ stable/530472. Rousseau, John J., and Rami Arav. Jesus and His World: An Archaeological and Cultural Dictionary. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995. Urman, Dan, and Paul V. M. Flesher, eds. Ancient Synagogues: Historical Analysis and Archaeological Data, vol. 1. StPB 47. Leiden: Brill, 1995.

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12 Capernaum, Village of Nah|um, from Hellenistic to Byzantine Times* Sharon Lea Mattila Overview of the Main Areas of the Site A Brief History of Excavations at the Site The ancient site of Capernaum, or Kēfar Nah\um (Hebrew), “Village of Nah\um,” is located on the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee, about 9.3 miles (15 km) north of the city of Tiberias (see maps 3 and 4B in the front gallery of this volume). It has been of great interest in particular to Christian scholars, on account of Capernaum’s reputation as the base of Jesus’ ministry. Consequently, since the end of the nineteenth century, the site has belonged to two church authorities, resulting in its division into two sections: (1) the southwestern side, in the hands of the Catholic Franciscan fathers; and (2) the northeastern side, in the hands of the Greek Orthodox patriarchate of Jerusalem. The most extensively excavated and best published section is the Franciscan side. Excavations began there in 1905, further conducted by Gaudenzio Orfali from 1912 to 1915, resumed under the direction of Virgilio Corbo and Stanislao Loffreda from 1968 to 1986, and then again under Loffreda from 2000 to 2003.1 The now-considerable published data on

* In the completion of this project, I am hugely indebted to the contributions in particular of three individuals: Stefano De Luca, who provided me with many corrections, suggestions, supplementary information, and excellent clarifying illustrations; John C. H. Laughlin, who shared with me much unpublished material; and George Yanchula, who collaborated with me in the production of fig. C, measured the plans using AutoCAD, and assisted me with the numismatic analysis. The responsibility for any remaining errors is, of course, mine. 1. Stefano De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti attorno al Lago di Galilea: contributo allo studio dell’ambiente del Nuovo Testamento e del Gesù storico,” in Terra Sancta: Archeologia ed esegesi. Atti dei convegni

217

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work there up to 2003, with the addition of further information generously provided to me by another of its excavators, Stefano De Luca, are surveyed here.2 On the Greek Orthodox side, excavations were conducted under the direction of Vassilios Tzaferis from 1978 to 1987, but only the first volume of the full excavation report on these, covering strata V–I, which date from the early seventh century to 1033 ce, has been published.3 The second volume, which is to cover the earlier strata, has yet to appear. Nevertheless, one of the excavators who examined these earlier strata, John C. H. Laughlin, did publish a short preliminary report on these and has also kindly shared with me some of the unpublished material, which I incorporate here.4 The Chronological Range of This Survey The focus of this survey chronologically is the Hellenistic period through to the end of the Byzantine period, that is, from c. 330 bce to 640 ce. I use the designation “Byzantine” to refer to the period from the beginning of the reign of Constantine I to the Arab conquest—that is, from the early fourth century to the early seventh century ce. Excavations on both sides of the site indicate that, sometime after the Arab conquest, the Byzantine-period synagogue, basilica, and settlement were replaced by a new Arab-period settlement of a different plan.5 This later settlement, as well as the finds and remains predating the Hellenistic period that were also unearthed, is beyond the scope of this essay.

2008–2010, ISCAB Serie Archeologica 1 (ed. G. Paximadi and M. Fidanzio; Lugano: Eupress-FLT, 2013), 13–111, esp. 35. 2.  The work prior to 1968 was published in Gaudence Orfali, Capharnaüm et ses ruines (Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 1922). Full reports on work at the site since 1968 (all in Italian) now include Virgilio Corbo, Cafarnao I: Gli edifici della città (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1975); Stanislao Loffreda, Cafarnao II: La Ceramica (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1974); Augusto Spijkerman, Cafarnao III: Catalogo delle monete della città (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1975); Emmanuele Testa, Cafarnao IV: I Graffitti della Casa di S. Pietro (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1972); Loffreda, Cafarnao V: Documentazione fotografica degli scavi (1968–2003) (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 2005); Loffreda, Cafarnao VI: Tipologie e contesti stratigrafica della ceramica (1968–2003) (Jerusalem: Terra Santa, 2008); Loffreda, Cafarnao VII: Documentazione grafica della ceramica (1968–2003) (Jerusalem: Terra Santa, 2008); Loffreda, Cafarnao VIII: Documentazione fotografica degli oggetti (1968–2003) (Jerusalem: Terra Santa, 2008); and Bruno Callegher, Cafarnao IX: Monete dall’area urbana di Cafarnao (1968–2003) (Jerusalem: Terra Santa, 2007). Numerous shorter reports, mostly in Italian but also occasionally in English, have also appeared, a number of which are cited below. For a couple of brief introductions to the site in English, see, most recently, Stefano De Luca, “Capernaum,” in The Oxford Encylopedia of the Bible and Archaeology (ed. Daniel M. Master; New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 1:168–80; and the entry for Capernaum in NEAEHL 1:291–96, which includes contributions from both Loffreda and Vassilios Tzaferis. 3.  Vassilios Tzaferis, ed., Excavations at Capernaum, vol. 1, 1978–1982 (Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1989). 4.  The preliminary report is John C. H. Laughlin, “Capernaum: From Jesus’ Time and After,” BAR 19 (1993): 55–61, 90. 5.  De Luca attributes these Arab-period alterations to the earthquake of 749 ce (“Capernaum,” 169).

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See the photo gallery (page G-5a) at the beginning of this volume for a color aerial photograph of both sides of the site, looking southeast, with the Franciscan side in the foreground, and the Greek Orthodox side in the background. See fig. A for a rough consolidated plan of the entire site put together by me, based on the published plans of both sections.6 As noted there, the Arab-period walls have been removed from most of the excavated areas in this figure, given that these later walls would have rendered the plans of the earlier structures unclear. Figure B is a photograph of the Franciscan side of the site, looking northwest toward the limestone synagogue from the olive-press complex of Area 4. The Main Axis of the Franciscan Side of the Site Figure C is an AutoCAD-generated three-dimensional reconstruction of the main axis of the Franciscan side of the site based on the published excavation plans, along with a photograph of 6.  A properly drafted plan including both sides of the Capernaum site is very much a desideratum, but to my knowledge none has been published thus far. In putting together this rough consolidated plan, I have relied especially on De Luca’s attempt to do the same in his “Scoperte archaeologiche,” 37–39. On top of the plan of the Greek Orthodox side found in Tzaferis, Excavations at Capernaum, which included only the excavations up to 1982, I have pasted the diagram of Area B found in Laughlin, “Capernaum,” 57, which also incorporated the 1984–1987 excavations. For the Franciscan side, I have used the plan found in Callegher, Cafarnao IX, with most of the Arabperiod walls removed.

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the glassware recovered in Area 9. The most magnificent and famous structure discovered along this main axis is its northernmost public building, the limestone synagogue, perhaps the most impressive in Israel (see figs. A–C). The limestone out of which this synagogue was constructed was not available locally and had to be transported into the village. Its architectural and stylistic features have led some scholars to contend that it dates to the second–third centuries, based on comparison with contemporary art and architecture found in Syria and Asia Minor. Both

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the numismatic and ceramic finds, however, indicate that it was in fact constructed in the late fifth or early sixth century.7 7.  For a recent, well-documented survey of the debate over the dating of the synagogue, see Rachel Hachlili, Ancient Synagogues—Archaeology and Art: New Discoveries and Current Research (Handbook of Oriental Studies, section 1, Ancient Near East 105; Leiden: Brill, 2013) 61–63, 590–93. Constraints of space do not permit me to identify all the scholars associated with each position in the debate, and so I must refer the reader to Hachlili’s discussion and the works documented there for most of this information. De Luca has pointed to three works that nevertheless deserve to be singled out for citation here: Hanswulf Bloedhorn, “The Capitals of the Synagogue of

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A very large proportion of the total number of coins recovered from the village derived from the synagogue. Table 1 provides an overall conspectus of 27,565 coins recovered from the site (including some from the Greek Orthodox side), based on the report of Bruno Callegher, Cafarnao IX, supplemented by articles by Loffreda and Ermanno A. Arslan on the coins recovered from the synagogue.8 Some 20,323 of these coins, or almost three-quarters of the total (73.7 percent), were recovered from Trench 12, a small trench of 7.0 sq m dug near the entrance to the northeastern corner of its eastern courtyard. Figure D shows the location of this trench, shaded in darker gray than the others.9 Of the sample of 1,925 coins out of this deposit identified by Arslan, all but 13, or over 99 percent, date from 335 to 491 ce.10 In the prayer hall, another large deposit of 3,158 coins was found in Trench 14, a larger trench of 28.5 sq m, located near the southwestern entrance to the prayer hall, shaded in medium gray in Figure D. The latest coins identified by Arslan in this deposit date to the beginning of Zeno’s reign in 475 ce.11 The circumstances of how these two very large deposits came to be there remain obscure.12 It is impossible that they arrived there accidentally.13 The number of coins per sq m recovered Capernaum: Their Chronological and Stylistic Classification with Regard to the Development of Capitals in the Decapolis and in Palestine,” in Ancient Synagogues in Israel, Third-Seventh Century C.E.: Proceedings of Symposium, University of Haifa, May 1987 (ed. Rachel Hachlili; BAR International Series 499; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), 49–54; Bloedhorn’s more detailed Die Kapitelle der Synagoge von Kapernaum: Ihre zeitliche und stilistische Einordnung im Rahmen der Kapitellentwicklung in der Dekapolis und in Palaestina (ADPV 11; Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1988); and Anders Runesson, “Architecture, Conflict, and Identity Formation: Jews and Christians in Capernaum from the First to the Sixth Century,” in Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition (ed. Jürgen Zangenberg, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin; WUNT 210; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007), 231–57. 8.  The articles are Stanislao Loffreda, “Coins from the Synagogue of Capharnaum,” SBFLA 47 (1997): 223– 44; and Ermanno A. Arslan, “Il deposito monetale della Trincea XII nel cortile della sinagoga di Cafarnao,” SBFLA 47 (1997): 245–328. Seventy additional coins are recorded in Callegher, “Cafarnao IX. Addenda: monete dalle ricognizioni di superficie (2004–2007),” SBFLA 57 (2007): 493–502. Of these, fourteen are unfortunately completely unidentifiable. An additional couple of coins are recorded in Callegher, “Cafarnao IX. Addenda: monete dalle ricognizioni di superficie 2007–2009,” SBFLA 60 (2010): 393–94, and another six in Callegher, “Cafarnao IX. Addenda: Coins from the 2011 Surface Survey,” SBFLA 62 (2012): 367–69. 9.  Like the Franciscan part of fig. A, fig. D is based on a scan of the plan in Cafarnao IX, with most of the Arab-period walls removed. The dimensions of the various trenches were measured using AutoCAD by Yanchula after importing a scan of this plan, and form the basis of the calculations and numbers recorded here and in table 1. 10.  The figures are based on the data provided in Arslan, “Il deposito monetale.” 11.  I derive these terminal dates from Arslan’s “Tabella I” (which includes this information for Trench 14 as well as Trench 12) in “Il deposito monetale,” 153. 12.  As Arslan observes, the Trench 12 deposit lacks the features of a typical hoard, and its profile closely resembles that of the stray finds in the village, with the exception of the period between the reigns of Marcian and Zeno (“The L812 Trench Deposit Inside the Synagogue and the Isolated Finds of Coins in Capernaum, Israel: A Comparison of the Two Groups,” Israel Numismatic Research 6 [2011]: 62–146). He suggests that these coins were not part of a hoard that was withdrawn quickly out of circulation, but that they were instead collected over time and then deposited. 13.  The phenomenon of coin deposits in synagogues has been found elsewhere, but constraints of space unfortunately preclude a comparative discussion here.

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Cat. Nos

Description

No. of Coins

Date Range

1(1a)+1(2)+ 1(3)+1(4a)+2(1)

Stray finds from all parts of the village, including the Greek Orthodox side of the site

1,473

223 bce to 14th/16th cent. ce

1(1b)

Hoard of 271 tetradrachms and 1,291 radiates (with 1 bronze) found in a jar in the locus of the later olive press of Area 11 (L710) (see fig. A)

1,563

Radiates, 251–270 ce; tetradrachms, 54–253 ce.

1(4b)

1 tetradrachm and 35 radiates from locus L130 in Area 5, described as “a hoard perhaps already dispersed in antiquity” (Callegher, Cafarnao IX, 139, my translation)

36

249–268 ce; tetra­ drachm 249–251 ce

1(4c)

7 medieval denarii found near the surface of Locus L86 of Area 3

7

End of 12th cent. ce

2(2)

Hoard of 282 gold dinars found in Area A of the Greek Orthodox side of the site (see fig. A)

282

696–743 ce

2(3)

Hoard of silver dirhams found in Area A of the Greek Orthodox side of the site (see fig. A)

6

709–740 ce

3(1)

An enormous quantity of coins found in Trench 12 (area = 7 sq m) in the courtyard of the synagogue (2,903 coins per sq m)

20,323

223 bce–498 ce (sample of 1,925)

3(2)

A large number of coins found in Trench 14 (area = 28.5 sq m) in the prayer hall of the synagogue (111 coins per sq m)

3,158

Similar to Tr. 12 coins

3(3)

Coins from Trenches 11, 18, and 21–25 in and around the synagogue, ranging in density from about 1 coin every 4.5 sq m (Tr. 23 a few m from Tr. 12) to about 16 coins per sq m (Tr. 18 along the front balcony)

710

Similar to Tr. 12 coins

3(4)

5 gold solidi and 2 trimessi hidden between the stones of the benches of the synagogue found in Trench 17

7

616–668 ce

TOTAL

27,565

Table 1. Overall Conspectus of Coins from Capernaum (as documented in Callegher’s Catalogue in Cafarnao IX; in Loffreda, “Coins from the Synagogue,” 230; and in Arslan, “Il deposito,” 245–328). See fig. D for most of the synagogue trenches.

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from Trench 12 near the entrance to the courtyard is a whopping 2,903 (or about 270 coins per sq ft); whereas Trench 23, a much larger trench of 40.7 sq m located a relatively short distance away and revealing the remains of a private dwelling that was later sacrificed to this courtyard (shaded in light gray in fig. D), yielded only nine coins, or about one coin every 4.5 sq m, quite consistent with the incidence of stray finds in the village.14 The ceramic data also confirm a late-fifth- to early-sixth-century date for the construction especially of the synagogue’s courtyard. Sealed under the mortar foundation of the private house’s courtyard unearthed in Trench 23 were found twenty-seven fragments of fine ware dating from the late fifth to early sixth century. Five further fragments were recovered in Trenches 4, 11, and 12 (see fig. D). Only three fragments were found in the prayer hall, however, all associated with the coin deposit of Trench 14.15 In an attempt to account for the clear evidence that the limestone synagogue did not stand prior to the late fifth century at the very earliest, on the one hand, and its earlier architectural features, on the other, De Luca has proposed that in the final phase of the synagogue’s construction “heterogeneous architectural materials from a monumental building of the 2nd– 3rd centuries ce were reused.” He also suggests that there were two earlier synagogues under the prayer hall of the later limestone one, the first constructed out of the local basalt stone and dating to the first century ce and the second dating to the fourth century, with a basalt perimeter wall and containing limestone architectural elements that were later reused in the fifth– sixth-century limestone synagogue.16 These earlier synagogues, however, were much smaller than the limestone one. A substantial part of the area under the prayer hall and all of the area under the eastern courtyard once consisted of private dwellings, as was clearly revealed for instance in Trench 23 (see fig. D, which shows the staircase and ovens of the private courtyard uncovered there), and this area was settled already in the Hellenistic period.17 In addition to the synagogue, Area 1 near the lakeshore, which the Franciscan excavators have designated the Insula Sacra (the Sacred Insula), has attracted much scholarly attention 14.  The number of coins found in Trench 23 is recorded in Loffreda, “Coins from the Synagogue,” 230. 15.  For these fragments, see Loffreda, Cafarnao VI, 99, 103, and the data in his “Registro della Ceramica” by loci in ibid., 300–377. The fragments sealed under the mortar foundation of the private courtyard of the house in Trench 23 include fifteen fragments of Late Roman Ware (LRC) 3 (450–550 ce), eleven fragments of Cypriot Red Slip Ware (CRS) 2 (475–525 ce) and a fragment of LRC 5 (460–550 ce). Five other fragments of CRS 2 were found in Trenches 4, 11, and 12 of the synagogue’s courtyard, and three fragments of earlier types were found in Trench 4. In the prayer hall, however, only two fragments of CRS 2 were found, together with a base of LRC, all associated with the coin deposit in Trench 14. The three earlier fragments found in Trench 4 include one CRS 1 (350–475 ce), one African Red Slip Ware (ARS) 58 (290–375 ce), and one ARS 59 (320–400 ce). 16.  De Luca, “Capernaum,” 174–76; and see this article for a more detailed discussion of his multiple-stage hypothesis. For a summary of other hypotheses putting forward multiple stages in the building of the synagogue, including that of Runesson, cited above, see again Hachlili, Ancient Synagogues, 61–63, 590–93. 17. Loffreda, “Ceramica ellenistico-romana nel sottosuolo della sinagoga di Cafarnao,” in Studia Hierosolymitana III (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1982), 273–312. For a photograph of Trench 23, see Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 178, DF 299.

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(see figs. A and C–D). In this area, at least three main pre-Arab archaeological strata were uncovered. The fine Christian shrine or basilica of the uppermost stratum, which consisted of three concentric octagons with mosaic floors (fine mosaics in the interior and a coarser one in the exterior), dates to the fifth–sixth centuries ce. The middle stratum, exposed underneath, was a quadrilateral shrine that stood from the second to the late fourth century ce.18 The lowermost stratum consisted of the remains of private domestic structures, dating to the Late Hellenistic–Early Roman period (200 bce–135 ce). These the Franciscan excavators have ascribed to the “House of Saint Peter.”19 The Greek Orthodox Side of the Site Only a small portion of the Greek Orthodox side of the site was excavated, clearing four main areas, designated by the excavators Areas A to D, as well as a sea wall about 1.5 m thick extending about 200 m (656.2 ft) along the shore and into the Franciscan side of the site, with two orthogonal jetties projecting into the lake (see fig. A).20 The earliest occupational strata of Areas A and C date to the very end of the Byzantine period, during the transition into Arab times, and are beyond the scope of this survey, although the hoard of 282 gold dinars recovered in Area A (see table 1) is worthy of mention.21 The structure in Area D “consists of two concave, semicircular pools flanking a raised platform built of thick, plastered walls.” These pools “were apparently used to store fish that were subsequently moved to the raised platform between them. The water in the pools drained into the Sea of Galilee through clay pipes.”22 According to Tzaferis and Laughlin, Area D and the jetty wall and port installation were first constructed in the Roman period.23 On the basis of pottery recovered from among its stones, however, De Luca dates the construction of the sea wall to the fifth century ce and argues that it formed part of a broader harbor complex servicing Christian pilgrims and immigrants (including monastics) to the Holy Land, which stretched southwest to et-Tagbah and Magdala and northeast another 300 18.  De Luca, “Capernaum,” 176. Joan E. Taylor challenged the dating of the erection of the first phase of the quadrilateral shrine to the second century ce (Christians and the Holy Places: The Myth of Jewish-Christian Origins [Oxford: Clarendon, 1993], esp. 268–94), but, as De Luca has brought to my attention, this challenge has since been rebuffed by Loffreda, “La tradizionale casa di Simon Pietro a Cafarnao a 25 anni dalla sua scoperta,” in Early Christianity in Context: Monuments and Documents (ed. F. Manns and E. Alliata; Collection maior 38; Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 1993), 37–67. 19.  For a convenient and comprehensive discussion that includes earlier work, see Loffreda, “La tradizionale casa di Simon Pietro.” De Luca offers 3-D reconstructions of the basilica and of the “House of Saint Peter” in “Scoperte archeologiche,” 40–41, 51. 20.  Laughlin, unpublished report; De Luca, “Capernaum,” 172. 21.  On these, see John F. Wilson, “The Gold Hoard,” in Tzaferis, Excavations at Capernaum, 145–79. For a photograph of these coins, see ibid., plate 3. 22. Tzaferis, Excavations at Capernaum, 295. De Luca is not certain that these structures were fish ponds. 23.  Laughlin, personal communication, 2014.

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m.24 Nevertheless, De Luca does also recognize that this sea wall may have constituted the strengthening of earlier port structures.25 Area B yielded earlier remains dating back to the second century ce and is reconstructed in fig. E, together with photographs of the murex shells and the bathhouse that were discovered there. The bathhouse dates to the second–third centuries ce and was built on an earlier structure that may have served the same function. It consisted of a single row of rooms 20 ft wide, of which four were recovered, and its identification as a bathhouse was indicated by “the scattered pieces of clay hypocaust tiles, both round- and square-shaped, used to raise the floor of the heated room” (the caldarium).26 It is very similar in plan to a bathhouse found in Ein Gedi. Laughlin argues that the plan of the bathhouse “probably indicates that it was built for Roman bathers, rather than Jews,”27 but bathhouses appear so frequently in the early rabbinic literature that one gets the impression that they were very common in Jewish towns and villages alike in the Roman period, and it is reasonable to suppose that they often had a Romanstyle plan.28 Immediately north of the bathhouse and also dating to the second–third centuries was a storehouse. De Luca records hundreds of basaltic stone grinders for processing grain found at the site,29 so this may well have been a granary. East of the bathhouse and storehouse were two well-constructed buildings, reflecting the use of skilled craftsmen. As can be seen in figs. A and E in comparison with fig. D, these buildings were more regular in plan than most of Capernaum’s private houses and may well have served public functions of some kind. Both were occupied from Roman through to Byzantine times. The stratigraphy of the easternmost of these buildings, with superimposed floors, indicates an occupation layer of the second to fourth centuries that underwent major refurbishing during Byzantine times (fourth–sixth centuries). In the later period, the building contained an elaborate drainage system and “a floor composed of a 5-inch-thick layer of extremely hard plaster and gravel.” Its walls were heavily mortared. On the western side of this building in the fifth–sixth centuries, a street was constructed of finely dressed ashlars (see figs. A and E). “On the northern end of the street was a public water fountain or installation lined with clay tiles and a drain in the southwestern corner,” with some of the waterproof plaster still visible.30 24.  De Luca, “Capernaum,” 172; Stefano De Luca and Anna Lena, “The Harbour of the City of Magdala/ Taricheae on the Shores of the Sea of Galilee, from the Hellenistic to the Byzantine Times: New Discoveries and Preliminary Results,” in Harbours and Harbour Cities in the Eastern Mediterranean from Antiquity to Byzantium: Recent Discoveries and New Approaches (ed. S. Ladstätter, F. Pirson, and T. Schmidts; Instanbul, forthcoming); and see De Luca, “Scoperte archaeologiche,” 36–37, for a map of this harbor complex. 25.  De Luca, “Capernaum,” 172. 26.  Laughlin, “Capernaum,” 56–57. 27.  Ibid., 57. 28.  Indeed, the famous story of Rabban Gamaliel bathing in the bathhouse of Aphrodite in Acco-Ptolemais (m. ‘Abod. Zar. 3:4) surely confirms that Jews did not eschew Roman-style bathhouses. 29.  De Luca, “Capernaum,” 171. 30.  Laughlin, “Capernaum,” 60; Laughlin, unpublished report.

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The Houses, Olive-Press Complex, and Proposed Shops and Workshops Also unearthed in Area B on the Greek Orthodox side was a house dating to the Byzantine period (fifth–sixth centuries) (see figs. A and E). Like most of the other houses in the village, it contained a staircase suggesting a second story. A very interesting find discovered in one of

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its rooms was “a large number of murex shells with dozens of bone needles used to extract the highly prized royal purple dye” (see fig. E).31 These would have to have been imported all the way from the coast. Small industrial activity of this type in domestic contexts was very common in the ancient world and likely occurred in other houses and workshops found in the village, discussed below. On the Franciscan side, the standing remains of the best-preserved houses also date to the Byzantine period. One can add at least eleven fully or partially excavated houses to the one on the Greek Orthodox side. In addition, several olive-press complexes were unearthed, also probably belonging to Byzantine times, in Areas 11, 1, and 4 (see fig. A). The last-mentioned was especially impressive. Smaller structures that were probably shops and workshops were also uncovered. The individual houses are numbered in fig. D, and the proposed shops and workshops and the olive-press complex of Area 4 have also been labeled and identified in various shades of gray.32 In differentiating these houses and the other structures one from another, I have followed the excavators,33 who in turn have followed the same general principle used by most archaeologists to identify independent units. As succinctly put by a scholar of Pompeii, “the independence of a unit is defined in terms of its own entrance from the street and the lack of accessibility from other units.”34 Houses #1–3 of Area 2 are reconstructed in fig. C; De Luca’s reconstructions of Houses #6–10, and the Olive-Press Complex #8a are presented in figs. F–H; and House #12 is reconstructed in fig. E. Table 2 provides their internal surface areas, measured by George Yanchula using AutoCAD on the basis of the plan published in Cafarnao IX.35 As can be seen there, the ground floors of the fully excavated houses ranged in size from 44.4 sq m (478 sq ft) to 317.5 sq m (3,417.5 sq ft), with an average area of 144.2 sq m (1,555.3 sq ft); although it should be mentioned that this likely underrepresents the average area of the houses that once stood in the village, given that the three incompletely excavated houses ranged in size from well over 115 sq m (1,238 sq ft) to well over 220 sq m (2,368 sq ft).

31.  Laughlin, “Capernaum,” 60. 32.  Like the Franciscan part of fig. A, fig. D is based on a scan of the plan in Cafarnao IX, with most of the Arab-period walls removed. 33.  I have followed the descriptions found in Corbo, Cafarnao I, 176–94; Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 25–27; and have also been greatly assisted by the very generous guidance of De Luca through personal communications at the end of 2014 and beginning of 2015. Any remaining errors are of course my own. 34.  Felix Pirson, “Rented Accommodation at Pompeii: The Evidence of the Insula Arriana Polliana VI.6,” in Domestic Space in the Roman World: Pompeii and Beyond (ed. Ray Laurence and Andrew Wallace-Hadrill; Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 1997), 165–81, esp. 175. 35.  These measurements include the vestibules. Where a vestibule is shared by two houses, as is the case in couple of instances, its area is divided between the two.

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Label in Figure D (or A)*

Corbo / Loffreda / De Luca / Mattila description (the loci mentioned are the main courtyards of each house)

Excavation Inner surarea (Figure face area A) (sq m)

Number of courtyards, rooms, etc.

#1

Western House / House L67

Area 2

317.5

c. 11

#2

Northeastern House / House L60

Area 2

135.1

6

#3

Triple Courtyard House / House L45-46, 51

Area 2

163.6

10

#4

House L300

Area 4

101.4

8

#5

House L330 (incomplete)

Area 4

220+

12+

#6

House L359 (incomplete)

Area 4

157+

9+

#7

House L216

Area 4

44.4

4

#8

House L222

Area 4

161.7

11

#8a

Olive-Press Complex L270

Area 4

118.1

12

#9

House L241

Area 3

143.1

9

#10

House L281

Area 3

148.9

11

#11

House L365 (incomplete)

Area 3a

115+

7+

(#12)*

#12=“Private House” on Greek Orthodox Side

Area B

82.2

5

#3a

Shop attached to House #3

Area 2

22.6

2

a

Oil-lamp/pottery shop

Area 5

26.2

2

b

Shop

Area 6

14.4

2

c

Shop

Area 6

31.4

2

d

Workshop with benches in entrance room

Area 4

31.9

3

e

Workshop or shop

Area 4

26.2

2

#4a

Large workshop attached to House #4

Area 4

24.8

1

#7a

Rooms of Houses #7 and #10 that were separated off to form a shop or workshop

Area 4

44.9

3

#10a f i

Area 3

55.1

3

2-room shops/workshops later enlarged with rooms butt- Area 4 ing into the street Area 4

64.2

5

16.5

3

g

Workshop

Area 4

15.0

1

h

Shop with raised platform inside the vestibule to Houses #6 and #8

Area 4

10.9

1

j

Shop

Area 3

14.6

2

k

Shop or workshop

Area 3

35.0

3

l

Shop or workshop

Area 3

27.7

2

Table 2. Capernaum houses (ground floors only), proposed shops and workshops, and the olive-press complex of Area 4. See fig. D.

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These houses, the olive-press complex, and the shops and workshops were all built with basaltic fieldstones that were unworked or roughly dressed, although corners and doorposts, in particular those leading to the streets, were generally made of dressed ashlars. The walls did not lack plaster but were “smoothed by a layer of pebbles covered with a clayey, lime-poor plaster,” some of which was observed during the excavations,36 although much of it did not survive the centuries in the Galilean climate. The roofs and ceilings also were plastered. Basalt-stone rollers, used to smooth the plaster on the roofs (illustrated in fig. F), were found at the site.37 Thus the standing remains of the walls are but the skeletons of the houses that once were. Mud plaster could sometimes be elaborately worked and even painted with simple frescos, as shown by the mud plaster found on the interior walls of the mud-brick houses of Egyptian villages, where the dry climate has permitted its survival.38 One cannot know, of course, if the interior walls of Capernaum’s houses were likewise decorated, but surely one cannot rule this out.39 Most, if not all, of these houses contained staircases, sometimes more than one.40 De Luca is of the opinion that they may have therefore contained second-story structures. His opinion is based on a number of finds. First, in the main hall of House #8 in Area 4, eight steps were preserved of the most complete staircase recovered, reaching a total height of 1.56 m (or over 5 ft).41 There was also evidence of a landing, suggesting that the staircase contained at least two more steps, and thus attained a height of approximately 2.1 m (or about 6.9 ft)! This strongly suggests, as De Luca observes, that “originally the staircases reached the roof-terrace/ upper story without the need of a supplementary ladder. The point is not irrelevant, because fixed structures like these, instead of mobile ones, would indicate a not occasional but daily need to climb safely and comfortably to the roof/upper story.” Adding to this datum is the evidence of the reinforcement of pillars in the collapsed debris found in some loci, probably as a result of the earthquake of 363 ce, which also points to second-story structures over them.42 See fig. F for De Luca’s illustration of how such structures may have been part of, for instance, the small House #7 in Area 4. Although it is possible that the staircase did not reach 36.  De Luca, “Capernaum,” 173; and De Luca, personal communication, 2015. 37.  De Luca, personal communication, 2014. 38. Sharon Lea Mattila, “Revisiting Jesus’ Capernaum: A Village of Only Subsistence-Level Fishers and Farmers?” in The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (ed. David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins; Early Christianity and Its Literature 11; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013), 75–138, esp. 124–29; and see the photographs presented there. De Luca, independently of me, has designated Capernaum’s walls as but the skeletons of the original houses (in his personal communication commenting on my above-mentioned article in 2014, before he got to the part where I thus designated them). 39.  For a suggested illustration of how the interior of the main room of the “House of Saint Peter” may have been decorated, see De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche,” 51. 40.  House #9 may be the one exception, although remains were found in one of its courtyards (L285) that may be part of a staircase, but also quite possibly a bench. For photographs, see Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 222, DF 403; and 224, DF 407. 41.  For a striking photograph of this staircase, see Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 209, DF362. 42.  All of the discussion of this paragraph derives from De Luca, personal communication, 2014–2015.

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the roof and there was need of a supplementary ladder, as illustrated in his Reconstruction #1, it is surely more reasonable to suppose that one would not bother to build a staircase that would take up room in the courtyard if one needed to use a ladder to get to the roof anyway. Thus it is more likely that it did indeed at least reach the roof, although it may simply have served to allow easy access there by means of a wooden platform at the top, as shown in Reconstruction #2. But the staircase also may have led to a second story, as depicted in Reconstruction #3. Here De Luca suggests the possibility that it led to two wooden platforms, which conducted

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to two upper-story rooms and also partially shaded the courtyard. Indeed, the existence of a second story would also help to explain how the northernmost “blind room” of House #7, which contained no entrance on the ground floor (see fig. D), was accessed. It would have been from the house’s second story by means of the staircase, remains of which were found within the “blind room” in question.43 43.  For a photograph of this “blind room” (L214), including the remains of the staircase, see Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 239, DF459.

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If this second story did indeed exist, it would have increased the living, storage, and work space (a conical stone basin was found in the ground-floor room east of the courtyard and is illustrated in fig. G44) available to the inhabitants of this small house from 44.4 sq m (c. 478 sq ft) to 73.5 sq m (c. 791 sq ft), with five rooms and a courtyard instead of only three rooms and a courtyard. De Luca is of the opinion that such platforms, partially shading the courtyards and leading to upper stories, may have been found in other houses too, and the upper story that may have existed in House #8, mentioned above, is partially reconstructed by him in fig. G. Only the ground-floor areas of the houses are provided in table 2. It is important to keep in mind that, if any of these houses also contained rooms on a second story, the living, storage, and work space they offered to their occupants would have been accordingly enlarged. As in House #12 on the Greek Orthodox side of the site, small-scale commercial industry in a domestic context may also be revealed inside the large House #1 in Area 2, on account of an exceptionally high concentration of ovens found in this house, including two very large ones in one of its southeastern rooms (L44) (see fig. D), along with basalt crushing mortars and an industrial flour mill of the rotating Pompeian mill/hour glass (catillus) type in its courtyard (L67), with the conical bottom part still in situ. De Luca very plausibly suggests that this might be a very good candidate for a bakery.45 Larger-scale industry is indicated by the Olive-Press Complex #8a, attached via a private entrance to House #8 (see figs. A, D, and H). This complex is in view in the foreground of the photograph of fig. B.46 It had an internal surface area of about 118.1 sq m (about 1,271 sq ft), but contained no stairs and was thus a single-story structure. The roofs of both House #8 and its attached Olive Press #8a were apparently covered with similar tiles, fragments of which were found here and there in the levels of collapse and decay. The olive-press complex also had a second entrance to it from the winding public street. It contained a large central crusher, with the grinding wheel found in situ, flanked by two presses fitted with reservoirs to collect the oil. Directly to the east of these installations, still inside the complex, was a network of at least eleven small compartments. These may have been used as storage spaces for sacks of olives and/ or perhaps also for jars of olive oil of various types of purity and/or quality.47 It is perhaps on account of the public entrance that Loffreda designates this complex a “public” one, without further explanation.48 In fact, it is much more likely that this complex, 44.  For a photograph of the conical structure, see Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 239, DF 457. 45.  De Luca, personal communication, 2015. For photographs of the two large ovens in L44, see Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 104–5; and of the other ovens found in House #1, see ibid., 113, DF 152–53, DF 155–56. 46.  For further photographs of the complex, see Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 211–17, DF 270–290a. 47. Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 25–26. The suggestion that these compartments were used to store sacks of olives is that of Loffreda. That they may also have been used for storage of the final product(s) is my own. 48. Ibid. To be fair to Loffreda—for reasons I have not been able to determine and can only attribute to the stubborn persistence of the “peasant” model of rural life in the ancient world (which I have critiqued elsewhere, in Sharon Lea Mattila, “Jesus and the ‘Middle Peasants’: Problematizing a Social-Scientific Concept,” CBQ 72 [2010]: 291–313)—he is far from being alone in asserting that agricultural installations, such as olive presses, were usually public property. To provide but one recent example, Joshua Schwartz claims that “[m]ost olive presses were

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and indeed most olive presses in ancient Palestine, were privately owned. In the case of the Capernaum complex, the private entrance into House #8 and the fact that both structures were covered with similar tiles surely strongly suggest that the owners of the house also owned the complex. This is why I have labeled the latter #8a and shaded it in the same shade of gray as its attached House #8 in fig. D. The private entrance is especially striking given the fact that when rooms attached to houses were later dedicated to shops and workshops, they were usually separated off without providing access to the private homes (see the examples #3a, 4a, 7a, and 10a in fig. D). To bring in corroborating evidence from another source, one searches in vain in the early rabbinic literature for instances where the sages envisioned olive presses—or for that matter other agricultural installations, such as wine presses or threshing floors—as communal

community property and were meant to service all local growers” (“The Material Realities of Jewish Life in the Land of Israel, c. 235–638,” in The Cambridge History of Judaism, vol. 4, The Late Roman–Rabbinic Period [ed. Steven T. Katz; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006], 431–56, esp. 444). He makes similar assertions about threshing floors and wine presses (ibid.).

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property.49 Instead, just like fields, houses, courtyards, triclinia, watchtowers, dovecotes, wine presses, and threshing floors, the sages of the Mishna and Tosefta routinely treated olive presses as private property, which could be bought, sold, inherited, and leased out, whether owned by individuals or by joint-holders, whose individual private property rights the sages were always scrupulous to guard.50 It appears from this literature that the owners of olive presses could either lease them out to local growers to use to process their produce, or purchase olives and process the olive oil themselves.51 A large olive-press complex like the one attached to House #8 at Capernaum would probably have required the owner(s) to engage in one or other of the above-mentioned practices, or perhaps both, as it is not highly likely that they themselves grew a sufficient quantity of olives properly to capitalize on the productive capacity of this press. It is also likely that laborers were hired to work there.52 In addition to the olive-press complex, smaller single-story structures that were likely shops and workshops were also either juxtaposed with or attached to Capernaum’s houses (see fig. D and table 2). These are suggested by an absence of ovens and their location along the road.53 As shown in table 2, the shops and workshops ranged in size from 10.9 sq m (117 sq ft) to 64.2 sq m (691 sq ft), with an average area of 28.8 sq m (310 sq ft). In plan, they often consisted of an entrance room flanked by a rear or side storage room, a plan that closely resembles that of most shops at Pompeii, as presented by Andrew Wallace-Hadrill.54 Shop #3a was roofed with tiles and was also adorned with a wide and somewhat pretentious doublecolumned entrance directly onto the street (see figs. A, C, and D).55 This type of wide entrance, it should be mentioned, is also found in many of the shops at Pompeii.56 49. In the present analysis, I have used as my guide Chayim Kasovsky, Thesaurus Mishnae (Tel Aviv: “Massadah,” 1967). 50.  For example, m. B. Mes i. 10:4; m. B. Bat. 1:6; 3:1; 4:1-5, 7; 10:7; m. Ned. 5:3; t. B. Mes i. 8:27; t. B. Bat. 3:1; 11:12. Indeed, the sages understood an olive press as private property to the degree that its portable parts were meticulously differentiated from its immovable parts (m. B. Bat. 4:5; cf. t. B. Bat. 3:2), as was the case with other types of private real estate, such as houses (for example, m. B. Bat. 4:3). For threshing floors patently treated as private property, see, for example, m. Šeb. 5:8; m. B. Bat. 2:8; m. H|allah 1:9; and m. Mak. 3:5; and for wine presses, see, for example, m. ’Abot 4:20; m. B. Bat. 4:8–9; t. B. Mes i. 8:27; t. B. Bat. 3:1; t. B. Bat. 11:12. 51.  For example, m. B. Bat. 10:7; m. Ned. 5:3; t. B. Mes i. 8:27. Wine presses could also be leased out (see, for example, t. B. Mes i. 8:27). 52.  See, for example, m. Toh. 2:8; 9:8, and the regulations where the owner of an olive press is required to ensure the workers’ purity in m. Toh. 10:1–3. Laborers were also apparently frequently hired to work in wine presses (see, for example, m. Ter. 3:4; m. Toh. 10:3; and m. B. Mes i. 7:4). 53.  De Luca, personal communication, 2014–2015. 54.  In “fig. D.11 House types by quartile,” see “Type 1: shop and back room (I, 6, 10),” in Andrew WallaceHadrill, Houses and Society in Pompeii and Herculaneum (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), 81. 55. Corbo, Cafarnao I, 178–81; De Luca, personal communication, 2015. 56.  Like Capernaum’s Shop #3a, according to Pedar Foss, the typical (work)shop-house in Pompeii has “a wide entrance onto the street” and has no entrance into the building to which it is attached (Pedar W. Foss, “Watchful Lares: Roman Household Organization and the Rituals of Cooking and Eating,” in Laurence and Wallace-Hadrill, Domestic Space in the Roman World, 205).

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Unused oil lamps were found in the oil lamp/pottery shop labeled “a” in fig. D, located in Area 5 beside the northeastern entrance to the synagogue’s courtyard. Recovered there also was another most interesting find—in the words of De Luca, a Greek magical pendant inscribed on the obverse with the formula αγιος/αγιος/αγιος/Ιαω/υγια [sic]” (“Holy, holy, holy, Iao [= YHWH], health”) and on the reverse reading πινω/ Y [symbol for υγιεια] (“I drink, health”). The shop labeled “h” was located inside the vestibules leading to Houses #6 and 8. It contained a raised platform, as illustrated by De Luca in fig. G. He suggests it may have been a shop for the sale of oil and may somehow have been connected to the Olive-Press Complex #8a.57 Developments in the Village over Time in Their Broader Context Overview of the Published Ceramic and Numismatic Finds Figure I is an overall conspectus of the pottery recovered from the Franciscan side, covering the period 300 bce–800 ce, generated via a detailed statistical analysis using Excel of the published data in Loffreda, Cafarnao VI.58 It is to be observed that the sample size of the data upon which fig. I is based is very large indeed, consisting of 36,065 specimens.59 Despite this very large sample size, an analysis based on these data is complicated by two important factors. The first is the fact that at many loci at the site, in particular those in the areas of the Franciscan side east of its main axis (Areas 6, 4, 3, and 3a; see fig. A), the excavators did not often dig below the Byzantine-period strata. This means that the pre-Byzantine finds are probably underrepresented in comparison to the Byzantine finds. Unfortunately, it is not possible at present precisely to ascertain to what extent this is the case. My discussion below proceeds keeping this important factor in mind. The other complicating factor is that larger vessels would leave 57.  De Luca, personal communication, 2014. For a photograph of the pendant, see Cafarnao VIII, 120, DF 863: 31. 58.  In generating this conspectus, I have consistently followed Loffreda’s dating of the various subtypes, provided throughout his report. Should future work determine with certainty that some of Loffreda’s date assignations are incorrect, my analysis of the ceramic profile of the village would of course have to be modified accordingly. For the present, I have deemed it wisest to follow the dating of one of the main excavators of the site, who is also the person most familiar with its pottery. It must also be mentioned that the sums of the individual entries for the various types and subtypes recorded in table XIII of Loffreda’s report (Cafarnao VI, 262) do not always tally precisely with the overall totals for these recorded in the same table. I have done my very best to reconcile these discrepancies by means of statistical weighting, in order to generate the most representative graphs of the published data that I am able. 59.  This number does not include the pottery outside of the date range surveyed here. When the later and earlier types are included, the total number of specimens, according to table XIII in Loffreda, Cafarnao VI, 262, is 38,327.

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behind more individual sherds than smaller ones.60 As indicated in their titles, all the Excelgenerated figures produced here represent or are based on (in the case of the proportional analysis of fig. J.1) simply the Average Annual Number of Specimens (AANS) or individual sherds, according to the counts and dates of the various types provided by Loffreda.61 There is unfortunately no simple correlation between the number of these sherds and the number 60.  As I was reminded by De Luca, personal communication, 2015. 61.  I have, however, applied some statistical weighting to Loffreda’s counts to compensate for discrepancies in the tallies, as noted above (n. 58).

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of vessels from which they derived.62 All of these caveats notwithstanding, I would submit that the attempt at a comprehensive analysis that I present here, overly simple though it may be in some regards, offers an important first step toward historical interpretations of the site of Capernaum that are grounded as much as possible in the actual data.63 62.  The AANS for lamp sherds, for instance, as indicated in fig. I, might seem at first glance to suggest that lamps were far less numerous in all periods than cooking pots and pans. But lamps were much smaller than pots and thus left behind fewer sherds per lamp. 63.  Simple though my approach has been, it has involved a very painstaking and time-consuming analysis. A more complex approach may well be devised that could compensate for the complicating factors mentioned here

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One very important general preliminary observation arising from the results of this analysis is in order. A striking feature of the overall conspectus in fig. I is the profile of the fine wares, in particular their marked variation as a percentage of the total pottery assemblage over time, which is represented in fig. J.1. As fig. J.1 shows, between 63 bce and 290 ce, luxury dining dishes constituted but a tiny proportion of the total amount of pottery in the village. Both prior to and after this approximately 350-year period, however, fine wares figured prominently and often predominantly in the ceramic profile. From 220 to 100 bce, fine-dining dishes, perhaps Eastern Terra Sigillata or some other fine ware produced along the Mediterranean coast,64 constituted from 38 percent to 57 percent of the total number of specimens of all pottery types recovered. The proportion of this fine ware began to fall off sharply after 100 bce, to be reduced to a mere trickle by 63 bce. It remained at a trickle until about 290 ce, when imported fine wares from Cyprus, Africa, and Asia Minor—usually termed African Red Slip Ware (ARS), Cypriot Red Slip Ware (CRS), and Late Roman C Ware (LRC) (which according to my chronological designation was actually Byzantine in date)—began to increase in importance. The proportion of these imported luxury dining dishes increased dramatically beginning in 450 ce and continued strong until 695 ce. See fig. J.2 for a profile of the Byzantine-period imported dining dishes, showing the proportions of ARS, CRS, and LRC types over time. The especially high proportions of these imported fine wares between 450 and 650 ce at Capernaum strongly vindicates Uzi Leibner’s use of these wares, in his recent, very important survey of eastern Galilee, as a reliable indicator for settlement at a given site during this period.65 Jodi Magness’s contention that “[l]ocal course wares, and especially cooking vessels, are far more common in most household assemblages than imported fine wares”66 holds true at Capernaum for the Roman period. But for the Byzantine period, in particular from 450 to 650 ce, it is firmly contradicted by the example of Capernaum, where the quantity of specimens of imported fine wares was almost always higher than that of the locally produced Byzantine cooking vessels, and sometimes almost twice as high (compare figs. J.2 and J.3, keeping in mind the smaller scale of J.2). Indeed, in 450–650 ce, the proportion of imported fine-ware specimens ranged from 30 percent to 74 percent, while most often averaging between 40 percent and 50 percent, of the number of specimens of all ceramic types (see fig. J.1). and provide a more refined analysis. If it remains solidly based on the published data, such a new approach would be highly desirable. 64. Loffreda classifies these wares as “possible candidates of ” Eastern Terra Sigillata (Cafarnao VI, 87; my translation of the Italian). For other possibilities as to the source of this ware, see my discussion in Mattila, “Revisiting Jesus’ Capernaum,” 91–92, which is based on observations that were personally provided to me by Andrea Berlin. 65.  Uzi Leibner, Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee (TSAJ 127; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009). 66.  Jodi Magness, “Did Galilee Experience a Settlement Crisis in the Mid-Fourth Century?” in Jewish Identities in Antiquity: Studies in Memory of Menahem Stern (ed. Lee I. Levine and Daniel R. Schwartz; TSAJ 130; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), 296–313, esp. 298.

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Lest it be retorted that what this indicates is merely Capernaum’s peculiar prosperity in 450–650 ce, it should be noted that Leibner has observed similarly high proportions of fine wares at other sites where settlement continued into this period.67 The ubiquity of these wares in Byzantine Palestine is a well-known phenomenon, and Leibner reports that they were found at every site in his survey, from which local Byzantine pottery was also collected, “including sites in hilly areas, small sites remote from major roads, and even groups of hard-to-reach cave dwellings.”68 Although Capernaum itself lies outside the region Leibner surveyed, it is not far from it, and thus the analysis of the data from the village that I offer here takes into account the important results of his survey. There is another crucial analytical and methodological conclusion that arises from the high proportions of imported fine wares in the Hellenistic and Byzantine periods, on the one hand, and their starkly contrasting low proportions throughout the intervening Roman period, on the other. This is the necessity of factoring these fine wares out of consideration when using the Capernaum pottery to assess changes in the population of the village at any given time. Clearly, the popularity of imported luxury dining dishes varied considerably over the centuries surveyed here. In contrast, the need to prepare food was surely a constant over time. Thus a far more reliable index of variations in the population of the village, I would submit, is the quantity of cooking ware. Thus, fig. J.3 provides a conspectus that singles out the AANS only of the cooking ware of Capernaum over the same time range as fig. I (300 bce–800 ce), and which still includes an impressive sample of 17,987 specimens. It is the conspectus of fig. J.3, and not the overall conspectus of fig. I, which serves as the basis of my estimation of the fluctuations in Capernaum’s population over time, presented below. In the case of cooking ware, the fact that larger vessels leave behind more individual sherds is counteracted at least to some extent by the fact that larger vessels would also prepare food for a larger number of people. Nevertheless, given the caveats mentioned above, fig. J.3 must be understood as only a rough approximation of variations in the population in the village over time, even if based on a large sample of data. With regard to the numismatic data, of the 1,473 stray finds of 225 bce–800 ce (see table 1), there is sufficient information on 1,409 of these coins to permit a detailed analysis using Excel.69 Figure K presents the results, namely, the Average Annual Coin Loss per decade of these stray finds over this date range. This figure also incorporates the calculations I have used statistically to weight and redistribute the large proportion of “fourth–fifth-century unidentifiable” Capernaum stray finds, on the basis of a detailed analysis that incorporates

67.  Uzi Leibner, “The Settlement Crisis in the Eastern Galilee during the Late Roman and Early Byzantine Periods: Response to Jodi Magness,” in Levine and Schwartz, Jewish Identities in Antiquity, 314–19, esp. 317. 68.  Uzi Leibner, “Settlement Patterns in the Eastern Galilee: Implications Regarding the Transformation of Rabbinic Culture in Late Antiquity,” in Levine and Schwartz, Jewish Identities in Antiquity, 269–95, esp. 274. 69. As indicated in table 1, the stray finds from the village include all the coins found in Callegher’s Catalogue numbers 1(1a), 1(2), 1(3), 1(4a) and 2(1) in Cafarnao IX. Excluded from my Excel analysis are the 54 undated coin fragments, blank flans, “tessere,” lead, or “axumite” coins, and the 10 coins postdating 800 ce.

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comparative data from Caesarea.70 These calculations and the data on which they are based are outlined in table 3, and the reasoning behind them is explained further below. Hellenistic Capernaum (300–63 bce) The village’s ceramic profile in the Hellenistic period stands out starkly from the period immediately succeeding it in several respects. First, the population of the village was much smaller 70.  These data derive from Jane DeRose Evans, The Joint Expedition of Caesarea Maritima Excavation Report, vol. 6, The Coins and the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Economy of Palestine (Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2006).

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Capernaum stray finds in Callegher, Cafarnao IX.

Coins dated within the range 346/48–498 ce = 1054 = 476 identified (45%) and 578 designated “4th–5th cent. unidentifiable” (55%). Masses provided for 345 identified AE3/AE4 coins dating from 346/48–425 ce (almost 79%) and for all 38 dating from 425–498 ce, but the sample size of the latter is too small to be statistically meaninful. Masses provided for 501 of the “4th–5th cent. unidentifiable” AE3/AE4 coins (almost 87%). Source #2

Caesarea stray finds in DeRose Evans, Joint Expedition VI.

Masses provided for 717 AE3/AE4 coins dating from 346/48–425 ce and for 333 AE3/AE4 coins dating from 425–498 ce, both statistically meaningful samples. To be noted are: (1) the close correlation of the mean mass of the earlier Caesarea coins with that of the earlier Capernaum coins, inspiring confidence in the commensurability of the comparative data from Caesarea; and (2) the fact that the mean mass of the later coins from Caesarea is only slightly above half that of the earlier ones, reflecting Empire-wide developments. Source

Capernaum stray finds.

Caesarea stray finds.

Identified AE3/AE4 coins of 346/48–425 ce, with masses provided. Sample Size

n = 345

n = 717

Mean Mass (g)

1.26

1.24

Identified AE3/AE4 coins of 425–498 ce, with masses provided. Sample Size

n < 39

n = 333

Mean Mass (g)

Statistically meaningless.

0.63

Determination of the approximate weighting factor for the statistical redistribution of the Capernaum “4th– 5th century unidentifiable” AE3/AE4 stray finds. Note that the low mean mass of these Capernaum coins already suggests that the majority are later in date. Sample Size

n = 501

Let x be the no. of these coins dating from 348–425 ce.

Total Mass (g)

397.77

Let y be the no. of these coins dating from 425–498 ce.

Mean Mass (g)

0.79

Then x + y = 501 and 1.26x + 0.63y = 397.77.

Solution: x = 130 and y = 371. The remaining 77 “4th–5th cent. unidentifiable” coins were redistributed according to the same proportions. In addition, the 20 “4th-century unidentifiable” and 20 “5th-century unidentifiable” AE3/AE4 coins were redistributed to 348–400 ce and 400–498 ce respectively. These redistributions are indicated fig. K.

Table 3. Comparing the mean masses of the AE3/AE4 stray finds from Capernaum with those from Caesarea, in order to determine a statistically weighted redistribution of the “4th–5th cent. unidentifiable” Capernaum stray finds for fig. K.

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than that of the period immediately after it (see fig. J.3). Despite this, the sample size of the Hellenistic ceramic finds, at 635 specimens, is still sufficiently large to inspire confidence that it is representative of the nature of this tiny population. It appears that Hellenistic Capernaum had broad economic ties to the Mediterranean coast and beyond. As already mentioned above, there was a high proportion of fine wares imported from the Mediterranean coast, especially from 220 to 100 bce (see figs. I and J.1), and also a high proportion of amphorae, indicating the importation of foodstuffs, in particular wine. Indeed, from 167 to 100 bce, about 42 percent of these were wine amphorae imported all the way from Rhodes, and from 100 to 63 bce, about 30 percent were the same (see fig. I).71 These economic ties are corroborated also by the coins. Six Seleucid coins from Seleucia, Ptolemais, Apamea, and Tyre, dating from 223 to 143 bce, were found in the vicinity of the synagogue, in Area 1, and in Area 2.72 Late Hellenistic and Early Roman Capernaum (63 bce–135 ce) With the consolidation of Hasmonean rule in the Galilee, radical demographic changes occurred in the village. There was a sudden, perhaps over twenty-five-fold increase in the population (see fig. J.3). This cannot be attributed to natural growth alone, and all indicators point to the newcomers having been predominantly Jews. These include the following (see fig. I): (1) the cooking ware was now overwhelmingly of the Kefar Hananya type, produced at this village and also at Kefar Shikhin, Yodefat, and probably other Galilean villages;73 (2) there was a cessation of imports from Rhodes; (3) imported coastal fine wares plummeted to a mere trickle; (4) ritually pure stone vessels appeared (some 264 specimens were found);74 and (5) although the sample size is small, of the 15 identified stray finds dating from the Hasmonean conquest of 103 bce to the eve of the destruction of the temple in 70 ce, one is a Tyrian shekel, the standard silver coinage used by Jews in this period; ten are Jewish coins minted in Jerusalem, including two of the Jewish Revolt; three are coins of Agrippa II from Sepphoris and Caesarea Paneas; and only one is a civic issue from Sidon.75 As I have argued in some detail elsewhere and as is also reflected in the Capernaum data, Jews in Palestine in the Hasmonean and Early Roman periods preferred to trade with fellow Jews, and market exchange was thus more introverted than in earlier and later periods, and centered on Jerusalem.76

825.

71.  For photographs of Rhodian stamped handles recovered at the site, see Loffreda, Cafarnao VIII, 57, DF

72.  As usual, this information on the coins is derived from Callegher, Cafarnao IX. 73.  David Adan-Bayewitz, Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Study of Local Trade (Bar-Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture; Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993), updated by Mordechai Aviam, “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First-Century Galilee and Its Origins: A Comprehensive Archaeological Synthesis,” in Fiensy and Hawkins, Galilean Economy, 5–48, esp. 27–28, and by a personal communication from De Luca, 2015. 74.  As recorded in Loffreda, Cafarnao VI, 155, 262. 75.  These numbers are derived from my analysis of the data in Callegher, Cafarnao IX. 76.  See Mattila, “Revisiting Jesus’ Capernaum,” 96–109; and Mattila, “Inner Village Life in Galilee: A

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Given that most of the houses of this time were later sacrificed to the monumental public structures, it is very difficult to determine the precise delineation of the earlier private structures.77 In Area 2, where no subsequent public building activity took place, as shown in fig. C, it appears that in the Early Roman period House #1 contained a very large courtyard of 97 sq m (about 1,044 sq ft), which was only later subdivided.78 The fine set of glassware found in this house dates to the late first–second centuries ce (see fig. C for a photograph).79 Also dating to the first–second centuries is the fine mausoleum of high-grade architecture found 600 ft (c. 200 m) to the north of the inhabited area. It contained eight long narrow shafts carved into the rock and five limestone sarcophagi.80 The kokhim niches are in line with the traditional burial practices of Jews at this time, also reflecting the Jewish nature of the settlement in this period. After the destruction of the temple in 70 ce, as fig. J.3 suggests, there was another significant increase in the population of the village, perhaps because of an influx of dislocated Judeans. The numismatic profile of the stray finds reflects the sudden shift in political control in the wake of the suppression of the revolt. None of the stray finds dating from 70–135 ce are from Jerusalem. Instead they are bronze civic issues from Tyre, or coins of Agrippa II from Caesarea Paneas, or of the emperors Domitian, Hadrian, and Trajan from Caesarea Maritima and Tiberias, including one of Hadrian from Gaza.81 Middle and Late Roman Capernaum (135–312 ce) As fig J.3 suggests, there was an interesting decrease in the population of the village right around the time of the Bar Kokhba revolt of 135 ce. Then, some sixty-five years later, from 200 to 270 ce, the village’s population reached one of its highest levels ever over the date range considered here. The AANS of cooking ware recovered from this period stands at almost 90 percent of the peak quantity recovered from Byzantine times (see fig. J.3). Indeed, given the fact that the pre-Byzantine finds are underrepresented in comparison to Byzantine finds, it is Diverse and Complex Phenomenon,” in Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods, vol. 1, Life, Culture, and Society (ed. David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2014), 312–45, esp. 327–33. 77.  As Corbo himself admits, with regard to Area 1 (The House of St. Peter at Capharnaum [trans. Sylvester Saller; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1969], 39). For a recent attempt to reconstruct the Late Hellenistic– Early Roman house(s) of Area 1, see De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche,” 51. 78.  For a more detailed discussion of this, see Mattila, “Revisiting Jesus’ Capernaum,” 114–24. It is to be noted that in this earlier discussion the Northeastern House of Area 2 (#2 in fig. D and table 2 here) is lacking a room that was brought to my attention by De Luca, and whose plan has been accordingly corrected here. In addition, what I thought was a window in this house was actually a doorway, and so there was no shop attached to this house. 79.  This is the date proposed, based on the pottery recovered from the same context, by Elisabetta Roffia, Vetri antichi dall’Oriente: La collezione personeni e i piatti di Cafarnao. Palazzo Sertoli, Galleria del credito valtellinese, Sondrio: 1 dicembre–5 gennaio 2001 (Milan: SIAE, 2000). 80.  This description is from De Luca, “Capernaum,” 173. Photographs of this mausoleum can be found in Loffreda, Cafarnao V, 187–90. 81.  These observations are based on the data cataloged in Callegher, Cafarnao IX.

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even possible that it was during this period in the third century in particular that the village reached its highest population, which De Luca has tentatively estimated at about 1,500 to 2,000 persons.82 After 270 ce, it then experienced a substantial drop, falling to under 60 percent of its earlier peak by the beginning of the fourth century. In sum, throughout the Roman period at least, the Capernaum ceramic data converge quite closely with those of Leibner’s survey, which indicates that the population of eastern Galilee grew steadily from the Hasmonean conquest to the Middle Roman period, reaching a peak in the mid-third century ce, but then began to decline afterward.83 Also in line with data recovered elsewhere in Palestine are the Capernaum coins, which from 135 to 253 ce reveal that throughout this period the village engaged not only predominantly in local trade, as in the period prior to the revolt, but also now in substantial trade with the neighboring pagan regions. As was the case throughout the provinces of the eastern Roman Empire during these centuries, where small change derived from a complex network of civic mints that dominated the production of everyday currency,84 the Capernaum coins likewise came from a large variety of city mints, either the local city mints of the Galilee, Samaria, and Judea (including Jerusalem, now Aelia Capitolina), or the mints of cities in the neighboring regions of Phoenicia, Syria, Trachonitis, the Decapolis, and Arabia.85 A Roman milestone with a Latin inscription dedicated to the emperor Hadrian (117–138 ce) was discovered about 1,600 ft (c. 500 m) northeast of the village center and serves as a reminder that Capernaum was flanked by a major imperial road running from Damascus to Egypt along the Jordan River and the western coast of the Sea of Galilee.86 Nevertheless, only two coins arrived in the village from as far away as the regions of Caria and Cappadocia in Asia Minor, and only three from Rome,87 in line with the fact that bronze coins from the mint of Rome did not form a significant part of the small change of the eastern provinces during the first two and half centu82.  De Luca, “Capernaum,” 169. 83. Leibner, Settlement and History, passim. 84.  For a survey of these civic mints, see Kenneth W. Harl, Coinage in the Roman Economy, 300 B.C. to A.D. 700 (Ancient Society and History; Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996), 106–17. 85.  Specifically, these included the Galilean mints of Tiberias and Sepphoris; the mints of Caesarea Maritima, Scythopolis-Beth Shean, and Neapolis in Samaria; the Judean mints of Aelia Capitolina, Gaza, and Raphia; the mint of Caesarea Paneas in Trachonitis; that of Gadara in the Decapolis; the Phoenician mints of Tyre, Sidon, Dor, Tripolis, and Orthosia; the mints of Damascus and Lucas in Syria; and those of Bostra and Philoppopolis in Arabia (data from Callegher, Cafarnao IX). 86.  For a photograph of this milestone, see Loffreda, Recovering Capharnaum, 20, or Cafarnao V, 192, DF 324b. A study of Roman milestones in ancient Palestine, edited by Ch. Ben David, Uzi Leibner, and Israel Roll, is presently in preparation. The milestone may well indicate, as De Luca suggests, not the construction of a new road but rather the improvement of an already existing one, meaning that Capernaum may well have been linked into this trade route even before the time of Hadrian (De Luca, “Capernaum,” 173). 87.  One of these is a coin of Trajan (98–117 ce) from Caesarea in Cappadocia, and the other a coin of Valerian (253–260 ce) from Bargasa in Caria (data from Callegher, Cafarnao IX). The third coin from Rome is not found in Callegher, Cafarnao IX, but is recorded in Callegher, “Cafarnao IX. Addenda” (2007). It is a coin of Trajan (98–117 ce).

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ries ce.88 As Kevin Butcher observes, the civic coins of the East in this period appear to be the products of autonomous city authorities, and it is uncertain to what extent imperial permission or sanction was required. Furthermore, the civic coins display a bewildering variety of types, weights, and sizes and had more restricted circulation patterns than later coins (see below). There does not appear to have been any attempt in this period on the part of the Roman state to impose universal standards on them.89 The watershed in the coinage of the Roman Empire marked by the reigns of Valerian (253–259 ce) and Gallienus (253–259 ce) is also clearly reflected in the numismatic record of Capernaum—not only in the stray finds but also in the two third-century hoards found in Areas 11 and 5 (see table 1). The civic bronze coinages now began very rapidly to decline and in short order ceased altogether. The production of silver tetradrachms likewise plummeted. Both bronze and silver denominations were now replaced by a single, uniform, empire-wide denomination, the radiate (often called the “antoninianus”), a silver-coated bronze coin that was now minted in huge quantities.90 Reflecting these developments, the large majority of the third-century hoard of 1,563 coins found in a jar in Area 11 of Capernaum consists of radiates dating from 251 to 270 ce (1,291 coins, or 83 percent of the hoard), with only a single bronze coin, and not one of the hoard’s 217 tetradrachms postdates 253 ce. The smaller hoard of Area 5 similarly includes only one tetradrachm of 249–251 ce, with the remaining 35 coins being radiates of 249–268 ce. The stray finds of these years exhibit a similar profile.91 This new uniform coinage, which brought about the demise of the civic mints, Butcher suggests may have been imposed by the imperial authorities upon most of the eastern regions of the empire. Ironically, it appears that “the replacement of the old civic currency systems with a wider, more universal currency” fueled the rampant, empire-wide inflation that characterized the 260s and especially the 270s ce.92 The resulting economic hardships probably contributed to the significant drop in Capernaum’s population after 270 ce, and probably also played a role in the concomitant demographic decline that occurred in the nearby part of eastern Galilee surveyed by Leibner. The consequences of this sudden and severe inflation are also reflected in the currency of the subsequent Byzantine period, discussed below.

88.  Kevin Butcher, Coinage in Roman Syria: Northern Syria, 64 BC–AD 253 (London: Royal Numismatic Society, 2004), esp. 15. 89.  Ibid., 240–42. 90.  Ibid., 258–63. 91.  All of these calculations are based, as usual, on the data in Callegher, Cafarnao IX. 92. Butcher, Coinage in Roman Syria, 262. Butcher reasons that “[w]hen the cities had regulated their coinage by creating localised currency systems, they had greater control over the values of their coins, and inflation was easier to keep in check; but the integration of the east into a more universal currency system after 250 made control at a local level much more difficult” (ibid.).

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During the first half of the fourth century, Capernaum continued to experience the demographic decline that characterized the rest of the Galilee. Between 350 and 400 ce, however, the fate of Capernaum patently diverged from that of the rest of eastern Galilee, for Leibner’s survey indicates that the late fourth century was the most pronounced period of demographic decline.93 This was surely in part due to the catastrophic earthquake of 363 ce, whose effects have left behind marked evidence in the archaeological record of such sites as Korazin, Hamam, Magdala, Sepphoris, and so on, and indeed also of Capernaum, where, for instance, evidence of collapse in Houses #8 and #5 was found.94 Despite this, in contrast to most of the rest of the region, Capernaum appears to have enjoyed a substantial recovery precisely in the second half of the fourth century ce, for this is when the AANS of cooking ware recovered from the village reaches its peak (see fig. J.3). Even taking into account the fact that the Byzantine pottery is overrepresented in the village in comparison to that of earlier periods, it is clear that 350–400 ce was a time of demographic recovery in Capernaum. Indeed, the Capernaum data show evidence of refurbishment at this time. For instance, the central pillars of House #8 were reinforced.95 The enormous magnitude of the corresponding peak in the numismatic profile of stray finds in 350–400 ce (see fig. K), however, at first glance would seem patently quite out of proportion with the village’s surge in population during this same period (see fig. J.3). While the village’s population had grown from the end of its crisis period in the first half of the fourth century, it was not much larger—and indeed, perhaps even a bit smaller, given the fact that Byzantine pottery is overrepresented in comparison with that of the Roman period—than its earlier peak population in 200–270 ce. In striking contrast, the Average Annual Coin Loss in 348–400 ce, while varying from decade to decade, further averaged out over this approximately fifty-two-year period at over 12.5 times that of the earlier peak of 200–270 ce (see fig. K)! In fact, however, this is precisely what one would expect, given that prices had increased roughly tenfold over those prior to the 260s–270s ce in the empire at large.96 This inflationary spiral had given rise to important currency reforms that led to a radical increase in small 93. Leibner, Settlement and History, passim. 94.  De Luca, personal communication, 2015. 95.  De Luca, personal communication, 2015. 96.  Dominic Rathbone has argued, against the notion that the entire third century was marked by rampant inflation, that prices actually remained quite stable until 274/275, when they very suddenly jumped tenfold, and afterward stabilized rapidly at around this level (“Monetisation, Not Price-Inflation, in Third-Century A.D. Egypt?” in Coin Finds and Coin Use in the Roman World: The Thirteenth Oxford Symposium on Coinage and Monetary History, 25–27.3.1993. A Nato Advanced Research Workshop [ed. Cathy E. King and David G. Wigg; Studien zu Fundmünzen der Antike 10; Berlin: Gebr. Mann, 1993], 321–39). A sudden, roughly tenfold decrease in the value of individual coins, which continued into the fourth and fifth centuries, fits in well with the Capernaum numismatic data discussed here.

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change, not only at Capernaum but also throughout the region of Palestine (and indeed the eastern empire).97 First, Diocletian (284–305 ce) created a single, empire-wide currency and a network of imperial mints that produced huge quantities of silver-clad bronze nummi. These Constantine and his successors continued to debase, both in silver content and in weight, so that after 348 ce, they had become so tiny that numismatists classify them as AE3 or AE4 types, the latter having had an average diameter smaller than that of a modern dime, with some having been considerably smaller. By this time, the value of individual nummi had degenerated to the point that large numbers were required even for modest purchases and thus nummi were sealed up in leather purses, called folles, with their value marked to facilitate market exchanges.98 These nummi minimi, dating from 312-498 ce (the latter being the date of Anastatius’s reform, on which see below), constitute by far the largest number of coins that were found at the Capernaum site, representing not only over 83 percent of all the identified stray finds recorded in Callegher, Cafarnao IX, over the entire date range of 223 bce to the fourteenth/ sixteenth century ce, but also over 99 percent of the thus far identified coins recovered from Trench 12 under the synagogue, mentioned above, and also the overwhelming majority of those found in Trench 14 (see table 1).99 Thus both the numismatic and the ceramic records point clearly to the unusual recovery of Capernaum in the second half of the fourth century, which was no doubt on account of the village’s sanctity as a Christian pilgrimage center. Indeed, Capernaum’s numismatic profile reflects its importance to Constantine and his successors, starting quite early on. From 312 to 450 ce, among the stray finds whose mints could be identified, a full half had come all the way from Constantinople and the imperial mints associated with it (i.e., Cyzicus, Nicomedia, and other eastern mints) versus only 24 percent from the much closer imperial mint of Antioch. The dominance of these eastern mints was even more pronounced among the examined coins of Trench 12—67 percent of those whose mints could be identified.100 In addition, as Callegher has suggested, the arrival in the village of such large numbers of these coins from such a distance may reflect the possibility that all of Palestine at this time had become a territory of legions during the prolonged wars of Constantine and his successors.101 Nevertheless, less important economic ties were also maintained with Egypt (9 percent of the stray finds whose mints could be identified had come from Alexandria) and the western part of the empire (17 97.  For this widespread phenomenon, see especially Haim Gitler and David Weisburd, “Coin Finds from Villages in Palestine during the Late Roman and Byzantine Period (A.D. 383–696/7): A Quantitative Examination of Monetary Distributions,” in Les villages dans l’empire byzantin, IVe–XVe siècle (ed. Jacques Lefort, Cécile Morrisson, and Jean-Pierre Sodini; Réalités byzantines 11; Paris: Lethielleux, 2005), 539–52. 98.  A very helpful survey of all these developments is provided in Harl, Coinage in the Roman Economy, 125–80. 99.  All these calculations are based on Callegher, Cafarnao IX (although I do not include the fifty-four undated fragments, blank flans, “tessere,” lead, or “axumite” coins), and Arlsan, “Il deposito monetale.” 100.  All these figures derive from my Excel analysis of the data in Callegher, Cafarnao IX, and Arslan, “Il deposito monetale.” 101.  Cafarnao IX, 40.

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percent had arrived from Rome and other western imperial mints, including a coin all the way from London).102 After 450 ce, with the fall of the western part of the empire, Constantinople and the other eastern mints now began to supply the vast majority of the coins arriving in the village. By this time, the population of the village had dropped substantially, to roughly 63 percent of its 350–400 ce peak, although this reduced population remained quite stable until 650 ce (see fig. J.3). This smaller but stable population had now become predominantly Christian. Cross-stamped fragments, mostly of LRC ware, have been found in virtually every part of the Franciscan side of the village, with the important exception of the synagogue.103 In striking contrast, only one cross-stamped imported fine ware sherd was recovered from the Upper Galilean village of Meiron, where a synagogue was unearthed.104 Nevertheless, the presence of a synagogue in Capernaum as well at this time and finds such as the magical pendant devoted to YHWH mentioned above show that there remained in the village a Jewish minority. Capernaum was exceptional in this regard, as usually there was “clear religious segregation between Christian and Jewish villages.”105 It has been suggested by Anders Runesson that the use of earlier spolia in the synagogue’s construction, which would have caused it to stand out architecturally from the Byzantine art found in the octagonal Christian shrine, “was probably meant to reinforce Jewish identity as ancient, over against that of the non-Jewish Christian colonizers,” providing “value added prestige to the Jews.” He also suggests, given that the Jewish minority of this time appears to have been quite small in the village, that they had received external Jewish support for the synagogue’s construction from the rabbis and the house of the patriarch.106 Could it be that the influx of Christians into Capernaum, while on the one hand augmenting its population, on the other hand ultimately reduced it overall by inducing the emigration of a substantial portion of its Jews elsewhere? The newly arrived Christians may well have come from far afield and wished to maintain their economic ties with their regions of origin. This may help to explain why it was during this period in particular that substantial trade with distant regions was taking place, which had been of negligible significance before,

102.  These figures derive from my Excel analysis of the data in Callegher, Cafarnao IX. 103.  For a plan indicating the locations of these cross-stamped wares, see Loffreda, Cafarnao VI, “Pianta II” (page unnumbered at the back of Cafarnao VI). The vast majority of the many cross-stamped fragments found in the village belong to the LRC type, with only very few found among the CRS and ARS types (ibid., 110). Whereas prior to 450 ce, the LRC-type fine ware was in the minority among the imported dining dishes, large quantities specifically of this type began to be purchased by the villagers beginning in 450 ce and continuing strong until about 650 ce (see fig. J.2). 104.  Dennis Groh, “The Finewares from the Patrician and Lintel Houses,” in Excavations at Ancient Meiron, Upper Galilee, Israel 1971–72, 1974–75, 1977 (ed. Eric M. Meyers, James F. Strange, and Carol L. Meyers; Meiron Excavation Project 3; Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1981), 129–38, esp. 136, 138. 105. Leibner, Settlement and History, 371 n. 79. 106.  Runesson, “Architecture, Conflict, and Identity Formation,” 253.

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not only in the case of Capernaum but also elsewhere in the Galilee, and indeed throughout Palestine.107 In Byzantine times, it appears that the village of Capernaum was producing olive oil on a relatively large scale, probably mostly for export. As mentioned above, in addition to the olivepress complex attached to House #8, another olive press, also Byzantine in date and similar in structure, was found in Area 11, and the oil press found in Area 1 may also date to this period (for these, see fig. A).108 This correlates with what was happening in the region more generally. As Leibner has shown, extensive olive oil production began only in the fourth century ce. He has observed the frequent connection between monumental synagogues and olive presses in this period,109 and Capernaum confirms this. Indeed, in the case of Capernaum, mass olive-oil production was also associated with the construction of an elaborate Christian shrine. It was especially after 450 ce that the villagers were also importing very large quantities of fine dining ware from Africa, Cyprus, and Asia Minor, much of it stamped with crosses (see fig. J.2). As the numismatic record discussed above also attests, their economic ties were with far more distant regions than in Roman times and seem to have been especially strong with Constantinople, Nicomedia, Cyzicus, Antioch, and other major eastern centers, although prior to the fall of the western empire, significant trade also took place with the West and with Egypt. Given all the above-mentioned factors, the drop in Capernaum’s population in the fifth century would scarcely account for an almost complete cessation of new nummi minimi arriving in the village during this century,110 which is the misleading impression that would result from leaving out of consideration the large proportion of the Capernaum coins classified as “4th–5th century unidentifiable.” All of these coins are AE3/AE4 types, which first began to be minted roughly in 348 ce, and therefore can be assigned more precisely to 348–498 ce. As 107.  See, for example, Leibner, Settlement and History, 351–89; and Sean A. Kingsley, “The Economic Impact of the Palestinian Wine Trade in Late Antiquity,” in Economy and Exchange in the East Mediterranean During Late Antiquity, ed. Sean Kingsley and Michael Decker (Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2001), 44–68. 108.  De Luca, personal communication, 2014. 109.  Leibner observes that “remains of oil presses were found at 12 of the 13 monumental synagogue sites and were almost totally absent from sites lacking monumental synagogues” (Settlement and History, 404). 110.  This is in fact Arslan’s conclusion (“L812 Trench Deposit,” 152–53), on account of the discrepancy between the coins of Trench 12 and the stray finds of the village during the reigns of Marcian, Leo I, and Zeno (450–491 ce). Whereas only nine nummi of Marcian and Leo, and none of Zeno, were identified among the stray finds, a goodly number (n = 228) of the nummi from Trench 12 dating to the reigns of Marcian and Leo I were identified, along with three nummi of Zeno. For the reasons I present here, I must maintain that taking this discrepancy at face value is misleading. The apparent discrepancy is readily explained by the fact that the fifthcentury nummi of the Trench 12 deposit were withdrawn from circulation comparatively sooner after they had arrived in the village, and so are easier to identify, whereas the fifth-century nummi among the stray finds continued to circulate and as a consequence by the time they were lost had become considerably more worn. My proposed explanation is corroborated by the mean mass of the 183 coins dating from 425 to 498 ce from Trench 12, whose masses Arslan provides in “Il deposito monetale” (he unfortunately does not provide the masses of all the coins in his catalogue). This mean mass is 0.95 g, considerably higher than the mean mass of the 333 stray finds dating over the same date range from Caesarea, which is 0.63 g (see table 3).

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table 3 shows, the proportion of these “4th–5th century unidentifiable” coins (c. 55 percent) exceeds that of the identified coins (c. 45 percent) over this period.111 It is the increasing tininess and poor quality of the fifth-century coins that accounts for the fact that most of them cannot be identified.112 I have therefore weighted and redistributed the unidentifiable coins by bringing in for comparison the numismatic data from Caesarea, where far more fifth-century coins have been identified, and the resulting calculations are summarized in table 3. As this table shows, the average mass of the Caesarea stray finds dating from 425 to 498 ce (0.63 g) is not much more than half that of those dating from 346/348 to 425 ce (1.24 g), fully reflecting the empire-wide developments outlined above. The resulting redistribution for Capernaum has been incorporated into fig. K and results in a much closer correlation between the numismatic profile of 348–498 ce with the varying population of the village as evident in the ceramic profile. Instead of dropping down to virtually nothing, the Average Annual Coin Loss in the village from 450 to 498 ce now stands at 68 percent that of 350–400 ce, much more closely reflecting the corresponding drop in the village’s population down to roughly 63 percent of its peak (compare figs. K and J.3). Finally, one must explain the precipitous, about twenty-three-fold drop in the Average Annual Coin Loss at Capernaum dating precisely to Anastatius’s reform in 498 ce (see fig. K), despite the fact that there was virtually no corresponding drop in the village’s population at this date, which remained stable until 650 ce (see fig. J.3). The explanation surely lies in the reform itself.113 Anastatius had introduced the much larger follis, valued at 40 nummi and named after the purses in which the multitudes of tiny single-nummus coins had earlier been enclosed. There were also smaller denominations introduced in the sixth century, valued at 20 and 12 nummi, and these all appear among the Capernaum coins. Indeed, the total value of the 33 Byzantine bronze coins of 498–656 ce recovered at the village is 1,095 nummi, exceeding that of the 1,094 AE3/AE4-type stray nummi of 348–498 ce.114 Also worthy of mention is the 111.  In addition, of the 53 identifiable coins predating the Arab period recorded in Callegher, “Cafarnao IX. Addenda” (2007), over half (29, or more likely 31 or more, given that 2 of the specimens actually consisted of more than one coin that had been glued together by oxidation) were classified as “4th–5th century unidentifiable” or “5th-century unidentifiable,” only reinforcing my present observations concerning the high proportion of coins in this category. 112.  On this issue in general, see DeRose Evans, Joint Expedition VI, 44–45; and Gabrielle Bijovsky, “The Currency of the Fifth Century ce in Palestine: Some Reflections in Light of the Numismatic Evidence,” Israel Numismatic Journal 14 (2000–2002): 196–210. Gitler and Weisburd also concede that their analysis leaves out of consideration “the massive numbers of unidentifiable coins that are common in finds of this period” (“Coin Finds,” 549). 113.  On this reform, see Harl, Coinage in the Roman Economy, 192–93. 114.  These calculations are based on the data from Callegher, Cafarnao IX. Single-unit denominations did continue to be minted, and a good number of these have been recovered at Caesarea (see DeRose Evans, Joint Expedition VI), but these were now so tiny that without careful sieving they are unrecoverable. This is probably the reason why only one such tiny coin of this period is recorded in Callegher, Cafarnao IX. Also arriving at the village between 638 and 690 ce were some Arab-Byzantine transition coins minted at Damascas, Tiberias, and Beth Shean. After this the coins were all Arab (data from ibid.).

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small but high-value seventh-century hoard of five gold solidi and two trimessi (616–668 ce) (see table 1) hidden between the stones of the benches of the synagogue found in Trench 17 (shaded in light gray in fig. D). The longer-distance trade, popularity of fine dining wares, and the presence of the two monumental buildings that characterized late Byzantine Capernaum have led some scholars to the conclusion that its inhabitants enjoyed a level of prosperity that they had previously not known.115 Leibner’s survey has shown, however, that the population of the Galilee had declined considerably by the time most of the monumental synagogues were built.116 The population of Capernaum likewise, despite an initial boom in the late fourth century, had, by 450 ce, fallen to only roughly 63 percent of this peak. Leibner adroitly warns us against the misleading impression that the monumental synagogues and churches of fifth- to sixth-century Palestine can produce.117 He points out that the synagogues of earlier periods seem to have been mostly non-monumental in character, and that they became monumental in the Byzantine period mainly on account of the “extensive construction of churches in Palestine, particularly from the 5th century onward” leading to a “confrontation with Christianity,” resulting in a “struggle of monuments,”118 a struggle that may well be sharply reflected in the two fine Jewish and Christian monuments that stood in such close proximity along the main axis of late Byzantine Capernaum. In sum, shifts in trade patterns and the erection of monumental public buildings are, in themselves and isolated from other data, insufficient indicators of the comparative prosperity of a settlement in any given period. There is no reason to suppose that the Christian inhabitants of Byzantine Capernaum were on average more well-to-do than their predecessors at the time of the village’s earlier peak population of 200–270 ce or, for that matter, the Jewish villagers of the first and second centuries, who left behind the fine mausoleum and set of glass ware recovered in a house whose Early Roman courtyard was probably over 2.5 times the size of the ground floor of one of the smaller Byzantine-period houses; or even the small Hellenistic population of the village that imported wine all the way from Rhodes and a large proportion of fine ware from the Mediterranean coast. Addendum: After this article was already in press, I came across a reference in a very recent work by Danny Syon (Small Change in Hellenistic-Roman Galilee: The Evidence from Numismatic Site Finds as a Tool for Historical Reconstruction [Jerusalem: Israel Numismatic Society, 2015] 58) to a Seleucid-era Capernaum silver-coin hoard of “70 tetradrachms and 8 didrachms,” all minted at Tyre. This hoard does not appear in Callegher’s 2007 catalogue and indeed, none of the Franciscan excavators mentions it in any published work of which I am aware. The record of this hoard is in Margaret Thompson, Otto Mørkholm, and Colin M. Kraay, eds., An Inventory of Greek Coin Hoards (New York: The American Numismatic Society, 1973) 221, no. 1602. There, Capernaum is indeed listed as its source, the date 115.  For example, John Dominic Crossan and Jonathan L. Reed, Excavating Jesus: Beneath the Stones, Behind the Texts (New York: HarperCollins, 2001), 85–97. 116. Leibner, Settlement and History, passim. 117.  Ibid., 399–404. 118.  Ibid., 403.

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of its discovery given as 1957 (i.e., at a time when no serious excavation activity was taking place at the site), and its “disposition” described as “dispersed” (ibid.). The coins are ascribed as follows (ibid.): “Demetrius II, 1st reign [i.e., 146–139 bce]: 1 tetradr.”; “Antiochus VII [i.e., 139–126 bce]: 25 tetradr.; 5 didr.”; and “Demetrius II, 2nd reign [i.e., 129–126 bce]: 44 tetradr.; 3 didr.”—that is, they display the typical features of what Syon would call an “emergency hoard” (Small Change, 37), with the coins minted closer to the time of burial (c. 125 bce) being predominant.

Bibliography Adan-Bayewitz, David. Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Study of Local Trade. Bar-Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture. Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993. Arslan, Ermanno A. “Il deposito monetale della Trincea XII nel cortile della sinagoga di Cafarnao.” SBFLA 47 (1997): 245–328. ———. “The L812 Trench Deposit inside the Synagogue and the Isolated Finds of Coins in Capernaum, Israel: A Comparison of the Two Groups.” Israel Numismatic Research 6 (2011): 146–62. Aviam, Mordechai. “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First-Century Galilee and Its Origins: A Comprehensive Archaeological Synthesis.” In The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus, edited by David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins, 5–48. Early Christianity and Its Literature 11. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013. Bijovsky, Gabrielle. “The Currency of the Fifth Century ce in Palestine: Some Reflections in Light of the Numismatic Evidence.” Israel Numismatic Journal 14 (2000–2002): 196– 210. Bloedhorn, Hanswulf. “The Capitals of the Synagogue of Capernaum: Their Chronological and Stylistic Classification with Regard to the Development of Capitals in the Decapolis and in Palestine.” In Ancient Synagogues in Israel, Third–Seventh Century C.E.: Proceedings of Symposium, University of Haifa, May 1987, edited by Rachel Hachlili, 49–54. BAR International Series 499. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989. ———. Die Kapitelle der Synagoge von Kapernaum: Ihre zeitliche und stilistische Einordnung im Rahmen der Kapitellentwicklung in der Dekapolis und in Palaestina. ADPV 11. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1988. Butcher, Kevin. Coinage in Roman Syria: Northern Syria, 64 bc–ad 253. London: Royal Numismatic Society, 2004. Callegher, Bruno. “Cafarnao IX. Addenda: Coins from the 2011 Surface Survey.” SBFLA 62 (2012): 367–69. ———. “Cafarnao IX. Addenda: Monete dalle ricognizioni di superficie (2004–2007).” SBFLA 57 (2007): 493–502. ———. “Cafarnao IX. Addenda: Monete dalle ricognizioni di superficie 2007–2009.” SBFLA 60 (2010): 393–94.

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———. Cafarnao IX. Monete dall’area urbana di Cafarnao (1968–2003). Jerusalem: Terra Santa, 2007. Corbo, Virgilio. Cafarnao I: Gli edifici della città. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1975. ———. The House of St. Peter at Capharnaum. Translated by Sylvester Saller. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1969. Crossan, John Dominic, and Jonathan L. Reed. Excavating Jesus: Beneath the Stones, Behind the Texts. New York: HarperCollins, 2001. De Luca, Stefano. “Capernaum.” In The Oxford Encylopedia of the Bible and Archaeology, edited by Daniel M. Master, 1:168–80. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. ———. “Scoperte archeologiche recenti attorno al Lago di Galilea: Contributo allo studio dell’ambiente del Nuovo Testamento e del Gesù storico.” In Terra Sancta: Archeologia ed esegesi. Atti dei convegni 2008–2010, ISCAB Serie Archeologica 1, edited by G. Paximadi and M. Fidanzio, 13–111. Lugano: Eupress-FLT, 2013. De Luca, Stefano, and Anna Lena. “The Harbour of the City of Magdala/Taricheae on the Shores of the Sea of Galilee, from the Hellenistic to the Byzantine Times: New Discoveries and Preliminary Results.” In Harbours and Harbour Cities in the Eastern Mediterranean from Antiquity to Byzantium: Recent Discoveries and New Approaches, edited by S. Ladstätter, F. Pirson, and T. Schmidts. Instanbul, forthcoming. Evans, Jane DeRose. The Joint Expedition of Caesarea Maritima Excavation Report. Vol. 6, The Coins and the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Economy of Palestine. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2006. Foss, Pedar W. “Watchful Lares: Roman Household Organization and the Rituals of Cooking and Eating.” In Domestic Space in the Roman World: Pompeii and Beyond, edited by Ray Laurence and Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, 197–218. Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 1997. Gitler, Haim, and David Weisburd. “Coin Finds from Villages in Palestine during the Late Roman and Byzantine Periods (A.D. 383–696/7): A Quantitative Examination of Monetary Distributions.” In Les villages dans l’empire byzantin (IVe–XVe Siècle), edited by Jacques Lefort, Cécile Morrisson, and Jean-Pierre Sodini, 539–52. Réalités byzantines 11. Paris: Lethielleux, 2005. Groh, Dennis. “The Finewares from the Patrician and Lintel Houses.” In Excavations at Ancient Meiron, Upper Galilee, Israel 1971–72, 1974–75, 1977, edited by Eric M. Meyers, James F. Strange, and Carol L. Meyers, 129–38. Meiron Excavation Project 3. Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1981. Hachlili, Rachel. Ancient Synagogues—Archaeology and Art: New Discoveries and Current Research. Handbook of Oriental Studies, Section 1, Ancient Near East 105. Leiden: Brill, 2013. Harl, Kenneth W. Coinage in the Roman Economy, 300 B.C. to A.D. 700. Ancient Society and History. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996. Kasovsky, Chayim. Thesaurus Mishnae. Tel Aviv: “Massadah,” 1967.

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Kingsley, Sean A. “The Economic Impact of the Palestinian Wine Trade in Late Antiquity.” In Economy and Exchange in the East Mediterranean during Late Antiquity, edited by Sean Kingsley and Michael Decker, 44–68. Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2001. Laughlin, John C. H. “Capernaum: From Jesus’ Time and After.” BAR 19 (1993): 55–61, 90. Leibner, Uzi. Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee. TSAJ 127. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. ———. “The Settlement Crisis in the Eastern Galilee during the Late Roman and Early Byzantine Periods: Response to Jodi Magness.” In Jewish Identities in Antiquity: Studies in Memory of Menahem Stern, edited by Lee I. Levine and Daniel R. Schwartz, 314–19. TSAJ 130. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. ———. “Settlement Patterns in the Eastern Galilee: Implications Regarding the Transformation of Rabbinic Culture in Late Antiquity.” In Jewish Identities in Antiquity: Studies in Memory of Menahem Stern, edited by Lee I. Levine and Daniel R. Schwartz, 269–95. TSAJ 130. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Loffreda, Stanislao. Cafarnao II: La Ceramica. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1974. ———. Cafarnao V: Documentazione fotografica degli scavi (1968–2003). Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 2005. ———. Cafarnao VI: Tipologie e contesti stratigrafica della ceramica (1968–2003). Jerusalem: Terra Santa, 2008. ———. Cafarnao VII: Documentazione grafica della ceramica (1968–2003). Jerusalem: Terra Santa, 2008. ———. Cafarnao VIII: Documentazione fotografica degli oggetti (1968–2003). Jerusalem: Terra Santa, 2008. ———. “Capernaum.” In NEAEHL 1:291–95. ———. “Ceramica ellenistico-romana nel sottosuolo della sinagoga di Cafarnao.” In Studia Hierosolymitana III, 273–312. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1982. ———. “Coins from the Synagogue of Capharnaum.” SBFLA 47 (1997): 223–44. ———. “La tradizionale casa di Simon Pietro a Cafarnao a 25 anni dalla sua scoperta.” In Early Christianity in Context: Monuments and Documents, edited by F. Manns and E. Alliata, 37–67. Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 1993. Magness, Jodi. “Did Galilee Experience a Settlement Crisis in the Mid-Fourth Century?” In Jewish Identities in Antiquity: Studies in Memory of Menahem Stern, edited by Lee I. Levine and Daniel R. Schwartz, 296–313. TSAJ 130. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Mattila, Sharon Lea. “Inner Village Life in Galilee: A Diverse and Complex Phenomenon.” In Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods. Vol. 1, Life, Culture, and Society, edited by David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange, 312–45. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014. ———. “Jesus and the ‘Middle Peasants’: Problematizing a Social-Scientific Concept.” CBQ 72 (2010): 291–313.

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———. “Revisiting Jesus’ Capernaum: A Village of Only Subsistence-Level Fishers and Farmers?” In The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus, edited by David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins, 75–138. Early Christianity and Its Literature 11. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013. Orfali, Gaudence. Capharnaüm et ses ruines, d’après les fouilles accomplies à Tell-Houm par la Custodie franciscaine de Terre Sainte (1905–1921). Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 1922. Pirson, Felix. “Rented Accommodation at Pompeii: The Evidence of the Insula Arriana Polliana VI.6.” In Domestic Space in the Roman World: Pompeii and Beyond, edited by Ray Laurence and Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, 165–81. Portsmouth, R.I.: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 1997. Rathbone, Dominic. “Monetisation, Not Price-Inflation, in Third-Century A.D. Egypt?” In Coin Finds and Coin Use in the Roman World: The Thirteenth Oxford Symposium on Coinage and Monetary History, 25–27.3.1993. A NATO Advanced Research Workshop, edited by Cathy E. King and David G. Wigg, 321–39. Studien zu Fundmünzen der Antike 10. Berlin: Gebr. Mann, 1993. Roffia, Elisabetta. Vetri antichi dall’Oriente: La collezione personeni e i piatti di Cafarnao : Palazzo Sertoli, Galleria del credito valtellinese, Sondrio: 1 dicembre–5 gennaio 2001. Milan: SIAE, 2000. Runesson, Anders. “Architecture, Conflict, and Identity Formation: Jews and Christians in Capernaum from the First to the Sixth Century.” In Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity in Ancient Galilee: A Region in Transition, edited by Jürgen Zangenberg, Harold W. Attridge, and Dale B. Martin, 231–57. WUNT 210. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007. Schwartz, Joshua J. “The Material Realities of Jewish Life in the Land of Israel, c. 235–638.” In The Cambridge History of Judaism. Vol. 4, The Late Roman–Rabbinic Period, edited by Steven T. Katz, 431–56. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Spijkerman, Augusto. Cafarnao III: Catalogo delle monete della città. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1975. Taylor, Joan E. Christians and the Holy Places: The Myth of Jewish-Christian Origins. Oxford: Clarendon, 1993. Testa, Emmanuele. Cafarnao IV: I graffitti della Casa di S. Pietro. Jerusalem: Franciscan Press, 1972. Tzaferis, Vassilios. “Capernaum: Excavations in the Area of the Greek Orthodox Church.” In NEAEHL 1:295–96. ———. Excavations at Capernaum. Vol. 1, 1978–1982. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1989. Wallace-Hadrill, Andrew. Houses and Society in Pompeii and Herculaneum. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994.

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13 Bethsaida Rami Arav and Carl E. Savage Location and Importance Bethsaida is located in the northeastern corner of the Kinneret basin about 2 km from the present shore of the Sea of Galilee and about 100 m from the east bank of the Jordan River. The site, which has been known to archaeologists as Et-Tell (“The Ruin Mound” in Arabic) since its discovery in the nineteenth century, has only recently been plausibly identified as the New Testament site that forms one of the corners in the triangle of Jesus’ ministry in the Galilee. Located in the territory of Philip Herod, brother of Herod Antipas, Bethsaida was thus politically separated from the other two points of the triangle, Capernaum and Chorazin, which are located within the territory of Herod Antipas (see fig. A and the maps 2 and 4B in the front matter of this volume). The site was a considerable city in the tenth to eighth centuries bce. The ancient city’s gate complex is a truly remarkable structure and remains a witness to the grandeur of the Geshurite city that was Bethsaida during the First Temple period.1 Second Temple period Bethsaida is notably less remarkable. Although given polis status in 30 ce and forming the “second city” of Philip’s tetrarchy, Bethsaida lacks the scale and wealth of nearby Tiberias and Sepphoris, or even of nearby Taricheae/Magdala, in Galilee, or of the neighboring Decapolis cities.2 Nonetheless, it is an important location in the Gospel accounts. It is one of the most often mentioned locations in the New Testament, is associated with miracles, and

1.  For a report on Iron Age Et-Tell’s gate, see Rami Arav, “Final Report on Area A, Stratum V: The City Gate,” in The Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies (ed. Rami Arav; Kirksville, Mo.: Truman State University Press, 2009), 4:1–122. 2.  It is true that, while little is known of the first century ce at Tiberias and Sepphoris, they are very grand settlements in the later Roman period. For the first century, perhaps it would be better to look at Caesarea and Samaria for comparison with other Herodian settlements to get a sense of the “rustic” nature of Bethsaida.

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Figure A. Map of Bethsaida in relation to Capernaum and Chorazin.

is the reported home of several of the disciples. Josephus mentions it, as does the talmudic literature.3 What Josephus actually says of Jesus is telling. He locates Bethsaida at the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee, alongside the Jordan River in lower Gaulanitis, that is, on the eastern side of the river (Ant. 18.28;4 J.W. 2.1685), near a marshy plain (Life 71–726). Yet, in addition to establishing the location, he says little more than his rather poetic reference to Bethsaida having “the dignity of a city.” Thus, when confronted with the archaeological reality, those who desire to find a romanticized Bethsaida in which Jesus and his disciples walked amid Greco-Roman institutions enshrined in monumental architecture complete with columns and capitals will be disappointed. All may have to accept another image: perhaps Philip Herod’s

3.  The New Testament references concerning Bethsaida include Mark 6:45; 8:22; Luke 9:10; 10:13; Matt 11:21; John 1:44; 12:21. 4. Josephus Ant. 18.28: “When Philip also had built Paneas, a city at the fountains of Jordan, he named it Cesarea. He also advanced the village Bethsaida, situated at the lake of Gennesareth, unto the dignity of a city, both by the number of inhabitants it contained, and its other grandeur, and called it by the name of Julias, the same name with Caesar’s daughter” (William Whiston, trans., The Works of Flavius Josephus in Four Volumes [repr., Grand Rapids: Baker, 1974], 4:6). 5. Josephus J.W. 2.168: “and the latter of them [Philip] built the city Cesarea, at the fountains of Jordan, and in the region of Paneas; as also the city Julias, in the lower Gaulonitis” (trans. Whiston, Works of Flavius Josephus, 1:152). 6. Josephus Life 71–72: “At the same time also there came forces, both horsemen and footmen, from the king, and Sylla their commander, who was the captain of his guard: this Sylla pitched his camp at five furlongs’ distance from Julias, and set a guard upon the roads, both that which led to Cana, and that which led to the fortress Gamala, that he might hinder their inhabitants from getting provisions out of Galilee. As soon as I had gotten intelligence of this, I sent two thousand armed men, and a captain over them, whose name was Jeremiah, who raised a bank a furlong off Julias, near to the river Jordan” (trans. Whiston, Works of Flavius Josephus, 2:5).

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“second city” was filled with unrealized delusions of grandeur not actualized in the humble basalt structures at Bethsaida. As noted, the ongoing debates in contemporary New Testament scholarship concern the construction of the social world of the first century. It is in this arena that archaeology from Bethsaida may provide helpful data. By applying careful analysis to the archaeological finds uncovered at Bethsaida, in conversation with discoveries in neighboring Galilee, particularly with those of Capernaum, Chorazin, and Sepphoris, a significant contribution can be made to the general discussion of the nature of society in this region in the first century. This contribution goes beyond a simple interest in whether Jesus traveled to Bethsaida to a discussion of the significance of Bethsaida’s impact on the region as a whole. What does it represent in terms of shaping and/or reflecting the religious, cultural, economic, and social milieu for early Christianity? The hard data from the many seasons of excavations at Bethsaida add to the general conversation concerning the social world of formative Galilean Christianity and the extent of its Jewish and gentile leanings. The Archaeology of First-Century Bethsaida Before turning to the material finds, let us briefly state a proposed timeline for the reoccupation of Bethsaida during the Hellenistic period. Bethsaida was destroyed sometime during Iron Age II, ostensibly during the Assyrian conquest of the region in the late eighth century.7 There is clear evidence of massive destruction at the huge Iron Age city gate and little evidence of occupation for nearly five centuries following that catastrophic event. There have been only a few very fragmentary finds from the Iron Age III and Persian periods, and there is no evidence of construction during these times. What we see instead is a sudden period of construction and reoccupation beginning during the Hellenistic period in the third century bce. The coin evidence indicates that this occurred during the reign of Ptolemy II or III, perhaps prior to the First Syrian War (274–271 bce). Control, however, seems to pass to the Seleucids under Antiochus III sometime following the Fourth Syrian War in 217 bce and perhaps as late as 200 bce. After this transition, we find none of the later Ptolemaic coins, yet there is no evidence of destruction at the site.8 7. This is the current position of Dr. Rami Arav, directing archaeologist of the Bethsaida Excavations project, and others of the research team (Rami Arav, “Bethsaida Excavations: Preliminary Report, 1994–1996,” in The Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies [ed. Rami Arav; Kirksville, Mo.: Thomas Jefferson University Press, 1999], 2:3–63). 8.  It is interesting to note that no Seleucid coins were found prior to Antiochus III. This is perhaps due to the economic ban that each kingdom had on the other, as Martin Hengel suggested (Judaism and Hellenism: Studies in Their Encounter in Palestine during the Early Hellenistic Period [trans. John Bowden; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974]).

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Figure B. Rhodian Wine Amphorae from Bethsaida. Photo by DreAnna Hadash. Used with permission.

There is simply a change in coinage that would indicate a change of governmental orientation. Seleucid control appears to survive until the expansion of John Hyrcanus I into the Golan area. Again, control seems to have been transferred peaceably. That is, there is no evidence of destruction, although there is a more significant change in the total material culture and not just in the coinage. The ceramic finds suggest an altered pattern of exchange. This change at Bethsaida supports Andrea Berlin’s observation that the expansion of the Hasmonean kingdom replaced the Mediterranean-oriented culture of the earlier Hellenistic period with “material simplification and economic isolation.”9 Likewise, we see evidence of a transition to Herodian control as a result of Herod’s assuming the throne. Thus Bethsaida was reestablished during a relatively peaceful time of expansion from the Phoenician coast. There is some thought that the earliest settlers may have been veterans from the Ptolemaic army. This idea results in part from the presence of Rhodian wine amphorae, which some have suggested are markers of military presence.10 According to Donald Ariel, “there may be some cogency in suggesting that, in the last third of the third century bce, there 9.  Andrea M. Berlin, “The Hellenistic Period,” in Near Eastern Archaeology: A Reader (ed. Suzanne Richard; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2003), 428. 10.  Gerald Finkielesztejn, “Politique et commerce à Rhodes au IIe s. a.C.: Le témoignage des exportations d’amphores,” in Les cités d’Asie mineure occidentale au IIe siècle a.C. (ed. Alain Bresson and Raymond Descat; Etudes 8; Bordeaux: Ausonius, 2001), 191.

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Figure C. One of the two dolobra (military pickaxes) from Bethsaida. Photo by Hanan Shafir. Used with permission.

was a military outpost at Bethsaida.”11 He notes that Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor have now also explained the earliest settlement at Gamla on that basis.12 Bethsaida’s location at the conjunction of two of the passes in the road system of the Golan that were among the six western entrances to the region creates a viable context for this possibility. Ariel notes that the notion that Bethsaida began as a military outpost explains its sudden appearance. Apart from this amphora connection, however, and a very few military implements such as the two dolabrae, or military pickaxes, that have been discovered, there are no obvious signs that Bethsaida was a military outpost: no towers, gates, and fortifications or other Hellenistic military artifacts.13 Therefore, it may be better to suggest that veterans rather than active military settled the site. In any event, the amphora and coin evidence suggest a renewed presence at Bethsaida beginning in the mid- to latter third century bce. Settlement Pattern and Architecture Except for the city walls, which most probably still stood to a considerable elevation, whether the settlers of the fourth century bce were veterans or Phoenician colonists, they found the site a near total ruin. Within the city, only a few fragmentary walls standing above the ground remained from the glamorous Iron Age city. During this period, the area north of the city gate 11.  Donald T. Ariel, “Stamped Amphora Handles from Bethsaida,” in Arav, Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies (2009), 4:267–92. 12.  Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor, “Gamla Old and New,” Qadmoniot 34 (2001): 2–33. 13.  There may be one exception in the small find record. A dolabra was found in a Hellenistic context in Area C in a building west of the large courtyard houses we call the “winemaker’s house” and the “fisherman’s house.” This area on the north end of the tel seems to be a primary area of resettlement activity in the third century bce at Bethsaida. Even the dolabra, however, may have been used for religious purposes in sacrificial slaughtering, or even for more mundane purposes such as mining and even tree cutting.

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Figure D. Hellenistic structures at Bethsaida. Left the “Winemaker’s House” (note the wine cellar extending to the top); right the “Fisherman’s House.” Photo by David Silverman. Used with permission.

included a large paved plaza and a palace built in a northern Syrian style known as “Bit Hilani.” While the eastern sections of this palace were completely demolished, the western sections were still visible and substantial enough to be reused during the Hellenistic period. The entire first floor of the city gate (nearly 3 m high) was filled with the debris from the second and the third floors, creating quite a large heap. On top of this heap, a modest broadroom temple, measuring 20 m by 5 m, was built in an east–west direction with a doorway in the northern wall. To this northern side, temenos walls were added, and some floors from the Iron Age period were exposed and reused. East of the temple, a one-room building was constructed, perhaps in conjunction with the temple. A favisa near the temple revealed fragments of figurines depicting the Phoenician goddess Astarte as a pregnant woman seated on a chair and supporting her abdomen. These finds may indicate that the temple was originally dedicated to Astarte. It seems that during this time, the major residential quarter sat in the north of the tel and was constructed of medium-size fieldstones that could be handled by one or two people. This is very different from the Iron Age walls, which were built from heavy boulders that would have needed some lifting devices. A lane, 2.5 m wide and nicely paved with cobblestones, ran north to south between spacious courtyard houses. It then turned west at almost a right angle and became slightly wider. These courtyard houses were rather simply built in a style common to this period. The spacious courtyards, paved with basalt cobblestones, were flanked by a kitchen to the east and a dining and residential section to the north. The large kitchens contained grinding stones, ovens, and much cooking ware. Two houses possessed underground cellars

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Figure E. Fragments of Astarte ­figurines. Photo by Hanan Shafir. Used by ­permission.

Figure F. Weaving Implements. Photo by DreAnna Hadash. Used by permission.

in which amphorae were discovered. Because no stone steps were found, we hypothesize that wooden stairways or ladders accessed the second floors of these courtyard houses. Weaving implements, including spindle whorls, loom weights, bone shuttles, a few broken murex shells, and flax pollen, suggest that the economy of these settlers was likely based on production of textiles, probably to be dyed in the Phoenician coastal cities and shipped to the western markets in Antioch, Greece, and Rome. Very few domestic items were found in the houses, which suggests that the inhabitants managed to take their belongings with them when they left the settlement. It also seems that the desertion of this quarter took place sometime during the first half of the second century bce. This may have happened as a result of the Hasmonean conquest and the subsequent attempt to force the Phoenician population to convert to Judaism. Yet not all the population may have deserted, for there is evidence that at least a small number of people stayed behind. The next population influx comprised of Jewish immigrants arrived from Judea during the Herodian period, in about the third decade of the first century bce. As noted above, finds

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Figure G. Site map of Bethsaida showing the Hellenistic and Roman structures in Stratum II. Map by Christine Etzrodt. Used by ­permission.

from this population suggest that they maintained their connections to and relationships with Judea and the other Jewish settlements in Galilee. Phoenician contacts were much reduced. Some of the Jewish population, which was much smaller than the preceding Phoenician population, settled in the old deserted Phoenician courtyard houses, but most preferred to build their homes in the center of the mound, where the old Phoenician temple stood but had fallen into disuse. Because the center of the mound was heavily disturbed by modern Syrian military installations, only fragments of those houses have been discovered. It seems, however, that unlike the Phoenician courtyard houses, the Jewish houses had no master plan, and they were built using fieldstones and in different architectural styles from one another. One particular house that was preserved better than the others sat atop the eastern section of the Iron Age palace, where it was built abutting and reusing the old city wall as its eastern wall. This practice clearly

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Figure H. Fishing implements. Photo by DreAnna Hadash. Used by permission.

indicates that the 6-m-wide Iron Age city wall was still standing high enough to be reused for a private home in the Early Roman period. The offsets of the city wall, now inside the house, were filled in with small stones to create one flat wall. Although the western section of this house was completely destroyed in modern times, two rooms were preserved in the eastern section, one of which contained a flat grinding stone in one corner. This placement of the grinding stone is similar to what was found in the excavations at Gamla. A few remains of plaster and whitewash found in the room suggest that the basalt stone walls were entirely plastered and coated with whitewash. In all of the inhabited locations, fishing gear—including lead, basalt, and limestone net weights; fish hooks of several types; line sinkers; and anchors—suggests that the economy of the population in this period was now based mainly on fishing. At the center of the mound, the deserted Phoenician temple was reused. In 30 ce, when Philip Herod elevated Bethsaida to a Greek polis and renamed it Julias, he had the temple rebuilt and dedicated to Livia/Julia, the wife of Augustus and the mother of Tiberius.14 The northern entrance of the temple was blocked and a new one was installed in the eastern short wall, as indicated by the discovery of a dressed threshold there. Hence, in the Early Roman period, the entrance to the temple was changed from the north to the east. While some sections, such as the foundations of the building and the cores of the walls, were built of fieldstones, it appears that dressed stones were widely used. These dressed stones included construction blocks, decorated basalt stones, limestone, and a small piece of marble. Noteworthy is a decorated lintel with a meander design that included eight petal rosettes. Herod the Great employed a similar design in the temple of Jerusalem. Another pattern of floral scrolls presumably decorated other parts of the temple building. A small piece of basalt stone decorated with 14.  This issue has been covered in a few publications. See, for example, the summary in Fred Strickert, “The Renaming of Bethsaida in Honor of Livia, a.k.a. Julia, the Daughter of Caesar, in Jewish Antiquities 18.27–28,” in Arav, Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies (2004), 3:93–114.

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Figure I. Basalt stone fragment of ­decoration with grapes found on the surface of Bethsaida and a frieze of identical decoration from Chorazim. Photo by Hanan Shafir. Used by permission.

grape clusters was also found and perhaps originally was part of an architrave that also contained floral scrolls. Although none of these fragments was found in situ, all were scattered near the temple area, which suggests that they did indeed originate from the temple. It is interesting that very similar designs were found in the excavation of the synagogue at Chorazin.15 Some of the synagogue decorative reliefs found there, such as Jupiter and Ganymede, Medusa, a centaur, an animal nursing (perhaps a depiction of Romulus and Remus), and a scene of what may have been a soldier sacrificing in front of an altar (but that was interpreted by the excavators as a person mixing wine16), actually belong to the Roman imperial cult repertoire, which suggests that the architectural elements originated in the temple at Bethsaida and were reused at a later synagogue at Chorazin. During the 2014 excavation season, a fragment of a Doric capital was discovered, but again it was out of its original context. We assume that the capital was reused as a grinding stone during the Islamic period. The capital’s abacus is flat with no curvature, a first-century feature. Thus it also probably came from the temple. Vessels discovered near the temple further contribute to the identification of this building as a temple. They include two bronze incense shovels, some pottery vessels consisting primarily of jugs found buried in a favisa near the temple, a few small votive anchors made from basalt, and a small group of terra-cotta figurines. One of the figurines represents a veiled woman with curly hair parted in the center. Another figurine fragment shows the upper torso of a female wearing a veil and a tiara or diadem. These two figurines could well have been portrayals of Livia/Julia, to whom the temple and the city were dedicated. A few κτίστης (founder) coins of Philip Herod, from the year 30 ce, indicate that the dedication to the imperial cult took place in that year. 15.  Zeev Yeivin, The Synagogue at Korazim: The 1962–1964, 1980–1987 Excavations (in Hebrew; IAA Reports 10; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2000). 16. Yeivin, Synagogue at Korazim, illustration 107.

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Figure J. Doric capital that was reused as a grinding stone. Photo by Hanan Shafir. Used by permission.

In addition to the temple, Philip restored and repaired segments of the city wall. He also added walls, about 2 m wide, on top of the 6-m-wide Iron Age city wall. All in all, the site of Bethsaida/Julias in the first century was somewhat odd but not entirely unusual. It was that of a fishing village that contained a Roman temple shrine, but unlike other rural settlements, it was surrounded by an ancient thick city wall. As indicated, the coins and the pottery finds from Bethsaida show a continuous occupation from the Hellenistic period to the early fourth century ce. This fact suggests that Bethsaida did not take part in the Jewish revolts against the Romans and the town was therefore spared. The lack of First or Second Jewish Revolt coins at Bethsaida may indicate that the inhabitants thoroughly disengaged themselves from the rebels. However, a large projectile head of a catapult lance was discovered in one of the Roman-period houses, and it may have been a trophy carried away by the owner of the house. A coin of Agrippa II from 84/85 ce may demonstrate Bethsaida’s compliance with the Herodian regime in the period following the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in 70. Likewise, an aureus of Antoninus Pius dating to 138 ce, merely three years after the Second Jewish Revolt, may suggest continued accommodation to the Roman authorities, or even that some Roman mercenaries who took part in crushing the revolt were subsequently stationed at Bethsaida.

Figure K. Reverse of founder coin of Philip Herod showing the façade of a temple. Photo by Hanan Shafir. Used by permission.

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The cemetery of Hellenistic- and Roman-period Bethsaida was located along the Iron Age cobblestone road leading to the city. This is not unusual; cemeteries often were placed near the roads leading to towns. All the burials were of a shaft type: that is, they are pits built with stone walls and covered with flat or hexagonal stones. The tombs were oriented north to south with their heads at the north. There were no offerings at the tombs. Coins Over 200 coins from the Hellenistic, Hasmonean, Herodian, and Early Roman periods have been recovered at Bethsaida. While a few coins predate the reconstructed history that we propose,17 the earlier coins still may have been in circulation during the time of the earliest reoccupation, particularly because they tend to be large-denomination silver coins. One may argue to some extent about the precise terminus a quo for this reoccupation, but it is likely that it began during the reign of Ptolemy II (r. 285–246 bce). The following gives an idea of the coin distribution during the relevant time periods: Ptolemaic: Seleucid: Hasmonean: Herodian: Early Roman:

59 coins 130 coins 38 coins 22 coins 83 coins18

(This list does not include 56 coins that are unidentifiable but could possibly be Seleucid, Hasmonean, or Early Roman, based on size.) It is clear that the coins provide a continuous record from Ptolemy II to the Roman period. That is, the coin record of Bethsaida preserves coins from all of the rulers who were likely to have been in power at Bethsaida. This seems to confirm a continuous occupation of the site during that time. At the same time, however, the number of coins can also indicate relative economic prosperity. Thus the first century appears less prosperous than the two centuries preceding and the two succeeding it. Rhodian Stamped Handles Fourteen stamped handles were recovered in the material of the Bethsaida excavation through the 2004 season. All of these are of the Rhodian type, which is the most common type found

17.  Five identifiable Ptolemy I coins and eight earlier coins have been found. 18.  Gregory C. Jenks, “More Than Just Couch Change: Bethsaida Coin Report 2001–2012,” in Bethsaida in Archaeology, History and Ancient Culture: A Festschrift in Honor of John T. Greene (ed. J. Harold Ellens; Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars, 2014), 152–87.

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Figure L. Top to Bottom, coins of Ptolemaic, Seleucid, Hasmonean, and Herodian rulers. Photos by Carl E. Savage. Used by permission.

in the region. Large numbers of unstamped imported amphora handles19 have also been found, but they do not contribute as much value to the chronological understanding of Bethsaida in the Hellenistic period. The stamped handles, however, do provide a second source of evidence to contribute to our understanding of the founding of Bethsaida during the third century bce. As seen above, many more coins than stamped handles were observed at Bethsaida, but coins generally remain in circulation much longer than amphorae, and so the stamped handles may provide more precise information about the dating for Hellenistic Bethsaida. According to 19.  There are also significant numbers of indicator sherds of amphora ware without associated handles. These include both Rhodian and non-Rhodian types.

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Figure M. Stamped handles of Rhodian wine amphorae found at Bethsaida. Photo by Christine Dalenta. Used with permission.

Donald Ariel, the stamped handles indicate that Bethsaida may have been established beginning in the last third of the third century bce. He notes that ten of the fourteen handles derive from that period, “which was not one of particularly high production in Rhodes, or of high importation into the southern Levant.”20 He suggests that the coins of Ptolemy II should be connected to the stamped handles rather than to earlier occupation. That is, the Ptolemy II coins were still in use during the period in which the shorter-lived amphorae were used.21 Ariel 20.  Ariel, “Stamped Amphora Handles from Bethsaida,” 269. 21. Ibid.

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goes on to suggest that the fact that the majority of stamped handles fall within a period before 205 bce might indicate a short-lived occupation in preparation for the Fourth Syrian War. In part, he bases his suggestion of a short-lived occupation at this time on his connection of Rhodian amphorae to a military presence.22 He notes, however, that two of the handles date to the later period of peak production of Rhodian amphorae from 190 to 160 bce. Furthermore, the latest clearly datable handle may be as late as 140 bce, and other less-well-classified handles may date even later, to 108 bce.23 Here, contra Ariel’s contention of a disrupted occupation, our numismatic evidence supplements the ceramics and indicates a clear Ptolemaic/Seleucid continuation of occupation until a much later period than the Fourth Syrian War. Consequently, while the stamped handles do not add directly to our first-century ce evidence, they do help to establish Bethsaida as a viable population center into the first century. Glass24 Andrea Rottloff, the glass expert for the Bethsaida excavations, has identified characteristic Hellenistic and Roman glassware. In her initial report on the glass material finds from Bethsaida, she notes that there are clear indicative pieces from the Claudian (27 bce–68 ce) and Flavian (69–96 ce) periods of the Roman Empire, and several from the Hellenistic period. She observes that the “most common Hellenistic vessels at Bethsaida are conical or hemispherical molded bowls with incised horizontal lines on the interior surface. . . . They appear from the 2nd cent. bc onwards in the whole eastern Mediterranean region.”25 Other common firstcentury types include beakers and bowls characteristic of the period that are well attested in other contexts. Rottloff suggests that some of the common household glassware may have been made at Capernaum, where Stanislao Loffreda found a number of this type of vessel along with a deposit of raw material for their manufacture.26 One rather surprising observation from the glass finds, however, is the dearth of later Roman glass finds associated with the northern large-courtyard houses. The glass finds show that in the first, second, and third centuries ce the central area above the Iron Age palace-gate 22. Ariel notes a connection made by Finkielesztejn (“Politique et commerce à Rhodes”) between the remains of (wine) amphorae and military presence. Thus, for him, the initial occupation could have been shortlived. He also bases this idea on the near absence of evidence for Rhodian amphorae at Bethsaida during their peak production period. Again citing Finkielstejn (“Politique et commerce à Rhodes,” 189–91), Ariel notes that this peak is present in other sites of the southern Levant. 23.  Ariel, “Stamped Amphora Handles from Bethsaida,” 271. 24.  For a fuller discussion of the glass finds from Bethsaida, see Andrea Rottloff, “Pre-Roman, Roman, and Islamic Glass from Bethsaida,” in Arav, Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies (2009), 204–51. 25.  Andrea Rottloff, “Hellenistic, Roman and Islamic Glass from Bethsaida (Iulias, Israel),” in Annuals of the 14th Congress of the International Association for the History of Glass (2000) (Lochem, Netherlands: AIHV, 2000), 142–46. 26.  Ibid., 142–43.

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Figure N. Roman glassware found at Bethsaida. Photo by DreAnna Hadash. Used with permission.

complex was more densely populated. This may be an additional indication that the occupied site shrank in size during the first century. Stone Vessels27 Beginning with the 2000 season at Bethsaida, a collection of chalk (very soft limestone) vessel fragments, which are important indicative pieces from the Roman period, were discovered. Subsequent examination of the archived ceramic diagnostic sherds from previous years led to the identification of limestone vessels that were recovered in earlier seasons but were not recognized as such.

Figure O. Two types of chalk vessels found at Bethsaida. Photo by Christine Delenta. Used with permission.

The majority of these fragments were found near limekiln pits that were used in the Islamic period to mine the site for lime used in fertilizer. Some vessels, however, were located within 10 m of the large public building that has been variously identified as a Roman-era 27.  The stone vessel, oil lamp, and ceramic information can be found in greater detail in Carl E. Savage, Biblical Bethsaida: An Archaeological Study of the First Century (Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2011).

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Figure P. Two of the many types of basalt vessels found at Bethsaida. Illustration by DreAnna Hadash. Used with permission.

temple or possibly a synagogue building, and others have been found in the context of domestic buildings that can be clearly associated with the first-century occupation of Bethsaida. It should also be noted that a significant number of basalt vessels were found in all areas of Bethsaida, in both the Iron Age and Hellenistic/Roman-period occupations. These would have had the same qualities of ritual purity as the chalk vessels, and they are more likely to have been produced locally. But they do not have the same usefulness for indicating cultural identity as do the limestone chalk vessels. If scholars are correct that limestone ware marks the presence of Jewish people at a site, the value of finding stone vessels at Bethsaida cannot be overestimated. They become the best indicators of a first-century Jewish community at the town. They are known to have been used at over fifty-nine different sites throughout Roman-period Judea, with their greatest occurrence in Jerusalem.28 Their popularity seems to have peaked just prior to the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 ce, and, according to some scholars, their use declined through the period of the Bar Kokhba revolt until it abruptly ceased in the mid-second century ce. Their presence at Bethsaida indicates a Jewish presence in the first century ce.29 Oil Lamps Due to their characteristic seriation—meaning that small variations allow them to be differentiated easily in a sequence of changing design—oil lamps often provide an additional time marker. At Bethsaida, we have a good sequence of oil lamps from the Late Hellenistic period 28.  Stuart S. Miller, “Some Observations on Stone Vessel Finds and Ritual Purity in Light of Talmudic Sources,” in Zeichen aus Text und Stein: Studien auf dem Weg zu einer Archäologie des Neuen Testaments (ed. Stefan Alkier and Jürgen Zangenberg; TANZ 42; Tübingen: Francke, 2003), 403. 29.  Yitzhak Magen, The Stone Vessel Industry in the Second Temple Period: Excavations at Hizma and the Jerusalem Temple Mount (Judea and Samaria Publications 1; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2002), 100.

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Figure Q. Herodian lamp fragments found at Bethsaida. Drawing by DreAnna Hadash. Used with permission.

into the first century ce. Approximately fifty sherds that identify their type of oil lamp have been recovered from the first century. Of these, the majority—well over 80 percent of all identifiable fragments recovered from the first century ce—are from Herodian oil lamps. This ratio is characteristic of other Jewish sites during this time period and differs from the ratio of non-Jewish sites in the same relative geographic area.30 Further analysis of these fragments by both x-ray fluorescence and inductively coupled plasma methods has shown that they likely originated in the Jerusalem area.31 Along with the stone vessels, this is a second strong indication of ties to the Jerusalem Jewish community and its practices. Ceramics A final important characteristic of the recovered archaeological assemblage involves the dramatic shift in the ceramic corpus between the Hellenistic period and the Roman period. Dur30.  David Adan-Bayewitz et al., “Preferential Distribution of Lamps from the Jerusalem Area in the Late Second Temple Period (Late First Century B.C.E.–70 C.E.),” BASOR 350 (May 2008): 57–59. 31.  Carl Savage, “The Source of All Light: A Study of the Herodian Oil Lamps at Bethsaida (et-Tell)” (paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research, Baltimore, Maryland, November 2013).

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Figure R. Imported Hellenistic Western Slope fine ware found at Bethsaida. ­Illustration and photo by DreAnna Hadash. Used with permission.

ing the Hellenistic period, many wares were imported from the coast, whereas most wares were locally made by the first centuries bce/ce. For example, we have early forms of ESA (Eastern Sigillata A) but not later forms. There is evidence of local Galilean ware in the Roman periods. For example, the Galilean bowl (Kefar H|ananya type 1) is a common pottery type found. Other local wares from Kefar Shikhin and Kefar H|ananya types are also found. The imported ware increases again in the second and third centuries. This may indicate the general growth in prosperity that occurred in the region during that time. Hellenization at Bethsaida As the result of the renaming of the town and its new rights as a Greek polis, one would expect to find robust hellenization at Bethsaida. In contrast to other Greek cities in the vicinity, however, such as Hippos, Gadara, and even Tiberias, as well as Herod’s endowments, such as Samaria and Caesarea, or even Jerusalem, there is no sign of urban architectural hellenization at Bethsaida. Private buildings at Bethsaida have no Greek classical architecture, no Grecian

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capitals, and no mosaic pavements. Contrary to other fully Hellenistic poleis, there is no grid pattern for city design and there are no theaters, hippodromes, agora, forums, colonnaded streets, or any other Hellenistic features so typical of the Hellenistic city. The only possible exception is the Hellenistic architectural features that seem to have been imposed on the population by the political powers. These features are manifested in the modest temple built by the tetrarch Philip to the honor of Livia/Julia, as part of the Roman imperial cult. The architectural decorations found next to the temple seem similar to Roman provincial architecture rendered in the basalt stone that is common in Syria and in particular in Hauran.32 The altar dedicated by Philip that was found in southern Syria demonstrates artistic and religious connections between these regions. Thus whereas the domestic ceramic corpus may provide some evidence of hellenization, there is no evidence of the elite and urban Hellenism typical of a truly Hellenistic city. Poverty and Wealth and the Audience of Jesus Poverty and wealth in the audience of Jesus of Nazareth has long been a topic of debate among theologians and scholars alike. Did Jesus address the poor? What did it mean to be poor in the time of Jesus? Was poverty metaphorical (Matt. 5:3) or was it physical (Luke 6:20)? Because the population of Bethsaida represented a part of the regional audience of Jesus of Nazareth, it would be interesting to assess the question of poverty and wealth in this audience. Since poverty and wealth are relative rather than absolute qualities, the level of household wealth in Bethsaida must be compared to that observed in other places. For example, in comparison to the lavish houses of the priestly class in the Upper City of Jerusalem, Bethsaida is definitely poorer. There are no mosaic floors, no multiple rooms, no stone tables, no imported Italian vessels, no Hellenistic architecture, and no frescoes on the walls, only simple rural houses built of fieldstones, with plastered and whitewashed walls. Yet, in comparison with the residences found in Ein Gedi of the same period, where the walls are thinner, the houses are smaller, and the floors consist only of beaten earth, the Bethsaida inhabitants were much ­better off. Conclusions The evidence presented provides a reasonable demonstration that a first-century settlement was in existence at Bethsaida. The archaeological evidence suggests that the settlement had declined somewhat from the Late Hellenistic period, but that first-century Bethsaida had incorporated 32.  See in particular Warwick Ball, Rome in the East: The Transformation of an Empire (London: Routledge, 2000), 198–206.

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elements of the larger Hellenistic settlement. The lack of any destruction debris and the fairly well sequenced numismatic evidence argues for a continuous settlement from the third century bce, although that is not without debate. In comparison to the earlier Hellenistic-period settlement, first-century Bethsaida does appear to be less wealthy, no longer so oriented to the Phoenician coast, and more oriented to the west and south: the Jewish Galilee and Jerusalem. Further, in terms of its ethnic identity, it shows elements of being a Jewish rather than a gentile settlement, and it therefore remains the most viable candidate for the location of many of Jesus’ disciples and a backdrop for his ministry. Bibliography Adan-Bayewitz, David, et al. “Preferential Distribution of Lamps from the Jerusalem Area in the Late Second Temple Period (Late First Century B.C.E.–70 C.E.).” BASOR 350 (2008): 37–85. Arav, Rami. “Bethsaida Excavations: Preliminary Report, 1994–1996.” In The Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies, edited by Rami Arav, 3–63. Kirksville, Mo.: Thomas Jefferson University Press, 1999. ———. “Final Report on Area A, Stratum V: The City Gate.” In The Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies, edited by Rami Arav, 1–122. Kirksville, Mo.: Truman State University Press, 2009. Ariel, Donald T. “Stamped Amphora Handles from Bethsaida.” In Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies, edited by Rami Arav, 4:267–92. Kirksville, Mo.: Truman State University Press, 2009. Ball, Warwick. Rome in the East: The Transformation of an Empire. London: Routledge, 2000. Berlin, Andrea M. “The Hellenistic Period.” In Near Eastern Archaeology: A Reader, edited by Suzanne Richard, 418–33. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2003. Finkielesztejn, Gerald. “Politique et commerce à Rhodes au IIe s. a.C.: Le témoignage des exportations d’amphores.” In Les cités d’Asie mineure occidentale au IIe siècle a.C., edited by Alain Bresson and Raymond Descat, 181–96. Etudes 8. Bordeaux: Ausonius, 2001. Hengel, Martin. Judaism and Hellenism: Studies in Their Encounter in Palestine during the Early Hellenistic Period. Translated by John Bowden. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974. Jenks, Gregory C. “More Than Just Couch Change: Bethsaida Coin Report 2001–2012.” In Bethsaida in Archaeology, History and Ancient Culture: A Festschrift in Honor of John T. Greene, edited by J. Harold Ellens, 152–87. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars, 2014. Magen, Yitzhak. The Stone Vessel Industry in the Second Temple Period: Excavations at Hizma and the Jerusalem Temple Mount. Judea and Samaria Publications 1. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 2002. Miller, Stuart S. “Some Observations on Stone Vessel Finds and Ritual Purity in Light of Talmudic Sources.” In Zeichen aus Text und Stein: Studien auf dem Weg zu einer

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Archäologie des Neuen Testaments, edited by Stefan Alkier and Jürgen Zangenberg. TANZ 42. Tübingen: Francke, 2003. Rottloff, Andrea. “Hellenistic, Roman and Islamic Glass from Bethsaida (Iulias, Israel).” In Annuals of the 14th Congress of the International Association for the History of Glass (2000). Lochem, Netherlands: AIHV, 2000. ———. “Pre-Roman, Roman, and Islamic Glass from Bethsaida.” In The Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies, edited by Rami Arav, 204–51. Kirksville, Mo.: Truman State University Press, 2009. Savage, Carl E. Biblical Bethsaida: An Archaeological Study of the First Century. Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2011. ———. “The Source of All Light: A Study of the Herodian Oil Lamps at Bethsaida (et-Tell).” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research, Baltimore, Maryland, November 2013. Strickert, Fred “The Renaming of Bethsaida in Honor of Livia, a.k.a. Julia, the Daughter of Caesar, in Jewish Antiquities 18.27–28.” In The Bethsaida Excavations Project Reports and Contextual Studies, edited by Rami Arav, vol. 3. Kirksville, Mo.: Thomas Jefferson University Press, 2004. Syon, Danny, and Zvi Yavor. “Gamla Old and New.” Qadmoniot 34 (2001): 2–33. Whiston, William. The Works of Flavius Josephus in Four Volumes. Reprint. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1974. Yeivin, Zeev. The Synagogue at Korazim: The 1962–1964, 1980 – 1987 Excavations. In Hebrew. IAA Reports 10. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2000.

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14 Magdala/Taricheae* Stefano De Luca and Anna Lena Toponyms and Sources: General Remarks The three toponyms known in the ancient sources as Taricheae (Ταριχέαι or Ταριχαίαι), Migdal Nunayya1 (‫)מגדל נוניא‬, and Magdala/Mugdala2 (‫ מגדלא‬/ ‫ מגדלה‬/ ‫—)מוגדלא‬the latter corresponding in several texts to Migdal Saba‘ayya3 (‫מגדל צבעייא‬, var. ‫ צבעייה‬/ ‫—)דצבעייא‬most likely all refer to the Arab village of the same name (el-Mejdel, ‫)المجدل‬, which existed until 1948 along the central part of western shore of the Sea of Galilee.4 On the basis, however, of a * This contribution has taken advantage of the valuable collaboration of the following colleagues who reviewed, commented on, and corrected the manuscript and to whom we express our deep gratitude: Richard Bauckham, Uzi Leibner, Sharon Lea Mattila, James Riley Strange, and Jürgen Zangenberg. A special thanks to Dr. Anna Lena for having sponsored and supervised the translation, for the assistance during the drafting of the text, and in particular the wording of the paragraphs under “4. Harbor” below. 1. Only b. Pesah\. 46a. The transliteration adopted follows the plural form ‫ נוּנַ יָּ א‬of ‫נוּנָ א‬, “fish” (Jastrow, 888). 2.  To the texts where only Magdala is found (y. Ma‘as. 3:1, 50c; y. ‘Erub. 4:3, 21d), the references to the inhabitants of Magdala (Magdalenes) should be added (y. Meg. 3:1, 73d), including the rabbis of Magdala: Rabbi Isaac the Magdalene (Gen. Rab. 5:9; 20:8; 93:7; 98:20; Cant. Rab. 3:10, 3; b. Šabb. 139a; b. B. Mes i. 25a; b. Nid. 27b, 33a; b. Yoma 81b), and Rabbi Yudan the Magdalene (y. Ber. 3:9, 14a; Gen. Rab. 13:15, 4). 3.  In the majority of texts, Magdala (Lam. Rab. 3:8, 3; Cant. Rab. 1:12.1, 12a; Lam. Rab. 2:2.4, 21c; y. Šeb. 9:1, 38d; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 11:16; Eccl. Rab. 10:8.1, 27a; y. Hor. 3:1, 47a; y. Sanh. 2:1, 19d; Midrash Samuel 7:5) alternates with Migdal Saba‛ayya (y. Ma‘as. Š. 5:2, 56b; y. Pesah\. 4:1, 30d; y. Ta‘an. 1:6, 64c; Cant. Rab. 1:12.1, 12a; y. Ta‘an. 4:5, 69a; Gen. Rab. 79:6; Midrash Samuel 7:5). In other texts, only Migdal Saba‘ayya occurs (y. Ta‘an. 4:5, 69a; Lam. Rab. 2:2.4, 21d; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 7:10; Lev. Rab. 17:4; Ruth Rab. 2:10, 4d; Pesiq. Rab. 17:6; Eccl. Rab. 1:8.1, 4a). The transliteration adopted follows the plural form ‫ ַצ ָבּ ַעיָּ א‬of ‫צ ָבּ ָעא‬, ַ “dyer” (Jastrow, 1259). 4.  Yoram Tsafrir, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green, Tabula Imperii Romani Iudaea-Palaestina: Eretz Israel in the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods, Maps and Gazetteer (Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994), 173; Salomon E. Grootkerk, Ancient Sites in Galilee: A Toponymic Gazetteer (CHANE 1; Leiden: Brill, 2000), 238–39, no. 55.

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reading of Josephus that intentionally disregards the findings of archaeology, Nikos Kokkinos has attempted to redraw the widely accepted scholarly map of the region of the lake, relocating not only Magdala/Taricheae but also such places as Capernaum, Sennabris, el-Mejdel, Nunayya, and others;5 and Joan Taylor implausibly suggests relating one of the above-mentioned toponyms to a place in Judea.6 The intention here is to show that these toponyms do indeed refer to el-Mejdel, near the cliff of Mount Arbel (fig. E, p. 290). The place name Taricheae—a toponym attested only in the Greek and Latin sources (Cassius, Pliny the Elder, Strabo, Flavius Josephus, and Suetonius)—refers to a city of remarkable importance that must have already been well established in the first century bce, as its foundation surely dates back at the latest to the final decades of the second century bce, when Hasmonean power expanded into Galilee.7 For a time during the Roman–Parthian wars, the site was a Roman outpost, probably with a permanent castrum (see Josephus Ant. 14.119–120; J.W. 1.180; Letter of Cassius Longinus to Cicero written ex castris Taricheis, “from the camp of Taricheae” in 43 bce; Ad Familiares 12.11).8 The fact that in 54 ce one of the four toparchies, that is, administrative districts, of the Lower Galilee (along with Tiberias, Sepphoris, and, presumably, Gaba/‘Arraba) was named after the city,9 indicates that it maintained its dominant role even after the foundation of 5.  Nikos Kokkinos, “The Location of Tarichaea: North or South of the City of Tiberias?” PEQ 142 (2010): 7–23. On the basis of the observations offered by Kokkinos (pp. 7, 20 n. 1), who analyzes the various occurrences of the name in Josephus, the spelling “Tarichaia” or “Tarichaiai” should probably be considered more correct. However, the diction “Taricheae,” which is commonly attested in the literature, is adopted here. 6.  Joan E. Taylor, “Missing Magdala and the Name of Mary ‘Magdalene’,” PEQ 146 (2014): 205–23. 7.  Stefano De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana di Magdala Taricheae: Gli scavi del Magdala Project 2007 e 2008. Relazione preliminare e prospettive di indagine,” LASBF 49 (2009): 445–46. 8.  See Marco Adinolfi, “Il Lago di Tiberiade e le sue città nella letteratura greco-romana,” LASBF 44 (1994): 375–80; Frédéric Manns, “Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” in Studia Hierosolymitana in onore di P. Bellarmino Bagatti. I: Studi archeologici (ed. Emmanuele Testa, Ignazio Mancini, and Michele Piccirillo; SBF Collectio Maior 22; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1976), 311–14; Uzi Leibner, Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee (TSAJ 127; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), 217–22; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 445, 447–48. Leibner (Settlement and History, 220 n. 86) suggests identifying the wall fortification on the summit of Mount Nitai—which includes nine circular and square towers (Leibner, Settlement and History, 205–13, figs. 72–75; Uzi Leibner, “Excavations at Khirbet Wadi H|amam (Lower Galilee): The Synagogue and the Settlement,” JRA 23 [2010]: 223, fig. 2; Stefano De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti attorno al Lago di Galilea: Contributo allo studio dell’ambiente del Nuovo Testamento e del Gesù storico,” in Terra Sancta: Archeologia ed esegesi. Atti dei convegni 2008–2010 [ed. G. Paximadi and M. Fidanzio; ISCAB Serie Archeologica 1; Lugano: Eupress, 2013], 78–89)—with the remains of Cassius’s castrum of Taricheae. This hypothesis, however, does not find confirmation in the sounding he recently made; rather, it provides evidence for a first-century ce construction. This fortification wall of Mount Nitai may instead be related to Josephus’s fortification of “the cave of Arbela” (Life 188; cf. Ant. 12.421; 14.415; J.W. 1.303–306) or/and to the Bar Kokhba revolt (Uzi Leibner, Uri Davidovich, and Benjamin Arubas, “The Structure, Date, and Purpose of the Fortification on Mount Nitai” [in Hebrew], ErIsr 31 [2015]: 236–46). 9.  Cf. Emil Schürer, The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (175 B.C.–A.D. 135) (rev. and ed. Géza Vermès, Fergus Millar, Matthew Black, and Martin Goodman; 3 vols. in 4 pts.; Edinburgh: T&T Clark,

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Tiberias (Josephus Ant. 20.158–159; J.W. 2.252). Possibly established by the Hasmoneans, the toparchy of Taricheae also included a number of villages to the west and to the north of the city. In addition to these smaller settlements, agricultural and industrial installations must have dotted the hinterland of the city, especially in the fertile Gennesar plain (also Gennesaret plain, el-Ghuweir) to the north.10 The geographical limits of the city with its suburbs probably 1973–87), 2:194–95 n. 43; Junghwa Choi, Jewish Leadership in Roman Palestine from 70 C.E. to 135 C.E. (Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity; Leiden: Brill, 2013), 127–30; E. Mary Smallwood, The Jews under Roman Rule from Pompey to Diocletian: A Study in Political Relations (SJLA 20; Leiden: Brill, 1981), 354; Peter Schäfer, The History of the Jews in the Greco-Roman World (2nd ed; London: Routledge, 2003), 88; Arnaldo Momigliano, “Ricerche sull’organizzazione della Giudea sotto il dominio romano (63 a.C.–70 d.C.)” (1934), reprinted in Nono contributo alla storia degli studi classici e del mondo antico (ed. R. Di Donato; Roma: Storia e Letteratura, 1992), 290–95. 10. Cf. Gilad Cinamon, “Migdal: Final Report,” HA-ESI 126 (2014): http://www.hadashot-esi.org. il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=11620&mag_id=121; Ken Dark, “Archaeological Evidence for a Previously Unrecognised Roman Town near the Sea of Galilee,” PEQ 145 (2013): 185–202. On the very fertile and agrarian character of the Gennesar (el-Ghuweir) in historical sources and on the meaning of the passage in J.W. 3.516– 521, see Jürgen K. Zangenberg, “Observations on the Function, Character and Location of the New Testament Toponym Γεννεησαρητ (Mk 6:53; Mt 14:34),” in Jesus, Paul, and Early Christianity: Studies in Honour of Henk Jan de Jonge (ed. Rieuwerd Buitenwerf, Harm W. Hollander, and Johannes Tromp; NovTSup 130; Leiden: Brill, 2008), 454–58. According to Zangenberg (“Observations on the Function,” 463)—contra Leibner (“Identifying Gennesar on the Sea of Galilee,” JRA 19 [2006]: 229–45), who proposed the identification with Kh. Abu Shusheh (cf. Leibner, Settlement and History, 180–91)—“the toponym Gennesaret in Mark 6:53 and Matt. 14:34 does not refer to an individual settlement but to the fertile plain on the west bank of the lake north of Magdala,” which was “a region intensively used for agriculture over several centuries” (“Observations on the Function,” 464). On this point, see also Marc Turnage, “The Linguistic Ethos of Galilee in the First Century C.E..,” in The Language Environment of First Century Judaea: Jerusalem Studies in the Synoptic Gospels (ed. Randall Buth and R. Steven Notley; Jewish and Christian Perspectives 2; Leiden: Brill, 2013; digital ed., 2014), 149. The author, like Kokkinos (“Location of Tarichaea,” 9 and n. 7), has applied to Taricheae also the sentence “on its banks grow fruit-bearing trees resembling apple trees” that in Strabo follows his mention of “pickling fish” (Geogr. 16.2.45). The fruit of these trees (δένδρα καρποφόρα μηλέαις ἐμφερῆ), however, seems to be the “apples of Sodom” of the Dead Sea region (see Yuval Shah\ ar, Josephus Geographicus: The Classical Context of Geography in Josephus [TSAJ 98; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004], 243–56), known from other sources (J.W. 4.484; Tacitus Hist. 5.6.2–7). In addition, R. Steven Notley takes this reference, among those found in other texts, to support his attempt to link the whole fertile Gennesar Valley with the inhabitants of Taricheae (“Genesis Rabbah 98,17 – ‘And Why Is It Called Gennosar?’ Recent Discoveries at Magdala and Jewish Life on the Plain of Gennosar in the Early Roman Period,” in Talmuda de-Eretz Israel: Archaeology and the Rabbis in Late Antique Palestine [ed. Steven Fine and Aaron Koller; Studia Judaica 73; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2014], 149–50). The proposal of Notley is based on the assumption of a “priestly presence in the plain of Gennesar from the days of John Hyrcanus” (p. 157), combined with David Flusser’s suggested etymology derived from Gen. Rab. 98:17, that Gennesar is a translation of the sentence “gardens of (the) ruler” (‫ גינוסר‬emended to ‫גניסר‬, from ‫גניׂשר‬, i.e. corresponding to Simon and Hyrcanus’s title, ἡγούμενον καὶ ἀρχιερέα, “ruler and high priest,” as in 1 Macc. 14:35. See David Flusser, “Who Is the Ruler of Gennesar?,” in Judaism of the Second Temple Period, (trans. Azzan Yadin; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans; Jerusalem: Hebrew University Magnes Press and Jerusalem Perspectives, 2009), 2:349–50. In our opinion, such an interpretation is suggestive but fairly speculative. As argued by Leibner, “Gennesar was an established place which had already given the lake its name. Thus Gennesar cannot be identified with Majdal” (“Identifying Gennesar,” 238). The two almost contemporary toponyms are mentioned independently as referring to separate entities in the ancient sources, although these texts routinely stress the fertility

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extended north to the fertile Gennesar plain (see J.W. 3.516–521) near the mouth of Wadi Salmon; west to the slopes of Mount Arbel—overhanging the banks of the lake—including the valley of Wadi el-H|amam; and south to the course of the Wadi Abu ‘l-‘Amis (see fig. A). The city played a leading role in the events of the First Jewish Revolt (Josephus Life 96, 127, 132–154, 156–159, 163–164; J.W. 2.573, 596, 599, 632–641), until it was conquered by Roman troops led by Vespasian and Titus in 67 ce (J.W. 3.462–542; 4.1–2). A passage in C. Suetonius, De Vita Caesarum (Titus 4.3), narrating the cursus vitae of Titus, refers to Taricheae and Gamla as having been among the strongest and most politically powerful (validissimas in potestatem) cities of Judea that he defeated, as Josephus also extensively reports (J.W. 3.470–503; 4.70–83). The meaning of the feminine plural term taricheiai (ταριχείαι)—to which the toponym found in the Greek and Latin sources undoubtedly is linked—originates from the verb taricheuō (ταριχεύω), as is also pointed out by Stephanus of Byzantium (Ethnika 603.15, s.v. Ταριχέαι). The noun refers to the “factories for salting fish,”11 or more precisely, the vats used for this purpose called in Latin cetariae, vivaria, or piscinae. In one variant of this toponym (Ταριχέαι), it is important to note the absence of the second iota, as occurs in the hapax legomenon ταριχᾶς, -ᾶ,12 which means a “dealer in salt fish,” a meaning more commonly rendered by ταριχέμπορος, in Latin salsamentarius, that is, a person who sells τάριχος or τάριχον. The τάριχος denotes “meat preserved by salting, pickling, drying, or smoking, especially dried or smoked fish”;13 while the neuter form τάριχον was used in a broader sense, denoting “salami, salted, smoked or dried meat, salted or pickled fish,” as in Latin salsamentum.14 This etymology and Strabo’s statement referring to the high quality of fish for salting (Geogr. 16.2.45)—and, with some doubt, Pliny’s claim that the lake was named after Taricheae (Nat. Hist. 5.71)15—suggests that the economy of the port city depended largely on fishing and fish processing, and that the activities associated with this industry most probably also involved smaller fishing villages, like Capernaum, which lay within its toparchy.16 of the valley, which, at least in part, was presumably under the direct control of Magdala/Taricheae throughout the Late Hellenistic–Late Roman period. 11.  See LSJ, 1758, s.v. τάριχος. Only Pliny (Nat. Hist. 5.71) uses the singular form Tarichea. 12.  Carl Wessely, Studien zur Palaeographie und Papyruskunde (Leipzig: E. Avenarius, 1901–24), 10:113 (IIp).  13.  LSJ, 1758, s.v. τάριχος. 14.  On this, see De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 448–49. 15.  In this passage, Zangenberg (“Observations on the Function,” 453) and Leibner (Settlement and History, 220) see a confirmation of the site’s importance. In contrast, according to Manns (“Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 313), Pliny seems to mistake Taricheae for Tiberias. 16.  Stefano De Luca, “Vorgeschichte, Ursprung und Funktion der byzantinischen Klöster von Kafarnaum/ Tabgha in der Region um den See Gennesaret,” in Tabgha 2012: Festschrift zur Einweihung des neuen Klostergebäudes am 17. Mai 2012 (ed. Benediktinern der Abtei Dormitio und des Priorats; Jerusalem: Emerezian, 2012), 28–32; De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti,” 41; De Luca, “Capernaum,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology (ed. Daniel M. Master; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 1:172.

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Figure A: Topographic Map of the geographical limits of the city’s district and its neighbors, with the main settlements, hill, and wadis. The locations of the excavations in the site are indicated by letters as listed in the text. The Magdala Project excavations cover the area included in the property of the Custodia Terrae Sanctae delimited by the polygonal frame. Realized by S. De Luca and A. Ricci, © Magdala Project 2009, and now updated (by courtesy of the authors). Figure B (p. 285). Joined Maps of the Main Excavations at Magdala. Archaeological Plan from joined maps of the Northern and Southern buildings excavated in the site of Magdala, including the IAA’s Areas A–D uncovered by D. Avshalom-Gorni and A. Najjar on behalf of the IAA (by courtesy of IAA Map and Survey Dept., 2012), the Areas A–E exposed by the University Anáhuac México Sur (UNAM) led by M. Zapata-Meza (by coutesy of M. Zapata-Meza, 2012), and the Magdala Project updated plan of the excavations directed by S. De Luca, in which the building excavated in the 70s on behalf of the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum are also surveyed (by courtesy of S. De Luca and A. Ricci, © Magdala Project 2013). The placing of the maps into a geo-referred grid (N.I.G.) was done by S. De Luca and A. Ricci in 2012 and updated in 2014. Some walls in the northern sector have been approximated with simple lines on the basis of the plans published by IAA and UNAM over time, and on the basis of the map now exposed at the site. The loci as mentioned in the text are reported in the plan.

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Although we lack much information about the fish-trade network, we can reasonably assume that it existed at least on an intraregional scale, because remains of species of lake fish were found in the excavations at Sepphoris.17 It is not clear whether the salted fish being sent to Egypt mentioned in two Zenon papyri are references to fish from Taricheae.18 It must be noted, however, that we lack archaeological evidence supporting the often-quoted statement about the export of salted fish to Rome. Nevertheless, Magdala’s location at the crossroads of main regional trade routes19 may have greatly favored commercial exchanges with the cities of the Decapolis to the east, the coastal centers to the west, and, likely, Syria and Phoenicia to the north. According to Matt. 15:39, after the feeding of the four thousand, Jesus embarks on a boat with his disciples and comes “to the region of Magdala/Magadan” εἰς τὰ ὅρια Μαγδαλά (Textus Receptus) or Μαγαδάν (critical editions). According to Mark 8:10, he comes “to the district of Dalmanoutha” (εἰς τὰ μέρη Δαλμανουθά). Thus, following the tendency already attested in many textual variants and versions of the New Testament from the fourth century onward, commentators also suggest identifying the toponyms Magadan (Μαγαδάν, var. Μαγεδάν)20—a hapax legomenon in Matt. 15:39—and Dalmanoutha (Δαλμανουθά)21 of the Synoptic passage in Mark 8:10 with Magdala. 17. Arlene Fradkin, “Long-Distance Trade in the Lower Galilee: New Evidence from Sepphoris,” in Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods (ed. Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough; South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997), 107–16. 18.  Seán Freyne, The Jesus Movement and Its Expansion: Meaning and Mission (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014), 95 n. 8. Similarly, it is doubtful that the “garum for the king” mentioned in an inscription on an amphora from Masada came from Taricheae, although evidence for Late Roman use of this product in Palestine is also known. See De Luca “La città ellenistico-romana,” 448–49; Stefano De Luca and Anna Lena, “The Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae on the Shores of the Sea of Galilee, from the Hellenistic to the Byzantine Times: New Discoveries and Preliminary Results,” in Byzas 19—Harbors and Harbor Cities in the Eastern Mediterranean from Antiquity to Byzantine Period: Recent Discoveries and Current Approaches. Istanbul, May 30–June 1, 2011 (ed. Sabine Ladstätter, Felix Pirson, and Thomas Schmidts; Istanbul: Ege Yayiniari, 2014), 1:122 n. 59. 19. Leibner, Settlement and History, 14–17. —Editor’s note: see also the maps produced by James F. Strange and digitized by A. D. Riddle in the front matter to this volume; see also James F. Strange, “The Galilean Road System,” in Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods, vol. 1, Life, Culture, and Society (ed. David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014), 263–71. 20.  Μαγδαλα is attested in the majority text, including the Byzantine Koine manuscripts, as well as in the uncial codices Regius L (Paris Ms. Gr. 62 [eighth century]) and Coridethianus Θ (Tiblisi Ms. Gr. 28 [ninth century]); in codices of minuscule families 1 and 13 (f 1.13); and in the Syriac version Harklensis (seventh century). Μαγδαλαν is in the uncials Ephraemi C (Paris Ms. Gr. 9 [fifth century]), Petropolitanus N (Leningrad Ms. Gr. 537 [sixth century]), and Washingtonianus W (Washington Ms 06.274 [fifth century]); in minuscule codices 33 (Paris Ms. Gr. 14 [ninth century]); 565 (Leningrad Ms. Gr. 53 [ninth century]), and 579 (Paris Ms. Gr. 97 [thirteenth century]); Latin codex Monacensis q (München Ms. 6224 [sixth–seventh century]); and in Coptic versions (Mesokemic and Bohairic). See Novum Testamentum Graece (ed. B. Aland, K. Aland, J. Karavidopoulos, C. M. Martini, and B. Metzger; 27th ed.; Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1999), critical apparatus at Matt. 15:39. 21.  Τα ορια Δαλμανουθα is in uncial Petropolitanus N (sixth century) and minuscules 1241 (Sinai Ms. Gr. 260 [twelfth century]), 1424 (Maywood Ms. 152 [ninth–tenth century]), and a few minuscule families. Τo oρoς

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Both readings, Magadan and Magdala, may go back to the same Hebrew word ‫מגדל‬, as is shown by Josh. 15:37 in the Septuagint, where Codex Vaticanus (fourth century) has Μαγαδὰ Γαδ for Μαγδάλ Γαδ of Codex Alexandrinus (fifth century). As is frequently observed, the New Testament phrase “the district of/the part of ” probably refers to a city territory. If the possible explanation that Dalmanutha derives from a corruption of Migdal Nunayya is correct, we are reading about a site with an urban character.22 In addition, scholars understand the epithet of Mary Magdalene (ἡ Μαγδαληνή) in Luke 8:2 (and Matt 27:56, 61; 28:1; Mark 15:40, 47; 16:1, 9; Luke 24:10; John 19:25; 20:1, 18)— referring to Jesus’ female disciple in Christian literature—to be an ethnonym (indicative of geographic origin) derived from that toponym. In the Hebrew Bible, the common word migdāl denotes a “tower,” and by extension also a “fortified citadel,” “tower (standing in some relation with a gate or a wall),” “watchtower,” or a “temple tower,” and the word is therefore attested several times in place names.23 The etymology of the word migdāl (with the same sense in Canaanite) is naturally considered a miqtāl construction from the root gdl, “be large, high,”24 although W. F. Albright alternatively suggested that migdāl may have arisen by metathesis from midgāl, as in the Akkadian madgaltu, “watchtower” or “border post,”25 a meaning that has been supposed for various protohistoric (that is, Bronze and Iron Age) localities.26 In the case of either etymology, however, the toponym would be a good fit for this site. In the Aramaic of the Talmudim,27 the common masculine noun migdāl—also derived from gādal—may designate “tower,” “turret,” “spice chest,” or “store closet.”28 As an Aramaic

Δαλμoυναι is in uncial Washingtonianus W (fifth century). Τo oρoς Μαγεδα is in codex 28 (Paris Ms. Gr. 379 [eleventh century]) and in the Vetus Syra of the Syriac Sinaitic codex (late fourth century). Τα μερη Μαγδαλα is in uncial Coridethianus Θ (ninth century), codices of minuscule families 1 and 13 (f 1.13), and minuscule codices 565 (ninth century) and 2542 (thirteenth century). Τα μερη Μαγεδα is in codex 565 (ninth century) and in the Old Latin version (Itala [third–fourth century]). Τα ορια Μαγαδα is in uncial Bezae D (Cambridge Ms. Gr. II.41 [fifth century]) and in Old Latin codices Aureus (aur, Stockholm Ms. A35 [sixth century]), Colbertinus (c, Paris Ms. 6 [eleventh–twelfth century]), and Bobiensis (k, Torino Ms. 1 [fourth–fifth century]). See Novum Testamentum Graece, 27th ed., critical apparatus at Mark 8:10. 22. Among others, see Leibner, Settlement and History, 229; and Manns, “Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 330–31. 23.  See Diether Kellerman, “‫מגְ ָּדל‬, ִ migdāl,”TDOT, 8:72. 24.  See Kellerman, “‫מגְ ָּדל‬, ִ migdāl,” TDOT, 8:69–73. Cf. ‫ּגָ ַדל‬, gādal, “grow up, became great,” BDB 152 (1431); ‫מגְ ָּדל‬, ִ migdāl, “tower,” “elevated stage,” “raised bed,” BDB 153–154 (4026). 25.  Kellerman, “‫מגְ ָּדל‬, ִ migdāl,” TDOT, 8:70. 26. Aaron A. Burke, “Magdaluma, Migdalîm, Magdoloi, and Majadil: The Historical Geography and Archaeology of the Magdalu (Migdal),” BASOR 346 (2007): 29–57. On el-Mejdel/Magdala, see esp. pp. 34, 42, 51 and pl. 1. 27.  See Gottfried Reeg, Die Ortsnamen Israels nach der rabbinischen Literatur (Beihefte zum Tübinger Atlas des Vorderen Orients, Reihe B, Geistes Wissenschaften 51; Wiesbaden: L. Reichert, 1989), 388–97. 28.  Jastrow, 726, ‫מגְ ָּדל‬. ִ Cf. also Jastrow, 212–213, ‫ ָגּ ַדל‬, “to be high, to grow, be large, tall.”

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proper place noun,29 it occurs in composite toponyms. In compound (Migdal X or Magdala d e–X), it is always followed by an attribute that aids in distinguishing which tower it is: for example, Migdal Gad, Migdal Geder, Migdal Div, Migdal Harub, Migdal Malh\a, Migdal ‘Eder, Migdal Šaršan. Even if it is possible in theory, none of the above-mentioned “Migdals” occurs in rabbinic literature in the absolute form “Magdala,” the only exception being “The Tower” near Tiberias. The passages referring to this tower seem to be the only documented cases in which Magdala, “The Tower”—noticeably with the Aramaic definite article -a (‫א‬-) as suffix30—is not a composite name. Either in the same passages or in the parallel texts, this Magdala often corresponds to the composite form, Migdal-Saba‘ayya, that is, “Tower of the dyers.” We cannot exclude the possibility that the simple determinative form “The Tower” could also originally have been applied to the composite name Migdal Nunayya, although this is never recorded in the Jerusalem Talmud. The fact that Migdal Nunayya appears at the twentieth turn in the Priestly Courses (lists of twenty-four priestly families in Galilee with their villages of residence),31 which were transmitted through the Palestinian liturgical piyyutim (from the sixth century ce onward), indeed suggests that the use of this form may be ancient, because passages that list the Priestly Courses are quoted in the Talmud (y. Ta‘an. 4:6, 68d), showing that they were already well known at least as early as the third century ce. Moreover, although their meanings do not overlap exactly, the Greek/Latin name Taricheae, “factories for salting fish,” and the Aramaic name Migdal Nunayya, “Tower of the fish,” correspond substantially, since both treat fish as the most noteworthy feature of the site. Based on geographical considerations (see below) and on the Arabic preservation of the name el-Mejdel, scholars commonly identify both names with the same site. In 1868, A. Neubauer proposed that Magdala, identified with el-Mejdel,32 was the “general name of the city” that was composed of different parts, each of which had the name “Migdal” followed by a second word, that is, Nunayya or Saba‘ayya. Thus, noting how the books of the Talmud often “confound” Magdala with Migdal Saba‘ayya, he “does not hesitate

29.  Jastrow, 726, ‫מגְ ָדּל‬, ִ ‫מגְ ְדּ ָלא‬, ִ ‫מגְ ְדּ ָלא‬, ַ ‫מוּגְ ְדּ ָלא‬. 30. Leibner, Settlement and History, 229. 31.  On the basis of later piyyutim, Michael Avi Yonah has integrated the Late Roman fragmentary inscription from Caesarea as [M]igdal [Nunayya], reading, “The twentieth priestly course Jehezekel Migdal Nunayya” (“A List of Priestly Courses from Cesarea,” IEJ 12 [1962]: 137–39). The complete mention occurs in a fragment from the Cairo Geniza as follows: “Eze[kiel] Migdal Nunayya twentieth priestly course.” For a full discussion regarding date, inscription documents, and meaning of these liturgical hymns, see Leibner, Settlement and History, 404–19 (on Nunayya, see also p. 229); and Rachel Hachlili, Ancient Synagogues—Archaeology and Art: New Discoveries and Current Research (Handbook of Oriental Studies, Section 1, Ancient Near East 105; Leiden: Brill, 2013), 527–30, for its use in synagogues. 32.  Adolph Neubauer, La géographie du Talmud: Mémoire couronné par l’Académie des inscriptions et belleslettres (Paris: Michel Lévy Fréres, 1868), 217.

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to consider Migdal Saba‘ayya as a part of Magdala.”33 Leibner maintains the identification Taricheae–Magdala/Migdal Nunayya–el-Mejdel, assuming that Magdala may well be a simple shortened form for Migdal Nunayya.34 Consequently, it seems that both of the composite place names could relate to the same city called “The Tower.” To determine to what this “tower” might refer, we must take into account the fact that the majority of the texts were composed in nearby Tiberias. Presumably, people knew about this tower. Although it is not clear how “fish” or “dyers” may have practical connections to the towers ordinarily built for agricultural purposes or related to fortifications, some edifices, to which the word “tower” could refer, were found at the site: for example, the Hasmonean tower port or the castellum aquae, A1 (both of them dating to the Late Hellenistic–Early Roman phase). However, considering that this is the only case in which Magdala—perhaps in the local pronunciation Mugdala35—also appears without specifications, we cannot exclude the possibility that the term refers to the grand limestone cliff at Arbel, towering over the city to the west and southwest with its unmistakable profile (see Josephus J.W. 3.486 and the discussion below). Clearly identifying the city’s location from any point on the lake, this cliff may in fact have been the source of the various toponyms associated with the city.  That is, it was the nearby towering cliff that was “The Tower” identifying the location of the city, which could then be qualified by the modifier “of fish” (or the “Fish-Tower”), and also of “the dyers” (or the “Dyers’ Tower”), or, if it were relevant, by any other important activity that took place within the city. Therefore, as Neubauer proposed,36 it is highly probable that both names identified two areas of the same city near the natural rocky “tower” of the Arbel cliff (fig. E): the area lying on the lake coast (Nunayya) with its port infrastructures, and the northern and/or western quarter (Saba‘ayya) with its industrial installations. Note that one of the meanings proposed for the New Testament’s Magadan, “highland”—“from the stem ‫נגד‬, “to be conspicuous,” with a locative -‫ מ‬prefix, having the nuance of the Arabic cognate najd, “high or elevated land”37—may in fact refer to the topography of the area in which Magdala was located, in particular the presence of the Arbel cliff. The increase in archaeological investigations of the area (see figs. A and B) has further strengthened the identification of the city of Taricheae/Magdala with the site of el-Mejdel. 33.  Ibid., 218, 259. 34. Leibner, Settlement and History, 229. 35.  For these observations, we are in debtde to Richard Bauckham, who compiled a complete list of rabbinic references for a forthcoming essay (“Magdala in Rabbinic Literature,” in Magdala, Jewish City of Fish [ed. Richard Bauckham and Stefano De Luca; Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, forthcoming]), and with whom we discussed at length some of these text’s implications. 36.  Also Manns, “Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 329; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 437. 37.  Thomas F. McDaniel, Clarifying Baffling Biblical Passages (Wynnewood, Pa.: n.p., 2007), 346. “All three (Magadan, Magdala, Dalmanutha) point to the same general area: Dalmanutha was the Sailors’ Wall at the tower of Magdala—that particular Magdala which was in the region of Magadan, i.e., the one near the highland of Mount Arbel” (pp. 352–53). Cf. De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 437.

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Figure E. An aerial view of Magdala landscape from the east looking west, with the Arbel cliff and the pass of Wadi H|amam. By courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project, photo SkyView, 2010.

Several discoveries document the historical time frame and the size of the settlement between the Late Hellenistic and Byzantine periods. Despite its urban character,38 the site witnessed a progressive decrease in the number of its inhabitants during Late Roman times until the city was almost totally abandoned after the 363 ce earthquake. As indicated by some mosaic motifs39 and buildings at the site, beginning in the second half of the fourth century, the place became a destination in the region’s flourishing Chris-

38. Leibner, Settlement and History, 221–29; De Luca, “Urban Development of the City of Magdala/ Tarichaeae in the Light of the New Excavations: Remains, Problems and Perspectives,” in Symposium Greco-Roman Galilee (21st–23rd June 2009, Tel H|ai Academic College—Kinneret College—Macalester College—Carthage College), forthcoming; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 441–45. 39.  All the geometrical themes of the mosaics of the monastic complex (M6 and M12–M18; see Virgilio Corbo, “Scavi archeologici a Magdala (1971–1973),” LASBF 24 [1974]: 5–37) appear already in the Severus synagogue at H|amath Tiberias (dated to the end of third century ce or more probably to the late fourth century ce). Some of them accord with a geometrical style known from the fourth to fifth centuries; a mosaic of closely parallel style was found in in the church recently discovered northwest of the “Civic Basilica” of Tiberias (probably late fourth century ce, on the basis of the inscriptions and style). In addition, the aqueduct was apparently built

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tian pilgrimage network,40 which was later organized around a fortified monastery41 built in the southern sector of the site to commemorate Mary Magdalene’s hometown42 or house.43 Considering the general lack of documents concerning the Christian sites of the Galilee in late antiquity,44 it is not surprising that the written sources referring to pilgrimage at Magdala started only in the sixth century. Topographic Questions Since the nineteenth century, scholars have debated whether Taricheae was located south45 or north46 of Tiberias. This is not the proper place to summarize this historical and topographical slightly before the 363 ce earthquake and was restored after a few years, in the late fourth century, probably to supply the monastic compound, which included workshops and baths that made use of water. 40.  See De Luca, “Vorgeschichte, Ursprung und Funktion der byzantinischen Klöster,” 44–47. 41.  See Ermanno Arslan, “Dall’Italia a Magdala in Terrasanta: Un pellegrino del V secolo e le sue monete,” in One Land, Many Cultures: Archaeological Studies in Honour of Stanislao Loffreda OFM (ed. G. Claudio Bottini, Leah Di Segni, and L. Daniel Chrupcała; SBF Collection Maior 41; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 2003; Leibner, Settlement and History, 228, 234; Corbo, “Scavi archeologici a Magdala (1971–1973),” 7–18; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 439–40. 42.  The city is commemorated as Mary Magdalene’s place of birth in earlier Byzantine texts—Theodosius (530 ce), Willibald (723 ce), Theodoric (1172 ce). See Donato Baldi, Enchiridion Locorum Sanctorum: Documenta S. Evangelii loca respicentia (2nd ed.; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1982), 364–65, 373. 43. The domus Magdalenae is mentioned in later medieval texts—by Epiphanius the Monk (ninth century), by the anonymous author of Sanctae Helenae et Constantini Vita (tenth–eleventh century), by Abbot Daniel (1106 ce), and by Burchard of Mount Sion (1283 ce). See Baldi, Enchiridion Locorum Sanctorum, 366–67, 369, 374. Other Crusader’s texts are listed in De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 439–40, and De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 124. 44.  See De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 439; and esp. Jürgen K. Zangenberg, “From the Galilean Jesus to the Galilean Silence: Earliest Christianity in the Galilee until the 4th Century C.E.,” in The Rise and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries of the Common Era (ed. Clare K. Rothschild and Jens Schröter; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013). 45.  Among others who proposed a southern location, thus pointing to the ruins of Kerak (Beth Yerah) or Sennabris, were Edward Robinson (Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai, and Arabia Petraea [London: John Murray, 1841], 2:387), Victor Guérin (Description géographique, historique et archéologique de la Palestine, part 3, Galilee [Paris: Imprimé par autorisation de l’empereur à l’Impr. Impériale, 1880], 1:275–85), Claude R. Conder (“Notes from the Memoir,” Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement 9, no. 1 [1877]: 181; Conder, “Notes on the Position of Taricheae,” Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement 10, no. 4 [1878]: 190–91), Hermann Guthe (“Zur Lage von Taricheä,” ZDPV 13 [1890]: 281–85), and Ernest W. G. Masterman (“The Galilee of Josephus: The Question of Gabara, Jotapata and Taricheae,” Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement 42, no. 4 [1910]: 268–80). 46. A northern location was suggested by Charles W. Wilson (“The Sites of Taricheae and Bethsaida,” Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement 9, no. 1 [1877]: 10–13), who first singled out the village of el-Mejdel. Having considered Josephus’s description of the city’s capture by the Romans (J.W. 3.443–542), he concluded, “We have at Mejdel all the requirements of Josephus’s narrative; it lies at the foot of a hill like Tiberias;

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debate, which has been one of the most complicated on the subject of this area.47 Therefore, the section that follows addresses only the main critical points based on the sources that have recently been proposed. Taricheae The two literary sources in question are: (1) Naturalis historia 5.71–72 of Pliny the Elder, who clearly placed Taricheae a meridie, that is, on the southern shore of the lake; (2) and Flavius Josephus’s Life 157, where he gives a distance of “30 stadia” (approximately 5.5 km) between Tiberias and Taricheae, not specifying a direction. Regarding Pliny, the confusion in that passage—attested throughout the entire work, which never underwent final revisions by its author—remains quite problematic, making it hardly acceptable as a geographic source, in spite of the many modern scholarly attempts to rehabilitate the geographical coordinates within an internal logic.48

it appears at one time to have extended to the Lake; the beach is admirably suited for drawing up war galleys; there is some level ground to the south on which the fight may have taken place; the cliff overhanging the landward face of the town would enable the archers ‘to repel those that were upon the wall,’ and the shallowness of the Lake at this point would be favourable to the form of attack adopted by Titus” (p. 13). His opinion was supported by Horatio H. Kitchener (“Lieutenant Kitchener’s Reports II: Camp at Tiberias 30th March, 1877,” Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement 9, no. 3 [1877]: 120; Kitchener, “Notes on Taricheae,” Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement 10, no. 2 [1878]: 79; Kitchener, “Survey of Galilee,” Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement 10, no. 4 [1878]: 165), Konrad Furrer (“Die Ortschaften am See Genezaret,” ZDPV 2 [1879]: 55–57; Furrer, “Taricheae und Gamla,” ZDPV 12 [1889]: 145–48; Furrer, “Noch einmal das Emmaus des Josephus, das Hammat der Bibel, Hammata des Talmud am See Genezaret,” ZDPV 13 [1890]: 194–98), Friedrich Spiess (“Die Lage von Taricheä,” ZDPV 8 [1885]: 95–99), Wilhelm Oehler (“Die Ortschaften und Grenzen Galiläas nach Josephus,” ZDPV 28 [1905]: 11–20), Samuel Klein (Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas [Leipzig: R. Haupt, 1909], 76–84), Gustaf Dalman (“Die Zeltreise,” Palästina-Jahrbuch [1912]: 36–37; Dalman, Orte und Wege Jesu [Gütersloh: C. Bertelsmann, 1921], 114), and several other scholars. The influential paper of William Foxwell Albright (“Contributions to the Historical Geography of Palestine,” AASOR 2–3 [1921–22]: 29–46) was a decisive landmark in the research. Albright took an authoritative position in favor of the northern location: “Happily it is unnecessary to add a new theory to those already proposed by others, since almost every site on the western coast of the lake, not preoccupied by a town like Tiberias or Capernaum, has been claimed for Taricheae” (p. 30). He revealed his methodology in his “conviction that the new archaeological material, combined with a more thorough sifting of the literary evidence, will turn the scales, and definitely overthrow the Hirbet Kerak hypothesis” (p. 31). 47. Manns (“Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 307–11) has summarized well the history of these fluctuations in the quest of the identification (see also Albright, “Contributions to the Historical Geography of Palestine,” 29–46; Leibner Settlement and History, 217–18), which Danny Syon efficaciously illustrates in a synoptic table about the topography of Gamla, Taricheae, and Hippos from 1845 to 1976 (“The Identification of Gamla,” in Gamla II: The Shmarya Gutmann Excavations 1976–1989. The Architecture [ed. Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor; IAA Reports 44; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2010], 5). 48.  Kokkinos, “Location of Tarichaea,” 8–9.

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Accordingly, when all of Josephus’s accounts of Vespasian’s military maneuvers are carefully examined, only a northern location for Taricheae is sensible.49 That claim is based on the following textual and topographical evidence. (a) After negotiating the submission of Tiberias (Josephus J.W. 3.447–60), Vespasian and his army entered the south gate and passed through the city (J.W. 3.460). Thence, he “continued” (προελθών) the march—evidently northward—along the existing road (see J.W. 3.537; Life 276).50 At a chosen point “between” (μεταξύ) Tiberias and Taricheae, he “pitched camp” (στρατοπεδεύεται; J.W. 3.462). By his order, this camp “was fortified more strongly” than usual (τειχίζει τε τὴν παρεμβολὴν ὀχυρωτέραν; J.W. 3.462). This is because Vespasian expected a long struggle, on account of “all the rebels” (πᾶν τὸ νεωτερίζον) who had gathered in Taricheae (see J.W. 3.445, 457), relying on this city’s strong defense (J.W. 3.463–466; Life 156, 188). (b) A potential site for a convenient encampment “between” (μεταξύ) Tiberias and Taricheae was guaranteed in the large plain to the southwest of Taricheae and to the east of Irbid/ Arbela. This site had (1) high ground all around; (2) easy access to the lake; (3) control of the heights, including the promontory of Arbel; (4) access to and control of the natural roads (the Wadi Arbel and Wadi Salmon routes) for an encirclement maneuver by land; (5) drinking water supplied by the wadis; (6) abundant pasture for horses; and (7) availability of fieldstones and an abundance of woodland (ἀφθονίᾳ τε ὕλης; J.W. 3.55). (c) On the whole, the Roman military strategy for the siege of Taricheae appears to have been a perfect encirclement maneuver.51 The fortified camp of the army barred the escape route to the south (J.W. 3.462). The west side was occupied by two thousand archers stationed “upon the mountain that was over against the city” (τὸ ἀντικρὺ τῆς πόλεως ὄρος), that is, the Arbel cliff that indeed overlooks the site (J.W. 3.486). From this location, the archers led by Antonius Silo

49.  Wilson (“Sites of Taricheae and Bethsaida”), Albright (“Contributions to the Historical Geography of Palestine,” 29–46), and Manns (“Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 314–20) have basically also argued some of the following observations. Morten H. Jensen, who is preparing an accurate study of the role of Taricheae in the Jewish Revolt (“Magdala/Taricheae and the Jewish Revolt,” in Magdala, Jewish City of Fish [ed. Bauckham and De Luca; Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, forthcoming]), also shares this approach. 50. It is very difficult to imagine a march of the three legions (V Macedonica, X Fretrensis, and XV Apollinaris) transporting all the equipment along a single road. The breaking down of the south city gate— freestanding, since no proper Roman city walls were revealed in connection to it—was probably necessary to widen the entrance bridge that crossed the wadi, which comes from the Yavniel plateau and runs in front of the city gate to a depth, here, of c. 3 m (see Moshe Hartal, Edna Amos, and Avner Hillman, “Tiberias, Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 122 [2010]: http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1574&mag_id=117). The bulk of military equipment could be easily transported via the lake, following a water path parallel to the ground road for a strategy of mutual security. In any case, a march inside the city likely had a deterrent purpose and was a practical strategy to isolate the city, preventing contact with nearby settlements. One should not, however, exclude the possibility that, as a precaution, all the city’s flanks were well guarded by groups of soldiers deployed on each side, including the hills and the lake. 51.  Cf. similar intention of Vespasian to surround (κυκλώσασθαι) Gamla in J.W. 4.12.

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could also easily guard the passage of Wadi Arbel,52 through which the six hundred horsemen of the cavalry headed by Titus deployed53 into the northern “plain before the city” (ἐν τῷ πρὸ τῆς πόλεως πεδίῳ),54 forcing the rebels assembled there to retreat back within the walls (J.W. 3.470, 487–491). Thus, taking advantage of the low seasonal level of the lake,55 Titus rushed to attack the lakefront from the east, which remained the only viable way out (J.W. 3.487–501). The following day, at the signal, the military rafts of Vespasian (J.W. 3.505) quickly sailed from the coast southeast of the city (where there is a good view of the stretch of water alongside) and engaged in the bloody final naval battle, catching those who tried to escape on the lake (J.W. 3.522–531). Because it was a harbor city, the Roman strategy anticipated the Taricheans’ use of boats, given that some boats had already played a role in the preparatory stages, first against Tiberias (J.W. 2.365–645) and then against the Roman army (J.W. 3.466–469).56 (d) From this circumstantial information, it does not seem reasonable to assume that the camp fortified “between” the two cities in anticipation of the siege of Taricheae (J.W. 3.462) should be identified with the camp built in the place named Ammathus after the existing village situated “in front of Tiberias” (J.W. 4.11). After a minimum time span of three weeks had elapsed (see J.W. 4.83), this latter camp was established in H|amath Tiberias expressly in order to benefit from the therapeutic effects of the thermae, “because therein is a spring of warm water, useful for healing” (ἔστι γὰρ ἐν αὐτῇ πηγὴ θερμῶν ὑδάτων πρὸς ἄκεσιν ἐπιτηδείων). Thus Vespasian’s purpose was to regain strength and treat the wounded soldiers before the new Roman military operation against Gamla started. Moreover, in J.W. 4.1, Gamla is said to lie “opposite” the city of Taricheae, “on the other side of the lake” (ἄντικρυς ὑπὲρ τὴν λίμνην), a piece of topographical information that fits perfectly with the site of el-Mejdel but is hardly compatible with a southern location.

52.  For a troop of horsemen, the most convenient regional routes were through the passes of Wadi Arbel to the west, and Wadi Salmon to the northwest (see “B.3 Wadi Arbel Route” and “B.2 Wadi Z\almon Route” in Leibner, Settlement and History, 14–15, 198). 53.  That is, efficiently deployed (παρεκτείναντες) along the front of the enemies (J.W. 3.487), thus requiring enough space on the plain. The six hundred Titus’s selected horsemen (J.W. 3.470), in fact, were joined by a reinforcement of four hundred horsemen led by the commander of Legio X, Trajan (J.W. 3.485) who arrived later from northwest, presumably, through the Wadi Salmon route. 54.  The Wadi Arbel issued into the area north of the synagogue, where archaeologists have revealed a broad band of alluvium and a massive ductwork system (Dina Avshalom-Gorni and Arfan Najjar, “Migdal: Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 125 [2013]: http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=2304&mag_id=120). The northern area “was part of the agricultural land” and “the meager building remains” excavated therein “might have been farm buildings or agricultural storerooms” (Cinamon, “Migdal: Final Report”), suggesting that the fertile Gennesar plain was used for agricultural purposes (see J.W. 3.506, 516–521). 55.  On the basis of the time frame indicated—“the eighth day of the month Gorpiaeus” (J.W. 3.542), that is, around the end of September 67 ce, when the lake normally reaches its lowest seasonal elevation. 56.  In addition, the dynamic of the rapid incursion by boats (σκάφη), made by a group of rebels, while the military sappers were fortifying the walls of the camp (J.W. 3.467–469), adequately fits with such a location (see Albright, “Contributions to the Historical Geography of Palestine,” 38).

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(e) It is clear that the fortified camp in J.W. 3.362 must not be confused with the provisional encampment placed at the statio Sinnabris57 (J.W. 3.447), some “30 stadia” (approximately 5.5 km) from Tiberias. On the southwestern coast, in fact, the homonymous village of Sinnabray (‫)צינבריי‬/Sennabris (Senn en-Nabra) existed close to Beth Yerah (see y. Meg. 1:1, 70a). In confirmation of this distance, according to the work of Yaqût al-H|amawi (3.410) in 1224, es-Sinnabra lay exactly 3 Arab miles (5.7 km) from Tiberias.58 (f ) To place Taricheae “30 stadia” south of Tiberias, it would be necessary to relocate the “village” of Sinnabris elsewhere, which is indeed what Kokkinos does. He argues that Sinnabris was west of Tiberias, in the valley southwest of H|ittin, because in J.W. 4.455 Josephus locates Sinnabris “in the Great Plain” (τὸ μέγα πεδίον), an expression that Kokkinos assumes always refers to the Plain of Esdraelon or Jezreel Valley, including its extension off Scythopolis.59 Josephus does not, in fact, confine the designation “the Great Plain” to the Jezreel Valley.60 In Ant. 4.100, for instance, he recounts that “Moses led his forces down towards the Jordan and encamped in the Great Plain over against Jericho” (ἐπὶ τῷ Ἰορδάνῳ κατὰ τὸ μέγα πεδίον Ἱεριχοῦντος ἀντικρύ), patently a reference to the Jordan Valley. In J.W. 4.451–458, likewise, Josephus mentions Jericho at both the beginning (J.W. 4.451) and end (J.W. 4.459) of a digression that is clearly devoted to a description of the Jordan Valley, “which is called the Great Plain” (τὸ μέγα πεδίον καλεῖται) (J.W. 4.455). After describing the north–south parallel ranges running along each side of the Jordan River—locating the northernmost point of the western range at Julias/Bethsaida, north of the lake, and the northernmost point of the eastern range in the territory of Scythopolis, south of Kokkinos’s proposed location for Sinnabris (J.W. 4.452–454) (as Kokkinos himself recognizes but dismisses)61—Josephus then situates “the Great Plain” of the Jordan Valley within the “region between these two mountain ranges” (ἡ μέση δὲ τῶν δύο ὀρέων χώρα) (J.W. 4.455), and adds that this region “extends from the village of Sinnabris to Lake Asphaltites [the Dead Sea]” (ἀπὸ κώμης Γινναβρὶν διῆκον μέχρι 57.  Ἔνναβρις, var. Δενναβρις, emend. Σινναβρις. 58.  See Yardenna Alexandre, “Tel Bet Yerah: The Bridge to el-Sinnabra. Final Report,” HA-ESI 126 (2014): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/Report_Detail_Eng.aspx?id=13670&mag_id=121. 59.  Kokkinos, “Location of Tarichaea,” 14–15. For the enhancement of this paragraph we are hugely in debt to Sharon Lea Mattila. She generously shared with us her own in-depth analysis of the occurrences of the “Great Plain” in Josephus, which has corroborated further the arguments presented here. 60.  It is true that there are thirteen instances when Josephus clearly means the Jezreel Valley when referring to the “Great Plain” (J.W. 2.232, 595; 3.39, 48; 4.54; Ant. 8.36; 12.348; 14.207; 15.294; 20.118; Life 115, 126, 318). But, in addition to the two occasions mentioned here where he uses this designation to refer to the Jordan Valley, he also uses it with reference to the Plain of Asochis (Life 207), the coastal plain near the Phoenician city of Sidon (Ant. 5.178), the coastal plain around Ptolemais (J.W. 2.188), and “the Great Plain of Babylon” (Ant. 10.213). In general, Josephus seems not to hesitate to dub any plain or valley of large extent τὸ μέγα πεδίον, and μέγα is indeed his preferred adjective when he wishes to convey the fact that such an area is at all extensive. 61.  Kokkinos insists that Josephus had in mind part of the Jezreel Valley in this passage when using the designation “the Great Plain,” “irrespective of the mountain range in the west which Josephus started only from the territory of Scythopolis” (“Location of Tarichaea,” 15).

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τῆς Ἀσφαλτίτιδος).62 Josephus thus clearly locates Sinnabris in the Jordan Valley, next to the ancient southern outlet of the Sea of Galilee into the Jordan River, near Beth Yerah (cf. y. Ber. 51a).63 (g) Furthermore, according to J.W. 3.446, the southern part of the toparchy of Tiberias (see Ant. 20.158–159; J.W. 2.252) was a “neighbor” of the territory of Scythopolis, leaving no place here for a southern Taricheae and the surrounding villages under its administrative control. Only a northern location of Taricheae is consistent with the distribution map of Lower Galilee’s four toparchies, assuming that Taricheae’s toparchy bordered the territories of Tiberias on the south, of Julias/Bethsaida (in Gaulanitis) on the north, of Sepphoris on the southwest, and probably of Gabara on the west. (h) Finally, additional confirmation comes from the events narrated in Life 398–406, which explain how the city became the headquarters of the rebels and a safe refuge for Josephus himself, as suggested in Life 404. These events support a location of Taricheae’s boundaries on the same coast on which Capernaum lay. Magdala/Migdal Saba‛ayya Recently, Joan Taylor suggested that Magdala was a short form of Migdal Nunayya;64 she assumed, however, that Migdal Saba‘ayya should be located in Judea. The literary evidence adduced in support of that hypothesis65 does not appear sufficient; rather, the texts point to a Galilean location. Y. Ma‘as. Š. 5:2, 56b, in a haggadic style, deals with Niqqay of Migdal Saba‘ayya (cf. Lam. Rab. 3:8.3, which mentions Magdala) but also with Tartiroi of Mahalul (a village close to Sepphoris), and a woman from Sepphoris. Although all three travel to Jerusalem within one day, we cannot infer that any of these places lay in close proximity to Jerusalem. In fact, these places are evidently all in Galilee, as are Kabul, Shikhin, and Migdal Saba‘ayya, according to y. Ta‘an. 4:5, 69a. The parallel passage in Lam. Rab. 2:2.4, 21c presents the analogous literary triple formula of the Galilean places: Kabul, Shikhin, and Magdala. This order follows the geographic locations of these places from west to east and may also reflect 62.  When Josephus provides the overall length of the Jordan Valley as “1,200 stadia” (about 222 km) (J.W. 4.456), he means to include the length of the two lakes, given that he writes immediately afterward, “it [the “Great Plain” of the Jordan Valley] is intersected by the Jordan and contains both the Ashphaltitis and the Tiberas lakes” (μέσον ὑπὸ τοῦ Ἰορδάνου τέμνεται λίμνας τε ἔχει τήν τε Ἀσφαλτῖτιν καὶ τὴν Τιβεριέων) (J.W. 4.456), an overall length that, as Kokkinos concedes, “is indeed about 219 km as the crow flies” (“Location of Tarichaea,” 14). Yet Kokkinos insists, in support of his relocation of Sinnabris, that Josephus must here be referring to the distance between Sinnabris and the Dead Sea (“Location of Tarichaea,” 14–15). 63.  Everything Josephus writes in J.W. 4.451–459 quite unambiguously concerns the Jordan Valley, and only the Jordan Valley, which he moreover characterizes as being “wholly without water, apart from the Jordan” (πᾶν γὰρ ἄνυδρον πλὴν τοῦ Ἰορδάνου) (J.W. 4.458), scarcely a reference to any part of the Jezreel Valley. 64.  Taylor, “Missing Magdala,” 211–12. 65.  Ibid., 209–10, 221–22.

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the order of their destruction as the Roman army moved from west to east during the Second Revolt.66 A number of texts reporting traditions regarding Shim‘on bar Yoh\ai mention Magdala or, alternatively, Migdal Saba‘ayya. For example, Gen. Rab. 79:6 narrates the legendary route of this rabbi, following the purification of Tiberias, from the capital (see y. Šeb. 9:1, 38d) to the Beit Netofa valley. The rabbi passed along the existing road, which is likely the Wadi Arbel route67 through Migdal Saba‘ayya, where he spoke with Niqqay the scribe. The circumstances of this encounter help us to identify Magdala somewhere near Tiberias and the Wadi Arbel. In 2004, Leibner proposed identifying Migdal Saba‘ayya with Khirbet Wadi H|amam.68 Later, studying some variants in the rabbinic literature, he proposed a different location at Tel Duwer in the Yarmuk area.69 As a result of his excavation at Kh. H|amam, however, he is now inclined rather to return to his earlier identification. Because this settlement, placed only 2 km inland from the coastal site, is plausibly a suburb of the same city, which likely stretched west, his recent opinion is largely acceptable.70 An additional topographic indication may be inferred from the tradition about Rabbi Shimon ben Laqish, who flees from Tiberias to Mugdala—“some say to kefar H|ittayya,” that is, H|ittin—narrated both in y. Hor. 3:1, 47a, and y. Sanh. 2:1, 19d. Taylor suggests reading here Migdal Nunayya, although the version of the same story in Midrash Samuel 7:5 contains the place name Migdal Saba‘ayya.71 It should be noted, however, that, according to the narrative, the rabbi was actually escaping from the “Goths” (troops) sent by R. Yehudah ha-Nasi. Hence, he probably sailed from Tiberias by boat, just as Josephus had done (Life 96; J.W. 2.618–619). Likewise, the traditions that acacia wood in Magdala (Cant. Rab. 1:12.1, 12a)—or Migdal Saba‘ayya (y. Pesah\. 4:1, 30d; y. Ta‘an.1:6, 64c)—should not be used in daily jobs out of respect “to the holiness of the ark,” and the traditions concerning pigeons (Lam. Rab. 2:2.4, 21d) or weavers (y. Ta‘an. 4:5, 69a) do not imply by necessity a close propinquity to the Temple Mount. They simply refer to a populated and prosperous settlement in Galilee (cf. Lam. Rab. 2:2.4, 21c) with synagogal buildings (cf. esp. y. Meg. 3:1, 73d; see also mentions of a scribe72 or schoolmaster Niqqai/Minqai73). 66.  See Leibner, Settlement and History, 277–78; 414 n. 30, and esp. 342 n. 36; Manns, “Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 326. 67.  See Leibner, Settlement and History, 197–98. 68.  Uzi Leibner, “History of Settlements in Eastern Galilee during the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods in Light of an Archaeological Survey” (in Hebrew; PhD diss., Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, 2004). 69.  Uzi Leibner, “A Galilean-Geographical Midrash on the Journey of Job’s Land” (in Hebrew), Cathedra 120 (2006): 34–54. We would like to thank Uzi Leibner for sharing his results with us and for a fruitful discussion about some relevant data from the sites in question. 70.  De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti,” 77, 79. See also the article “Khirbet Wadi H|amam in the Early and Middle Roman Periods,” by Uzi Leibner in this volume, pp. 343–61. 71.  Cf. Manns, “Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 325 n. 48. 72. Cf. y. Ma‘as. Š. 5:2, 56b; y. Šeb. 9:1, 38d; Gen. Rab. 79:6; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 11:16; Eccl. Rab. 10:8.1, 27a. 73. Cf. Lam. Rab. 3:8, 3.

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In b. Pesah\. 46a, it is written that the time it takes to walk from Migdal Nunayya to Tiberias is the time necessary for the “dough to rise,” and that the equivalent distance between the two cities is close to “a mile.” This matter is used by Albright,74 followed by Taylor,75 to demonstrate that the site in question should be located close to Tell Raqqat/Kh. Kaneitriyeh nearby Wadi Abu ‘l-‘Amis (cf. fig. A). The problem, however, is that there are no Roman remains nearby.76 The presence of a mausoleum77 also excludes the possibility that it was close to an inhabited area. Uzi Leibner has demonstrated convincingly that the original text, from the Palestinian tradition, stated that it was a four-mile walk.78 In fact, “four miles” are mentioned in all of the additional teachings that follow the same discussion; moreover, y. Pesah\. 3:2, 30a, clearly establishes that the time needed for the dough to rise is the same as a four-mile walk.79 Thus, calculated in kilometers, the four miles of the text accord well with the “30 stadia” of Josephus (Life 157) and consequently with the location at el-Mejdel. In conclusion, Migdal Nunayya corresponds to Taricheae, the ruins of which are revealed at el-Mejdel. The texts also suggest that the Jewish town called Migdal Saba‘ayya is to be located in the same place as Nunayya/el-Mejdel, and that it cannot be placed near Jerusalem in Judea. So Nunayya and Saba‘ayya are likely to be two names applied—probably at different times—to the same town, called Magdala. Perhaps this name, “The Tower,” refers to the promontory of Arbel towering over the site, or to some monumental tower that gave the name to two distinct areas of the same settlement, named Taricheae in the Greek and Latin sources. A careful reading of the text of Josephus does not recommend locating Taricheae south of Tiberias, while its location “30 stadia” north of Tiberias coheres well with the ancient literature, with Vespasian’s military strategy, and with the results of the excavations.

74.  Albright, “Contributions to the Historical Geography of Palestine,” 43–44. The argument of Albright on this point is based on y. ‘Erub. 5:1, 22c, a text that seems to combine information from y. ‘Erub. 4:16 dealing with Migdal Geder (Gadara). See Manns, “Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 322–23. 75.  Taylor, “Missing Magdala,” 212. 76.  Moshe Hartal, “Tiberias, Survey of the Northern Entrance,” HA-ESI 120 (2008): http://www.hadashotesi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=778&mag_id=114. In a personal communication, Uzi Leibner, who also carried out an archaeological survey in the area, confirmed the complete absence of Roman potsherds. 77.  Fanny Vitto, “A Jewish Mausoleum of the Roman Period at Qiryat Shemu’el, Tiberias,” ‘Atiqot 58 (2008): 7*–29*. Located in the Qiryat Shemu’el quarter of Tiberias, this burial complex, which was dated to the end of the first or the early second century ce, represents “the westernmost tomb of the Jewish cemetery of Roman Tiberias discovered to date” (p. 7*). 78. Leibner, Settlement and History, 218–19 and n. 84. 79.  Alternatively, in the same passage of b. Pesah\. 46a, Manns (“Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 327) considers the possibility that the letter ‫ ד‬of ‫ דמיל‬could have the numerical value of four, as is implied by the parallel passage of y. ‘Erub. 5, 22d. Nevertheless such an observation seems not sufficiently supported by the linguistics because the letter ‫ ד‬here is clearly a relative pronoun.

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Archaeological Results Excavations The following list of the excavations80 also delineates the extension of the city that at times stretched over an area of at least ten hectares.81 (Refer to fig. A for their locations on the map.) Southernmost Sector. The cemetery located south of the archaeological site, which has not been investigated so far, can be taken as the southernmost border of the urban plan (fig. A: m).82 On behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), in 1992 Hanaa Abu-‘Uqsa exposed a square building of uncertain function (Area B1; cf. fig. A: b), two caldaria, and an apsed frigidarium probably belonging to the Byzantine monastery (upon which the village of el-Mejdel was later built), which during the Early Islamic period were covered by geometric mosaics uncertainly belonging to a chapel (Area B2; cf. fig. A: b).83 In 2002, more soundings were carried out by Mordechai Aviam and Abu-‘Uqsa (IAA) south of the monastic compound, uncovering walls of the Crusader period and other findings from the Roman to the Crusader period (Areas C and D; cf. fig. A: c–d).84 In 2006, Dina Avshalom-Gorni (IAA) carried out a salvage excavation along the modern aqueduct path to the south of the previous digs and corresponding to the southernmost known part of the site. She uncovered settlement remains with a number of buildings dating from the Hellenistic to the Late Roman period (second/first centuries bce–third century ce) with storerooms, installations, and domestic finds (including fishing implements), separated by an east–west street (fig. A: e).85 In 2007, another sounding by Avshalom-Gorni (IAA) discovered medieval remains possibly connected to sugar manufacturing, an activity that was documented in the region during the Crusader and Mamluk periods (fig. A: f).86 80.  See Leibner, Settlement and History, 215–17; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 346–47, pls. 2–3; De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 1:120, fig. 2; Meztli Hernández Grajales, “Taricheae o la antigua ciudad de María de Magdala,” in El Pensador monográficos 1.5, El proyecto arqueológico Magdala: Interpretaciones preliminares bajo una perspectiva interdisciplinar (ed. Marcela Zapata-Meza and Rosaura Sanz-Rincón; 2013), 15–16, 18–19, fig. 5, http://issuu.com/revistaelpensador/docs/el_pensador_n___5. 81. Leibner, Settlement and History, 214; De Luca, “Urban Development”; De Luca, “La città ellenisticoromana,” 441–42; De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti,” 78–79. 82. See Bellarmino Bagatti, Ancient Christian Villages of Galilee (SBF Collectio Minor 37; Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 2001), fig. 33; Leibner, Settlement and History, 215–16, fig. 76; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 441, 450, figs. 134–35. 83.  Hanaa Abu-‘Uqsa, “The Findings from Two Excavations at Migdal” (in Hebrew), ‘Atiqot 42 (2001): 16*–25*, 321; Danny Syon, “The Coins from Migdal” (in Hebrew), ‘Atiqot 42 (2002): 33*–36*. In fact, the decoration with a “cross” may be part of a geometric reticular pattern. 84.  Hanaa Abu-‘Uqsa, “Migdal. Final Report,” HA-ESI 117 (2005): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_ detail_eng.asp?id=238&mag_id=110. 85.  Dina Avshalom-Gorni, “Migdal. Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 121 (2009): http://www.hadashot-esi. org.il/report_detail_eng.asp?id=1236&mag_id=115. 86.  See, for example, Edna J. Stern, “The Excavations at Lower Horbat Manot: A Medieval SugarProduction Site,” ‘Atiqot 42 (2001): 277 fig. 1; Stern, “Sugar Production in the Lake of Galilee Region as Revealed

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Figure C. Magdala Project Excavation Updated Map. Synchronic Map of the remains uncovered during the SBF and Magdala Project’s excavations in the land owned by the Custodia Terrae Sanctae. The Map was drawn by the Magdala Project team (cf. De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 344–46, 348) and digitized by S. De Luca and A. Ricci, © Magdala Project 2014.

Southern Sector. During the 1970s (1971, 1973–1975, 1977), Virgilio Corbo and Stanislao Loffreda of the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum (SBF), Faculty of Biblical Sciences and Archaeology, brought to light important structures belonging to the walled Byzantine monastery (Area M, fig. C, mostly in the area of Recital Beach) and to Roman public buildings. For example, they uncovered a quadriporticus (Area F), a paved road (V1–V2) running along the west side of Areas C–F, an aqueduct on pillars, and a so-called urban villa (Area C), along with a building with columns that they soon interpreted as a “mini-synagogue” (D1 on west by Ceramic Vessels Unearthed at Archeological Excavations in Tiberias (Crusader period, 12th Century ce),” in 45 Years for the Golan Heights Survey: A Conference in Honor of Moshe Hartal, 30 April 2013 (Haifa: Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, 2013).

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Figure D. Magdala Project Excavation Updated Map of the Harbor’s Structures. Zoom on the map of fig. C focusing on the structures uncovered by the Magdala Project’s excavations in the Harbors area. Drawn by S. De Luca and A. Ricci, © Magdala Project 2014.

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side of Area D in fig. C.1, p. 321).87 From 2006 to 2012, S. De Luca directed the Magdala Project on behalf of the SBF. The project expanded the archaeological investigation inside and outside the southern sector of the site previously examined by Corbo and Loffreda, including a residential quarter on the west (see Areas H1–H4 in fig. C), underground water networks, a bathing complex (including five stepped pools, caldarium, latrinae), and harbors. De Luca also reached the earlier strata of the previously excavated edifices (see section C in fig. B and figs. C and D).88 In 1991, in a spot to the west of the Franciscan compound, an excavation by Abu-‘Uqsa (IAA) unearthed the remains of three two-story domestic buildings and warehouses dating to the first to third centuries ce (Area A; cf. fig. A: a).89 Northern Sector. In 1985, in the area to the north of the Franciscan compound, the IAA excavated some trial trenches (fig. A: g).90 In 2006, in two trial trenches at the ex Hawaii Beach (to the northwest of the synagogue), pottery was collected (dating from the second century bce to the fourth century ce) within alluvium layers (fig. A: k).91 Between 2009 and 2012, extensive research for the construction of the Magdala Center of the Legionaries of Christ was carried out in the north and northwest sectors under the direction of Dina Avshalom-Gorni (IAA) and Arfan Najjar (IAA), joined in 2010 by Marcela Zapata-Meza (Universidad Anáhuac México 87. Virgilio Corbo, “Scavi archeologici a Magdala (1971–1973),” 5–37; Corbo, “La città romana di Magdala: Rapporto preliminare dopo la IV campagna di scavo: 1 ottobre–8 dicembre 1975,” in Testa et al., Studia Hierosolymitana in onore di P. Bellarmino Bagatti, 355–78; Corbo, “Piazza e villa urbana a Magdala,” LASBF 28 (1978): 232–40; Stanislao Loffreda, “Alcune osservazioni sulla ceramica di Magdala,” in Testa et al., Studia Hierosolymitana in onore di P. Bellarmino Bagatti, 338–54. 88.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana”; De Luca, “Urban Development”; Anna Lena, “Magdala 2007: Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=4342&mag_ id=120; Lena, “Magdala 2008: Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_ detail_eng.aspx?id=5433&mag_id=120. For additional information, see Stefano De Luca, “Magdala Project 2007,” in Notiziario Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem: Anno Accademico 2006–2007 (ed. R. Pierri; Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 2008), 12–17; De Luca, “Il contesto storico-archeologico della missione di Gesù attorno al Lago di Galilea,” in Con gli occhi degli apostoli: Una presenza che travolge la vita (ed. J. M. Garcia and D. Massara; Milan: Piccola Casa Editrice, 2011), 14–16; De Luca, “Magdala Project 2008–2010,” in Notiziario Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem: Anno Accademico 2009–2010 (ed. R. Pierri; Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 2011), 13–18; De Luca, “Magdala Project. Conferenza nuovi scavi a Magdala,” in Notiziario Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem: Anno Accademico 2011–2012 (ed. R. Pierri; Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 2012), 22–23; De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti,” 78–89; Anna Lena, “Il porto di Magdala/Tarichea sul Lago di Galilea” (PhD diss., Università di Napoli “L’Orientale,” 2012); De Luca and Lena, “The Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex of Magdala Reconsidered: Archaeological Context, Epigraphy and Iconography,” in Knowledge and Wisdom: Archaeological and Historical Essays in Honour of Leah Di Segni (ed. Giovanni C. Bottini, L. Daniel Chrupcała, and Joseph Patrich; SBF Collectio Maior 54; Milan: Terra Santa, 2014), 1–33; De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 124–28. 89.  Hanaa Abu-‘Uqsa, “Migdal,” ESI 13 (1993): 28; Abu-‘Uqsa, “Migdal,” ESI 16 (1997): 34; Abu-‘Uqsa, “Findings from Two Excavations at Migdal,” 9*–15*, 320–21. 90.  Yosef Stepansky, “Migdal,” ESI 71 (1986): 318, 322. 91.  See De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 347.

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Sur, UNAM; “Mex” in this chapter). The excavations are ongoing and so far have brought to light four residential quarters delineated by a network of orthogonal roads (fig. B: Mex Areas A–C), two in Area A with baths; a “commercial” building (fig. B: Mex Area E); a series of plastered vats, possibly connected to workshops uncovered by the IAA (fig. B: IAA Areas B–C) and by the UNAM (fig. B: Mex Area E); warehouses facing the lake (fig. B: IAA Area A and Mex Area D); an aqueduct (fig. B: IAA Area C); a large round pool (fig. B: IAA Area D), and a Second Temple–period synagogue (fig. B: IAA Area C).92 Northernmost Sector. Farther north, on behalf of the IAA, in 2010 Gilad Cinamon performed several trial excavations prior to municipal development of the area (Areas G1–G8 and E0–2; cf. fig. A: j).93 According to the report and to the published pottery, the uncovered remains must be dated from the Late Hellenistic (second to first century bce) to the Late Roman period (third century ce). On the basis of a survey done in the Gennesar Valley, Ken Dark has suggested the existence of “urban” remains to the south of Kibbutz Ginosar that he provisionally identifies with New Testament Dalmanutha.94 Although much of the evidence from all of these archaeological excavations has not yet been published in detail, the fragmented data nevertheless can be tentatively brought together into a fairly concise and comprehensive picture of the settlement history at Magdala. Urban Layout 1. Road Network. The earliest levels reached so far have allowed us to fix the foundation of the city to the south (figs. C and D)—apparently on the site of a previous settlement (third–second centuries bce)95—at least to the Late Hellenistic age (second century bce). The most significant residential and monumental remains, however, date to the second half of the second century bce.96 If the urban character of the site is to be associated with the authority of the Hasmoneans over the region, on the basis of the archaeological evidence (pottery and coins), it might be assigned to the building activity of Aristobulus I (104–103 bce) or Alexander Jannaeus (103–76 bce). From the Late Hellenistic phase, the urban layout was designed according to 92.  Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar, “Migdal: Preliminary Report”; Marcela Zapata-Meza, “Neue mexikanische Ausgrabungen in Magdala–Das Magdala Archaeological Project,” in Bauern, Fischer und Propheten: Galiläa zur Zeit Jesu (ed. Jürgen K. Zangenberg and Jens Schröter; Zaberns Bildbände zur Archäologie, Sonderbände der antiken Welt; Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2012), 85–98; Zapata-Meza and Sanz-Rincón, El proyecto arqueológico Magdala. 93.  Cinamon, “Migdal: Final Report.” 94.  Dark, “Archaeological Evidence.” If further excavations confirm Dark’s suggestion, in our opinion the area surveyed by him might be part of the same urban settlement of Magdala/Taricheae, just separated from the northern sector by a strip of alluvium formed by the Wadi el-H|amam. 95.  See Veronica Rossi et al., “New Insights into the Palaeoenvironmental Evolution of Magdala Ancient Harbour (Sea of Galilee, Israel) from Ostracod Assemblages, Geochemistry and Sedimentology,” Journal of Archaeological Science 54 (2015): 356–73, here 359. 96.  De Luca, “Urban development”; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 445–46.

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Figure F. View of the Excavations in the Southern Sector. Aerial view looking north with the ­southern sector of Magdala excavated by the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum and the Magdala ­Project. Courtesy of © M. Zapata-Mesa; photograph by SkyView 2011.

an orthogonal plan with a network of east–west roads (V3 with portions of stone paving) that start at the Roman-period quay and intersect the main north–south paved road (the so-called cardo maximus V1–V2). The road pattern—which did not change significantly during the Roman period—confines the public quarters and the domestic and private spaces. The original width of the main north–south paved road VI–V2 was more than 10 m and was covered in late antiquity by the pylons of an aqueduct.97 A paved east–west road 5 m wide (one of the so-called town’s decumani) was brought to light in the Area H2 (V5). In general, one can observe that the road levels follow the terrain and drop from west to east toward the lake and from north to south (figs. A–D). To the north, a portion of a large, paved north–south road has been excavated near the landing structures (probably a quay) of IAA Area A (fig. B). They apparently continue into 97.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 396–401, 412–15.

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Mex Area D (fig. B). In addition, the northern domestic units are apparently organized by an orthogonal pattern of streets, as is the case regarding the streets paved with small stones that flank the synagogue (fig. B: IAA Area C) to its west and south. 2. Water Network. As shown in fig. C and D, the original intricate southern water networks (Late Hellenistic–Middle Roman) run both beneath the viae publicae and under the buildings, supplying fresh water to the fountains (e.g., the monumental fountain D1, and fountain F20 in the center of the large quadriporticus F), to the baths (C3, D3, E11, E22, E2), to a latrina (C30), and to several different kinds of water installations (cf. fig. C.1). The large waterworks—fed by a spring beneath the Late Hellenistic water tower A1—has been thoroughly investigated.98 During the Late Roman–Early Byzantine period, an aqueduct also was connected to water tower A1. From this tower extends a sophisticated system of drainage, masonry channels (along with clay and lead pipes), water collectors, plants for heating and pressurization, and covered deep channels to discharge the water toward the lake. This network reveals a unitary and coherent plan created in order to convey the aquifer flow toward the lake and at the same time serve the hydraulic installations in the large public bathing complex. According to the excavations, this includes all the Areas C, D, and E east of main road V1–V2. Comparable water systems and hydraulic devices appear to have been used in domestic and industrial buildings of the northern sector, where covered channels ran under the streets and the remains of an aqueduct traveling from the west were uncovered north of IAA Area C (fig. B). The presence of bridges to cross these watercourses suggests that the settlement developed farther to the north.99 In order to establish whether the covered channels were to feed or to discharge water, the system (with its interconnections) needs to be investigated in full, taking into account the two springs recorded to the north and northwest,100 and considering that the sewage should run off eastward toward the lake. 3. Residential Quarters. The western residential quarter in the south, unearthed in 2007,101 as shown in fig. C, was planned along the same axis as the paved decumanus, whose upper surface (dorsum) had been designed to shed water along raised footways on each side (V5 in H2). Beneath this main road—onto which the entrances of the houses (H1 and H3) open—a deep channel covered with long stone slabs was built to receive water from a spring located to the northwest.102 The quarter underwent three major building phases: (1) second–first centuries bce: beaten earth floors associated with wall remains and a large amount of finds; (2) first–   98.  Ibid., 394–401, pls. 14, 27, figs. 49–50, 57–58, 60, 68, 83–85, 113.   99.  The synagogue was commonly thought to be the northern “border” of the city, but the bridges and the excavation carried out by Cinamon show that the city extended to the north and to the west beyond the synagogue. 100.  See Leibner, Settlement and History, 215; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 396 (‘Ein Kera and ‘Ein Nevi‘an). Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar (“Migdal: Preliminary Report”) indicate ‘Ein Nun as the source for the aqueduct. 101.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 352–72, pls. 5–9, figs. 3–47; Lena, “Magdala 2007.” 102.  Ibid., 359–62, pls. 6, 8, figs. 23–34.

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second centuries ce: Early Roman masonry built directly on the Hellenistic walls; (3) third– fourth centuries ce: minor repairs and reinforcements of the existing walls during the Late Roman period before the final collapse due to the 363 ce earthquake. This picture describes a virtual continuity from the Late Hellenistic to the Late Roman urban layout, which is also observable elsewhere at the site. The function of these buildings as private houses is clearly indicated by the artifacts pertaining to the instrumentum domesticum, including food remains, common cooking ware, storage vessels, and basalt mills. Among these domestic finds, a few basalt implements—a single-hole basalt anchor and a ring stone net weight—indicate fishing.103 In 2011, under the impressive structural collapse of H3,104 De Luca exposed a pillared peristyle court (K3) completely paved with chiseled flagstones, also shown in fig. C. The peristyle was composed of a series of arches, one of which even crossed the court with a central column. The quality of the masonry, which includes ashlar stones, water channels, pillars with projecting corbels (springers), chiseled voussoirs, column and wall niches, along with the findings, indicates an elevated standard of living. On one side, there is a square limestone basin (labrum) with a hole for drainage. A possible dwelling (Area G in fig. C) with mosaic pavements was partially unearthed west of road V2. The building was refurbished with ashlar masonry in the Late Roman period in order to adapt the entrance between two of the pillars of the aqueduct.105 An equally high standard of living is indicated in the two northern mid-first-century bce–second-century ce dwellings of the Mex Area A (fig. B.1)—consisting of two separated units partially revealed so far: E1 with 14 rooms and E3 with 6 rooms—where architectural solutions comparable to those in the southern Area H were adopted: rooms and courtyards with flagstone paving (E1-Ps1 and E3-Pn2; E1-C11), rooms with benches, roofs held by arches, underground water conduits and cisterns (E1-C9; basin in E3-Pn2), plaster on the wall (E1-C9, C11, C13, C14), and a fine mosaic with the central emblem of a rosette inscribed in a rhombus bordered by a swastika-meander pattern. The room with the mosaic (E1-C13), if not a triclinium, seems to be a good example of a dressing room (apodyterium) connected with the stepped baths (Mkw1 and Mkw3), which would be very appropriate for the wealthy inhabitants of the house. The three stepped pools (Mkw1–3) were built in masonry, with only the lower courses of pool Mkw1 and the steps made of ashlars. The excavators suggested that these pools were ritual baths of an “unknown type—namely mikva’ot that make use of groundwater.”106 But since they are typologically different from the about 850 known examples of mikva’ot, and because ritual baths are generally absent in sites around the lake, such an iden103.  Ibid., 354, 357, figs. 13, 18–19. 104.  Ibid., 365–72, pls. 6, 9, figs. 36–43. 105.  Ibid., 415–17, pl. 26, figs. 111–13. 106.  Ronny Reich and Marcela Zapata-Meza, “A Preliminary Report on the Miqwa’ot of Migdal,” IEJ 64 (2014): 63–64; Reich and Zapata, “The Miqwa’ot of Magdala on the Shore of the Sea of Galilee,” in Bauckham and De Luca, Magdala, Jewish City of Fish (forthcoming).

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tification is merely based on (1) the general Jewish context of the site; (2) their relative proximity to the synagogue (about 70 m away); (3) their belonging to a domestic space (although they are directly accessible from the street); (4) the assumption that the pools in fact were fed with groundwater interpreted as the “living water” required by Lev 15:13, which in turn, according to the excavators, would make the mikva’ot “the purest that has been discovered in Israel.”107 This interpretation, however, fails to take into account the stepped pools of the thermae, where analogous building techniques, masonry types, and water devices were adopted, including underground feeding conduits that harnessed the water from the spring. After decanting in collectors, the water for the bathhouse reached the nearby pools through rectangular openings in the walls (with or without protruding corbels).108 These features are not unique to this allegedly “unknown type” of mikveh. Moreover, because the possibility that the three baths were not fed by subsurface runoff water but with channeled water—as in case of the thermae, latrinae, fountains, or industrial installations—has not yet been examined, their identification as ritual baths seems questionable at the moment.109 The buildings of the Mex Area B (fig. B.1; mostly from the Early Roman phases: midfirst century bce–end of first century ce) seem to be less refined, even if they maintain a regular urban plan. They consist of three units (partially exposed) separated by two streets (Str2 and Str3) and were identified as Jewish habitations on the basis of the common pottery and chalk vessel finds. In contrast to that, the complete domestic block of Mex Area C (fig. B.1; second century bce–second century ce), where fishing tools were also found, was identified as hypothetically “inhabited by Romans.”110 The most complete unit in this Area (E7) was delimited by three streets (Str4–6) and, in the Early Roman phase, it comprised twelve intercommunicating rooms apparently headed by a courtyard with the main entrance from Street 5. Moreover, the unit had an inner courtyard (E7–C1) provided with a stone staircase, where several grinding 107.  Marcela Zapata-Meza, “Los mikva’ot de Magdala un encuentro con los sacro,” in El proyecto arqueológico Magdala, 62, 66. According to Zapata-Meza, “Es el argumento principal para su identificación como los mikva’ot más puros de todo Israel hasta el momento” (p. 63); “Los mikva’ot de Magdala se ubican en la categoría de mikveh natural y por tanto, con un grado de pureza que sobre pasa los estándares de los demás mikva’ot descubiertos hasta el momento en Israel” (p. 64). 108.  See, for example, De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” pls. 11–12, 15–16, 18–19, 24–25, figs. 49–50, 52–54, 56–59, 65, 67–68, 72–79, 80–81, 91–96, 100, 106–107. 109.  The completion of the excavations to the south and to the west will surely clarify whether the baths were actually filled during the rainy season “by water infiltrating through the joints of its constructed walls and through a low-level channel” (Reich and Zapata-Meza, “Preliminary Report on the Miqwa’ot,” 67) coming from the natural water table. Moreover, it will be clarified if the nearby underground water reservoir (a kind of cellar, in E1-C9)—built of masonry and with the covering supported by an arch—was actually the main water source of the installation. If it is so, the groundwater that is supposed to have fed the baths probably played a minor role. It seems important also to consider how the piscina—“possibly for keeping fish alive” (Hernández Grajales, “Taricheae o la antigua ciudad,” 18) in C3-Pn2—was fed. Apparently it seems connected to the same water-supply system as the baths. 110.  Hernández Grajales provides a summary of the excavated areas (“Taricheae o la antigua ciudad,” 18–19). A more detailed preliminary report is in preparation by Marcela Zapata-Meza et al. for ‘Atiqot (forthcoming).

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Mex Area A

Mex Area B

Mex Area C

Figure B.1

implements were uncovered. The presence of three clay bread ovens (tannûrim) in the annexed rooms (C5 and C6) might suggest that it was a small bakery. A comparable typology of houses with annexed workshops was found at Capernaum.111 4. Industrial Installations. Regarding crafts and industries at Magdala, Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar report that around the “stone-paved open area” (probably a large north–south road) in the east of the northern sector of IAA Area A (fig. B), “several rooms were uncovered” along “part of the basement level of a large building.” Since the eastern side of the built structures was likely “used as a quay,” where the cobblestone surface may have constituted the lake’s bed, the adjacent buildings “might have been used as a storeroom near the anchorage on the shore.”112 In addition, Mex Area D (fig. B; mid-first century bce–second century ce and later)— which includes two buildings separated by a street (Str9)—gives the impression of being the continuation of the mooring facilities of the IAA Area A (fig. B). Zapata-Meza argues that in the Early Roman period, “the settlement seems divided into two areas, one predominantly Jewish on the west, and on the east a presence of possibly Roman groups, close to where the major economic activities are concentrated”113 near the port, also interpreted as a “market.”114 Mex Area E (fig. B; first century ce) has also been understood as a market or an industrialmercantile area, located to the south of the synagogue and to the east of the main north–south road that was crossed by an east–west street most probably running from the landing area. 111.  See the chapter on Capernaum by Sharon Lea Mattila in this volume, pp. 217–57. 112.  Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar, “Migdal: Preliminary Report.” 113.  Marcela Zapata-Meza, “Introduccíon general: Proyecto arquelógico Magala,” in El proyecto arqueológico Magdala, 9. 114.  Ibid., 6.

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Along this street, some extremely interesting features were found: a dozen small structures, each incorporating small rectangular plastered vats sunk into the floors, along with one deeper stepped shaft (IAA Areas B–C and Mex Area E in fig. B). “The shaft was presumably flooded with ground water. The water in the shafts might have been used to fill the pools, or the pools might have served as small reservoirs.”115 The vats could have been supplied by underground channels fed by the above-mentioned aqueduct unearthed to the north of the site (IAA Area C in fig. B), although the excavators have dated this aqueduct to the Byzantine period. The spatial organization and the distribution of the vats seem not to be uniform, so we cannot exclude the possibility that they were intended to be used for different activities. Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar state precisely that, although it is possible,116 the hypothesis that the workshops “were used in conjunction with the fish industry, . . . at this stage, cannot be substantiated.”117 The study of the water distribution between the vats (of various dimensions and depth) and the search for precise comparisons could help us better to understand their function. Indeed, only a couple of the various types seem compatible with comparable garum (and by-product) installations. But this kind of production required several other archaeological features118 and produced some bad smells and probably some ritually unclean consequences (for the use of water and for the possible processing of some non-kosher fish species) that should be taken into consideration, given the proximity of the synagogue. Although the vats could hypothetically be associated with any factory requiring water (for example, dyeing, tanning, or fulling), it is reasonable to assume that at least some of them were probably used for some kind of fish processing. For the other vats, given their location close to the landing area, it could instead be suggested that they were aquaria where fresh fish could be temporarily stored before they were processed (salting, pickling, smoking, drying, etc.), probably nearby or elsewhere. We further suggest that the rooms could be “shops,” where fishermen from the villages around the lake sold their catches. Such an interpretation is supported by the information 115.  Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar, “Migdal: Preliminary Report.” 116.  De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti,” 89. The subject has been thoroughly examined by Richard Bauckham in his essay “Magdala and the Fishing Industry of the Lake,” in Bauckham and De Luca, Magdala, Jewish City of Fish (forthcoming). He compares the complexes of Magdala with the best-known examples of vat installations, suggesting that they were workshops for fish processing associated with garum production. According to his analysis, the shafts with steps could be mikva’ot comparable to the known ritual baths adjacent to agricultural installations. 117.  Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar, “Migdal: Preliminary Report.” 118.  The most prominent signs of fish processing installations are (1) salting vats (cetariae), usually square or rectangular in shape and varying in size and depth and often with round corners; (2) a waterproof coating (opus signinum, cocciopesto) covering the interior walls and floor of the vats; (3) reinforced angles at the bottom and the floor provided with a shallow cuvette to assist in cleaning; (4) finds of many amphorae with shapes usually associated with salt-fish products; (5) evidence for a salt supply; (6) source of fresh water; (7) storage facilities nearby; (8) eventually heating facilities. See Athena Trakadas, “The Archaeological Evidence for Fish Processing in the Western Mediterranean,” in Ancient Fishing and Fish Processing in the Black Sea Region (ed. Tønnes BekkerNielsen; Black Sea Studies 2; Oakville, Conn.: Aarhus University Press, 2005 [digital ed. 2006]), 68–73; and, in the same volume, Robert I. Curtis, “Sources for Production and Trade of Greek and Roman Processed Fish,” 37.

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about taxation119 and by the evidence of a thriving market supervised by officials (agoranomoi), revealing a volume of exchanges appropriate for a regional emporium. We can add the abundance of coins with minimal nominal value that were used in retail transactions,120 and the lead weights found in the site, including a piece from Arados (first century bce–first century ce) bearing the image of the Phoenician goddess Tanit-Astarte,121 an inscribed weight dating to Agrippa II,122 and a more recent bronze exagium.123 The large circular pool (diameter = 13 m) of an unclear function, from the Byzantine layer beside the shore (IAA Area D in fig. B), was probably supplied by the coeval aqueduct inside the bed of the Wadi H|amam. The pool may have been used as a fishpond124 and was less likely a basin to salt fish.125 The large number of amphorae and jars from the artificial sediment layers in the harbor (see figs. C and D) suggests a high volume of transported goods. Among these containers, some types from the first century ce show a remarkable presence of pitch treatment on their internal 119.  For a reconstruction of the production chain led by the fish market of Taricheae, see Kenneth C. Hanson, “The Galilean Fishing Economy and the Jesus Tradition,” BTB 27 (1997): 99–111. See also De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 444, 446–47, 449. 120. Ya‘akov Meshorer, “A Hoard of Coins from Migdal,” ‘Atiqot 11 (1976): 54–71; Corbo, “La città romana,” 360, 362, 364, 371, 374, 377–78; Haim Gitler, “The Coins,” in The Excavations of an Ancient Boat in the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret) (ed. Shelley Wachsmann; ‘Atiqot, English Series 19; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 1990), 101–6; Syon, “Coins from Migdal”; Arslan, “Dall’Italia a Magdala”; Bruno Callegher, “E le monete di Magdala ci raccontano che,” Terrasanta 4, no. 1 (2009): 49; Leibner, Settlement and History, 421–25; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 436–37, 446–49; Leibner, “Excavations at Khirbet Wadi H|amam,” 227, 232; Uzi Leibner and Gabriela Bijovsky, “Two Hoards from Khirbet Wadi H|amam and the Scope of the Bar Kokhba Revolt,” Israel Numismatic Research 8 (2014): 109–34; Andrea Garza Díaz Barriga, “Las cuatro monedas: El dinero que circuló en Galilea; las monedas que conocieron en Magdala y Gamla,” in El proyecto arqueológico Magdala, 76–83. Bruno Callegher, for the Magdala Project Excavations Series, is preparing a volume titled From the Hasmonean Period to Umayyad Rulers: Coins and Economy in Magdala/Taricheae, in which thousands of numismatic finds are studied. 121.  Bruno Callegher, “Note su un peso fenicio in piombo da Magdala,” Quaderni Ticinesi di Numismatica e Antichità Classiche 37 (2008): 321–29; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 371–72, 446, 452, fig. 47. 122.  Shraga Qedar, “Two Lead Weights of Herod Antipas and Agrippa II and the Early History of Tiberias,” Israel Numismatic Journal 9 (1986–87): 30–33; Alla Kushnir-Stein, “Two Inscribed Lead Weights of Agrippa II,” ZPE 141 (2002): 295–97; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 343, 371–72, 447. De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Therman Bath Complex,” 26 n. 47. 123.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 371, 419. 124.  Yosef Stepansky arrived at a similar conclusion (“Kefar Nahum Map Survey,” ESI 10 [1991]: 89–90; Stepansky, “Kefar Nahum Bay,” ESI 12 [1993]: 10–11) for the peculiar installations between Tabgha and Capernaum (map in De Luca, “Vorgeschichte, Ursprung und Funktion der byzantinischen Klöster,” 31). Stepansky points out the vivaria (fishponds or fish traps) mentioned as bibarim in the rabbinical sources (e.g., m. Bes iah 3:1). See De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti,” 36, 115; De Luca, “Capernaum,” 172; De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 117 n. 24. 125.  Hernández Grajales, “Taricheae o la antigua ciudad,” 16.

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Figure N. Mid Roman 3 imported amphora. Restored “micaceous water jar” probably transporting wine (Pt 18439), imported from the Aegean region, bearing a Greek graffito under its single handle, from the Magdala Project excavations in G9. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2011. Photograph by Virginia Sedia.

surfaces. Some amphora fragments are comparable to Rhodian, Koan, Aegean, and Phoenician types, although none of these, at the moment, seem to belong to the types commonly associated with fish products. A recently excavated building along the main paved road V1 (G8–9), later obstructed by the fourth-century ce aqueduct, shows some features typical of shops (see fig. C, Area G, and fig. C.1). The finds include several glass fragments and a Mid Roman 3 amphora bearing a graffito (probably a counter mark or a date) on its single handle (fig. N). The water tower (A1 in Area A, fig. C) was rearranged during the Late Roman–Early Byzantine period. After being surrounded by the plastered tanks (A2–A5 in Area A, fig. C), it was equipped with a wooden wheel (noria) to pump water from the basins built at its base up to the top of the aqueduct. The aqueduct on arcades seems to have reached the southern area of the site where, due to the presence of the monastery (see fig. C, Area M) with baths and workshops, an abundance of water was required. The complexity of the working facilities indicates a variety of industrial and commercial activities; their organization in different urban areas around the whole site seems to correspond to a high level of economic development. In addition, the high standard of living that the houses and the daily-use objects reflect supports this conclusion. The houses were arranged in urban spaces that were orthogonally delimited by streets. All of this reveals a coherent layout that was planned at the same time as the waterworks.

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1. Synagogue. Impressive vestiges of a Second Temple–period synagogue (50 bce–100 ce) have been discovered in the IAA Area C (fig. B). Three building phases have been recognized:126 (1) Late Hellenistic building remains (mid-first century bce) of uncertain function in the foundation level; (2) early or mid-first-century ce almost rectangular, colonnaded gathering hall surrounded on all four sides by a continuous aisle and benches, with portions of fine mosaic floor surviving in the eastern aisle, an entrance from the vestibule on the west (possibly used as bet ha-midrash), and a small room (likely a geniza or repository for Torah scrolls) with a mosaic floor and wall paintings in the southwestern corner. Beneath the pebbles of the floor foundation in the central hall—apparently the bedding of a mosaic in phase with the one in the eastern aisle—a coin of 43 ce may provide a terminus post quem for the laying of the mosaic floor. The excavators have argued that the paving was probably never completed because of the sudden outbreak of the First Revolt (67 ce); (3) according to coin finds, sometime after 80 ce, the entire building underwent a systematic dismantling down to the ground level, which was then covered by a layer of plaster and crushed chalk. In the meeting hall, some stone reinforcement (including a grooved, polished limestone block in reuse, comparable to the one visible in the vestibule) built on the stylobate against the eastern columns suggests a phase of restoration. Depending on whether these structures abutted the bedding of the eastern aisle mosaic or vice versa, the reinforcements may have been made after the decorations with fine stuccoes and colorful frescoes on walls and columns were applied and before the mosaic pavement was laid; or, alternatively, the structures could indicate a use of the building during the period between the laying of the mosaic and the demolishing of the edifice. The mosaic themes on a white background show a central, squared panel (pseudoemblema) framed by a simple black fillet containing a red-bordered and black-outlined rosette with eight spaced pairs of black and white wedges. In each internal corner of the central panel are depicted four interesting black gammadic (Γ-shaped) motifs that may delimit a space for a special function. On both sides of the panel, there is a swastika meander fret bordered by a simple black fillet. The fret comes with simple return that alternates with outlined white squares, each of which contains a smaller black square. The fact that the ends curve at 90 degrees indicates that the south and north aisles were also intended to be decorated with the same pattern. Regarding technique, design of the fret, size, density, and color range of the tesserae cut in local stone (including white, beige, black, and red), the mosaic is comparable to the figurative panel of rooms C1 and C6 in the thermae (see below, p. 322). In the surviving portions of the polychrome frescoes, the absence of figurative themes follows decorative schemes of the Second Pompeian Style. Apart from resembling the Herodian palaces and the domus of the Sadducean aristocracy in Jerusalem,127 this style fits the common 126.  See primarily Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar, “Migdal: Preliminary Report.” 127.  See Ehud Netzer, The Architecture of Herod, the Great Builder (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006), 359–60, with bibliography in n. 33; Nahman Avigad, Gerusalemme: Archeologia nella città santa (Roma: Armando

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regional taste also witnessed by frescoes of Yodefat128 and Gamla,129 also involved in the Great War. For the organization of the space into framed panels and for the range of colors used, the frescoes closely resemble the fragments coming from the harbor excavations (F25) and from the levels of destruction of the thermal pools (E11, E12, and E22), the oldest of which are associated with the First Revolt. The patterns of the mosaics and frescoes, along with stucco décor, all of which correspond to the aristocratic taste of the period, show the presence in the city of an affluent group among the Jewish community, “possibly associated with a priestly family.”130 Within the whitish layer of the abandonment (resulting from the dismantling of both ceiling and walls), an exceptional piece of artwork was found in the central hall toward the southeast: a rectangular carved stone table standing on four legs and with all five visible surfaces carrying reliefs bearing various motifs (see figs. P and Q).131 The rough cutting of the irregular legs with different heights could suggest that these were to be inserted into a floor. On the basis of the menorah engraved on one of the short sides, the decorations on the stone were interpreted by Aviam132 within the framework of Jerusalem’s temple symbolism, which is a unique finding in a synagogue of this period. The image carved on one of the short sides represents the seven-branched lampstand (apparently with knobbed arms)133—flanked by two amphorae or vessels—having a triangular base, and standing on a square pedestal, which is Curcio, 1976), 84, 89, 123–25; Silvia Rozenberg, “Wall Painting Fragments from Area A,” in Jewish Quarter Excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem Conducted by Nahman Avigad, 1969–1982, vol. 2, The Finds from Areas A, W and X-2. Final Report (ed. Hillel Geva; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society and Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University, 2003), 302–28. 128.  See Mordechai Aviam, “First Century Jewish Galilee: An Archaeological Perspective,” in Religion and Society in Roman Palestine: Old Questions, New Approaches (ed. Douglas R. Edwards; New York: Routledge, 2004), 17. 129.  See Danny Syon, “Gamla: Portrait of a Rebellion,” BAR 18, no. 1 (1992): 33; Yoav Farhi, “Stucco Decorations from the Western Quarter,” in Syon and Yavor, Gamla II, 176, color pl. 1. 130. Eric M. Meyers and Mark A. Chancey, Archaeology of the Land of the Bible, vol. 3, Alexander to Constantine (AYBRL; New Haven: Yale University Press: 2012), 212. 131. Dina Avshalom-Gorni, “One of the Oldest Synagogues in the World Was Exposed in the IAA Excavation at Magdala,” IAA Press Release, http://www.antiquities.org.il/article_Item_eng.asp?sec_id=25&subj_ id=240&id=1601&module_id=#as; Dina Avshalom-Gorni and Arfan Najjar, “The Stone Decorated with Reliefs from the Second Temple Period Synagogue at Migdal: First Impression, abstract” (in Hebrew), in Studies in Archaeology and Ancient Art, Third Conference: Past and Present—Old Theories and New Finds (Jerusalem, 2010), 7; Avshalom-Gorni and Najjar, “Migdal: Preliminary Report.” 132.  See Mordechai Aviam, “The Decorated Stone from the Synagogue at Migdal: A Holistic Interpretation and a Glimpse into the Life of Galilean Jews at the Time of Jesus,” NovT 55 (2013): 205–20; and Richard Bauckham, “Further Thoughts on the Migdal Synagogue Stone,” NovT 57 (2015): 113–35. 133.  Donald D. Binder has recently argued that the menorah of Magdala does not feature ornamental knobs, comparing it with Mattathias Antigonus’s coins (“The Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” in A City Set on a Hill: Essays in Honor of James F. Strange [ed. Daniel Warner and Donald D. Binder; Mountain Home, Ariz.: Borderstone, 2014], 24–25). According to Hachlili (Ancient Synagogues, 40), instead, “each arm [is] decorated with several knobs.” These are carefully represented on the menorah of Titus’s Arch in Rome, “deemed the most accurate

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Figure P. Sketches of the stone table from the ­Magdala synagogue. Sketches based on photographs available on the web of each face of the stone table found in 2009 during the IAA excavation of the synagogue (IAA Area C). On the upper side, note the characteristic shape of the two double-handled vessels that we suggest are kylixes or kantharoi. Courtesy of S. De Luca. Drawn by S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2015.

usual in later representations of the temple’s menorah. This array is set under an arch supported by two monumental columns that could well represent the temple façade. The architectural motif of a double arcade surmounted by a cornice, also probably referable to the temple architecture, decorates the long sides of the stone. Here, below the arches close to the façade, an oil lamp is probably represented.134 Three additional columns divide the back panel of the stone rendering” of the temple’s menorah (Binder, “Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 25). We thank James Riley Strange for bringing to our attention the interesting essay of D. Binder. 134. We maintain the original interpretation first offered by the excavators because the shape appears strongly comparable in all the details to contemporary clay oil lamps. Also Binder (“Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 31–32) agrees with this interpretation, recalling the “perpetual lamp” from which the temple’s menorah was lit, and the Herodian lamps. Lamps suspended from arches are a recurrent motif. For the association of hanging lamps with the menorah, see, e.g., Hachlili, Ancient Synagogues, 330–32. According to Hachlili, the objects here are “twohandled jugs” (Ancient Synagogues, 41); according to Aviam, they are “censers” (“Decorated Stone,” 212–13; cf. m. Tamid 5:4); according to Bauckham, they are “two of the four rings” of the showbread table, of which the entire stone is a representation (“Further Thoughts,” 122–23). Meyers and Chancey take into consideration the depiction of Early Roman lamps on the top face (Alexander to Constantine, 211), identified as “Maccabean lamps” (p. 312 n. 29). Under the remaining three arches, Aviam suggests seeing “another row of arches . . . an arcade behind an arcade,” as a “symbolic representation of the Holy of Holies inside the temple building” (“Decorated Stone,” 212). According to Binder (“Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 30–31), the motif would represent “a stream of fire issued and flowed out from his presence” (Dan. 7:10) and seems consistent with the texts recalled for the interpretation of the back side (cf. 1 En. 14:18b and 4QShirShabbf [4Q405] 22.10b). Bauckham suggests that “the arcades represent the Temple courts” (“Further Thoughts,” 120–21).

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Figure Q. Photograph of the stone table as found in the Magdala synagogue. Courtesy of Israel Antiquities Authority.

in two arches, under which one can recognize two wheels and some semicircular motifs.135 The subjects were interpreted as a chariot and flames, for example, according to the Merkavah mysticism of Dan. 7:9 and the book of Enoch (1 En. 14:18), which, as Aviam suggested, was possibly compiled in Magdala during the Hasmonean period.136 The symbolic and/or decorative motifs on the upper side (fig. P)—interpreted as alluding to the showbread table137—include multiple pairs of twelve elements (a six-petaled rosette138 135.  See Aviam’s discussion (“Decorated Stone,” 218–19, 223). See also Bauckham, “Further Thoughts,” 118–20; and Binder, “Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 28–30. 136.  Mordechai Aviam, “The Book of Enoch and the Galilean Archaeology and Landscape,” in Parables of Enoch: A Paradigm Shift (ed. James H. Charlesworth and Darrell L. Bock; Jewish and Christian Texts in Contexts and Related Studies 11; London: Bloomsbury, 2013), 159–69. See also Zapata-Meza (“Introduccíon general,” 7), who mentions the interpretation of Rina Talgam, who sees here the prophet Elijah’s chariot of fire. Other plausible references are Ezek. 10:6, and 4QShirShabbf 22.9–10a; cf. Binder, “Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 29. Bauckham stresses the importance of Ezek. 43:1–9 as a possible source of inspiration (“Further Thoughts,” 119). 137. See Aviam, “Decorated Stone,” 209, 213–16. Bauckham suggests that the stone as a whole is a representation of the table of the showbread, upon which the twelve loaves, which would have been depicted in various shapes, were intended to represent the tribes differentiated according to the matriarchs (“Further Thoughts,” 122–28, 132–33). 138.  See conveniently Binder’s discussion on the rosette theme in ancient Jewish art—which was usually understood as merely ornamental—and its associated meanings in dependence on texts such 1 Kgs. 6:29; 32.35; or Exod. 28:36 (“Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 32–35).

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encompassed by six tangent recumbent spindles, bordered on the top and bottom by six bilobed ivy leaves)139 in addition to two pairs of rectangular forms (loaves? cf. m. Menah\. 11:4), and a pair of two-handled vessels that recall closely the shape of the kylix or the kantharos,140 all lying between two treelike elements.141 Because the synagogue was heavily robbed in antiquity, it is not clear whether the spot in which the stone table was found can be considered its original location.142 Still, if the principal façade was the northern one,143 the table would have been found in the “correct” orientation 139.  Concerning the six heart-shaped figures, a good iconographic parallel is found in the gourds from Jerusalem’s Tomb of Grapes, as suggested by Binder (ibid., 37–39, fig. 7). 140.  Comparable chalices or goblets are reproduced “on coins of a single shekel, half-shekel and quartershekel, and on the bronze coins of an ‘eight’ from the fourth year of the Revolt, and on bronze coins from Gamla” (Robert Deutsch, “Coinage of the First Jewish Revolt against Rome: Iconography, Minting Authority, Metallurgy,” in The Jewish Revolt against Rome: Interdisciplinary Perspectives [ed. Mladen Popović; JSJSup 154; Leiden: Brill, 2011], 363–64). Ya‘akov Meshorer showed the prototype development of the chalices on the first-year’s coins (A Treasury of Jewish Coins from the Persian Period to Bar Kokhba [Jerusalem: Yad Yitshak ben-Zvi, 2001], 115–16, coins 183–91), that recur on the war’s coins from the second to the fifth years (Treasury of Jewish Coins, 120, 127, coins 193–95, 202–3, 207–9, 214–17). Moreover, Meshorer recalled the three leading interpretations regarding this subject (pp. 117–18), preferring Paul Romanoff’s suggestion who identified here the golden omer (cf. m. Menah\. 10:4) [See Paul Romanoff, Jewish Symbols on Ancient Jewish Coins (Philadelphia: The Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning, 1944), 21–25.] Furthermore, according to Meshorer, “a similar vessel is seen standing on the shewbread table that was carried in the triumphal procession, as depicted on the Arch of Titus. . . . and it seem that this is the very same vessel” (Treasury of Jewish Coins, 117). The right-side chalice on the arch’s showbread table—that, although damaged, appears “larger, wider and resembles a bowl”—“may well have been decorated with the same pearled rim as the chalices on these coins” (Deutsch, “Coinage of the First Jewish Revolt,” 363). The chalice or goblet on four-year bronze mints, which is more globular and deeper, looks similar to the subject on the first-to fifth-years’ silver shekels. According to Donald T. Ariel, “together with the ‘four species’ types, these symbols too may allude to the sukkot/Tabernacles festival” (“Identifying the Mints, Minters and Meanings of the First Jewish Revolt Coins,” in Popovi, Jewish Revolt against Rome, 376). It is clear that chalices are linked with the temple’s cultic gold utensils (cf. Ant. 3.143, 255–256). The number of such paired cups or kylixes on the Magdala stone—that in our opinion are sufficiently detailed in their shape to remain unrecognized—is relevant since it parallels the two chalices on Titus’s Arch, where their great symbolic value is emphasized by being at the head of the triumphal procession. 141.  These elements are “palm trees” according to Hachlili (Ancient Synagogues, 40) and Bauckham (“Further Thoughts,” 128–29); according to Aviam, they are rakes used on the Altar of Sacrifice (“Decorated Stone,” 216). One should not exclude the possibility that these elements are intended to represent two schematic bunches of the Four Species. The comparative analysis of Binder (“Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 32–33, 35–37)—who offers several examples of coeval palm trees and palmettes and identifies three recurrent details—is noteworthy and convincing, as well as his discussion of the possible origin and meaning of such motifs and their cultic connotations. Regarding Gamla’s lintels, in addition to the references listed by Binder, see also Orit Peleg-Barkat, “Architectural Decoration,” in Syon and Yavor, Gamla II, 167, fig. 27, 168, fig. 5.15 (from the synagogue), 169, fig. 5.16 (from Area S). 142.  On this opinion, see also Hachlili, Ancient Synagogues, 40. 143.  On the basis of excavators’ information, Aviam holds that the principal façade was the southern short side (“Decorated Stone,” 208; Aviam, “Mesa de piedra para la lectura de la Torah, adornada con simbolismos

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pointing toward Jerusalem, as the iconography of the menoroth next to the Torah ark or temple motifs always does in later Galilean Jewish art. As far as its possible function is concerned, there is reason to doubt that the four protuberances on the four corners of the upper side—being triangular in section with a concave side facing the center—are the remains of four columns, or of four protruding knobs on which the wooden legs of a lectern could have been inserted.144 It is more likely that they are the remains of four horns of a common type, which suggests that the stone object could be used as an incense altar145 or, more plausibly, as an offering table used for different purposes.146 A comparable stone table, provided with a framed receptacle (ferculum) on the upper side, has recently been uncovered in secondary use in the Byzantine synagogue of Horvat Kur.147 Although on this table one notices strong iconographic similarities with the funerary banquet themes in Hellenistic and Roman art (an indication of its possible original context?), there is no doubt that for its form the stone was (re)used as an offering table.148 Other decorated stones uncovered in Magdala offer useful comparisons (see fig. R). judaicos en la sinagoga de Magdala,” in El proyecto arqueológico Magdala, 47), while from the published photos it seems to be the northern one. See also Hachlili, Ancient Synagogues, 40; Binder, “Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 24–27. 144.  The stone’s function as a lectern—and consequently the label “reading room” given to the hall—is argued by Meyers and Chancey (Alexander to Constantine, 212) and Aviam (“Decorated Stone,” 216–20), followed by Bauckham (“Further Thoughts,” 114, 120 n. 22). Hypothetically, the stone table could have functioned as a reading table, assuming that “the reader knelt when reading the scroll” (Hachlili, Ancient Synagogues, 41). But the presence of the four horns on the top face would have made problematic the unfolding of the scrolls. Binder lists four possible practical functions, underlining the arguments for and against each: (1) a table for the reading of the sacred Scripture; (2) a base for a lampstand; (3) a seat for the archisynagogos; (4) a base for an offering vessel (“Mystery of the Magdala Stone,” 41–43). 145. Hachlili, Ancient Synagogues, 41. 146.  “Prayer table” is the definition adopted by Avshalom and Najjar (“Migdal: Preliminary Report”), who also term the hall a “reading room.” 147.  Jürgen K. Zangenberg, “Ein Dorf auf dem Hügel: Neue Entdeckungen des Kinneret Regional Project in der Synagoge von Horvat Kur,” in Zangenberg and Schröter, Bauern, Fischer und Propheten, 131–44; Zangenberg et al., “The Kinneret Regional Project Excavations of a Byzantine Synagogue at Horvat Kur, Galilee, 2010–2013: A Preliminary Report,” Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel 4, no. 2 (2013): 557–76; Zangenberg, “A Basalt Stone Table from the Byzantine Synagogue at Horvat Kur, Galilee: Publication and First Interpretation,” in Yizhar Hirschfeld Memorial Volume (forthcoming); Zangenberg, “Performing the Sacred in a Community Building: Observations from the 2010–2013 Kinneret Regional Project Excavations in the Byzantine Synagogue of Horvat Kur (Galilee),” in Spaces in Late Antiquity: Cultural, Theological and Archaeological Perspectives (ed. Juliette Day et al.; London: Ashgate, forthcoming in 2015). 148.  Zangenberg, who fully discusses the item, underlines how the iconography refers to banquets and tentatively connects the table to synagogal meals (“Basalt Stone Table”). By contrast, Aviam suggests that it served as a base for a monopodium lectern (“Mesa de piedra,” 50). See also Mordechai Aviam, “Yet, Another Reading Table Base from a Galilean Synagogue: Some Comments on the Stone Table from Khorvat Kur,” in Yizhar Hirschfeld Memorial Volume (forthcoming). We are greatly indebted to Jürgen Zangenberg for having discussed these topics with us and for having allowed us to read his manuscripts. Moreover, we thank Motti Aviam and Richard Bauckham for the helpful exchange of views.

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Figure R. Mysterious stone. Drawings of a carved basalt stone of uncertain function uncovered in the SBF excavation of the southern sector. The front face reproduces two rosettes in relief, and two chalices flanking a door motif. The sides have dovetail slots that suggest a probable use as a balancing weight for a wooden lifting machine. Courtesy of S. De Luca, drawn by Marcello Forgia, © Magdala Project 2012.

Figure H. Pool [D3]. General view of stepped Pool D3 (Area D in fig. C) looking northwest, during the Magdala Project excavations in 2008. The pool was originally plastered and underwent enlargement in the Late Roman period. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2008. Photograph by S. De Luca.

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Figure I. Pool [E22]. View of the Pool E22 (Area E in fig. C) during the 2008 Magdala Project excavations, looking north. This pool was served by hot water from the Caldarium E18–E19. Note the covering system including a masonry arch that supports the stone slabs for the roofing, in situ. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2008. Photograph by Team.

2. Bathing Complex. As shown in figs. C and D, to the north of the quadriporticus (Area F), a large thermal complex, in which three different phases are recognizable, has been investigated (see also figs. F, H, and I).149 (a) Some Late Hellenistic (late second to first century bce) buildings, water systems, and components suggest an earlier phase of the bathhouse where cold water was used, as in the balaneia. To this phase belong the original stepped pool in D2, the small stepped pool E2, fragments of hewn oval tubs carved from a single block of limestone, and the Late Hellenistic colonnaded building D1 (figs. C, C.1, D, and F).150 In the past, this latter building has been

149.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 373–415; Lena, “Magdala 2008”; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex.” 150.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 376–78, pls. 14–16, figs. 56–59.

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the subject of different interpretations, as a synagogue151 or a nymphaeum152 or a latrina,153 but recently and convincingly it has been taken for a “Stoa-shaped fountain.”154 (b) During the Early Roman period (first half of first century ce), a series of stepped pools155 encompassing a circuit headed by the caldarium E18–19 was in use (see fig. C.1, a view of Areas D and E). The caldarium had a flagstone pavement on suspensurae, vertical clay tubuli inside the walls, a plastered vat in the south, and the praefurnium E30 on the east.156 The plastered basin in the caldarium E19 supplied the pool E22 with hot water.157 The entrance to pool E22 was from the quadriporticus F by a few steps and was roofed with basalt slabs supported by an arch still in situ (fig. I). Moreover, benches were set along two sides and the walls were covered by plaster, painted fragments of which were recovered in the abandonment layer. To the 151.  Corbo, “Scavi archeologici a Magdala (1971–1973),” 22; Corbo, “La città romana,” 365–71; Loffreda, “Alcune osservazioni,” 338–41. 152.  Ehud Netzer, “Did the Magdala Springhouse Serve as a Synagogue?” (in Hebrew), in Synagogues in Antiquity (ed. Aryeh Kasher, Aharon Oppenheimer, and Uriel Rappaport; Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 1987), 165–72. 153.  Jürgen K. Zangenberg, Magdala am See Gennesaret: Überlegungen zur sogenannten“Mini-sinagoga” und einige andere Beobachtungen zum kulturellen Profil des Ortes in neutestamentlicher Zeit (Kleine Arbeiten zum Alten und Neuen Testament; Waltrop: Spenner, 2001). 154.  Rick Bonnie and Julian Richard, “Building D1 at Magdala Revisited in the Light of Public Fountain Architecture in the Late Hellenistic East,” IEJ 62 (2012): 71–88; De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti,” 85; De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 376–78, pls. 14–16, figs. 56–59; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 1–2. 155.  We agree with the opinion of Benjamin G. Wright III (“Jewish Ritual Baths: Interpreting the Digs and the Texts. Some Issues in the Social History of Second Temple Judaism,” in The Archaeology of Israel: Constructing the Past, Interpreting the Present [ed. Neil Asher Silberman and David Small; JSOTSup 237; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997], 200) and Stephanie Hoss (“From Rejection to Incorporation: The Roman Bathing Culture in Palestine,” in SPA. Sanitas per aquam: Proceedings of the International Frontinus-Symposium on the Technical and Cultural History of Ancient Baths, Aachen, March 18–22, 2009 [ed. Ralf Kreiner and Wolfram Letzner; Leuven: Peeters, 2012], 261; Hoss, Baths and Bathing: The Culture of Bathing and Baths and Thermae in Israel from the Hasmoneans to the Moslem Conquest. With an Appendix on Ritual Baths (Miqva’ot) [BAR International Series 1346; Oxford: Archaeopress, 2005], 111–12)—contra Ronny Reich (“The Hot Bath-House (Balneum), the Miqweh, and the Jewish Community in the Second Temple Period,” JJS 39 [1988]: 102–7) and Yonatan Adler (“The Archaeology of Purity: Archaeological Evidence for the Observance of Ritual Purity in Erezi-Israel from the Hasmonean Period until the End of the Talmudic Era (164 bce–400 ce)” [in Hebrew; PhD diss., Bar-Ilan University, 2011], 102– 7)—regarding the origin and the use of the stepped pools in the Herodian balnea, where they took the place of the Roman frigidaria. Because the stepped pools in Magdala are integrated into a heating water system and into a thermal circuit, and because the findings therein pertain to bath and toilette practices, we exclude the possibility that the pools functioned as ritual baths (De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 4–5, 25 n. 18). This does not exclude the eventuality that Jewish people attended the thermae, as this practice is also known in the rabbinic literature (see Hoss, Baths and Bathing, 67–80). The authors would like to thank Yonatan Adler and Stephanie Hoss for the useful exchange of views. 156.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 409, pl. 17, figs. 100–101; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 1–2, 4, fig. 3. 157.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 388–93, pls. 17, 22–25, figs. 68–79, 139; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 1–5.

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Figure S. Mosaic of C6. Drawing of the central panel (“pseudo-emblema”) of the mosaic floor in C6, featuring in the lower part a Mediterranean vessel, a dolphin, and a kantharos, and, in the upper part, a couple of tied-up strigils with an aryballos, a disk for throwing, and a couple of halteres for long jumping. Courtesy of S. De Luca, drawn by S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2012.

west of the caldarium another stepped pool, E11,158 was uncovered. This pool was fed by hot water mixed with the water conveyed from the spring through the collector E12.159 Pool E11 was built in pseudo-isodomic masonry and had a covering system, of which corbels and one column survive. In E11, on the top east side of the room, there is a bench plastered and decorated with frescoes. In addition, on the south side, there is a small shallow pool covered with hydraulic mortar with a painted surface. On the opposite side of the corridor V4, originally paved with mosaics, the symmetrical stepped pool D3, also plastered, was found (fig. H).160 This was fed by cold water, as were the stepped pools E2161 and C3 in the northern sector of the complex (Area C in fig. C, C.1; see also fig. F).162 From rooms C1 and C6 of this block (fig. C.1), which was misinterpreted as “urban villa,”163 come two first-century ce mosaics: one with a black and white swastika meander and another with a figurative panel and a Greek

158.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 378–88, pls. 17–21, figs. 60–68, 138; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 1–5. 159.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 403–5, pls. 17, 25–27, figs. 68, 91–92, 113. 160. De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 374–76, pls. 11–14, 25, figs. 54–56; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 1–5. 161.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 401–3, pls. 14, 17, figs. 49, 68; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 5. 162.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 373–74, pls. 10, 16, figs. 50–52; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 1–7, figs. 1 and 18. 163.  Corbo, “Piazza e villa urbana a Magdala,” 236–40.

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Figure K. Unguentaria and ­juglets assemblage. Some samples of clay aryballoi and juglets for ointments and balms uncovered in the ­Magdala Project excavation of the bath complex. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2011. ­Photograph by Virginia Sedia.

Figure L. Needles and hairpins assemblage. A group of bone needles and hairpins found during the Magdala Project excavation of the bath complex. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2011. Photograph by Virginia Sedia.

Figure O. Iron Finger Ring. Intaglio gemstone on a signet ring (Mtl 73) bearing an eagle standing on thunderbolts, from the Magdala Project excavations in E33. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2011. Photograph by Virginia Sedia.

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inscription that have recently been reconsidered (see fig. S).164 The apotropaic, ambivalent motto καì σύ, “you too” or “to you too,” must be understood in the context of the ancient Greco-Roman superstition concerning the evil eye and bathing, which is also common in the Jewish milieu.165 The elements depicted have been read as a Mediterranean merchant galley, a dolphin, a kantharos, two tied-up strigiles with a suspended aryballos, a disk for throwing, and a pair of halteres for long jumping and athletic training. All the elements refer to the pleasure of bathing and its associated sense of leisure, comfort, and enjoyment. The thematic choice can be intended as an attempt to work out an iconography of pleasure through a set of simple signs referring to the cultural Greco-Roman world of thermae and gymnasia. (c) During the Middle and Late Roman periods, the pools underwent renovation and enlargement (especially C3, D3), the aquarium E27166 was built (see fig. C.1), and block C was repaved with a new mosaic.167 To this phase belong also the latrinae C30 (see figs. C.1, F)168 and two rectangular basins (apparently bathtubs) covered by marble and provided with water by a lead fistula running beneath a marble pavement (E28).169 The large number of artifacts of the Roman period, found in abandonment layers in the pools—including hundreds of ceramic and glass unguentaria (fig. K), glass bottles and aryballoi, bronze specilla, spatulae, cosmetic spoons and strigiles, bronze handles and rings, hundreds of tokens, dozens of needles or bone hairpins (fig. L), wooden combs, and bronze and gold jewelry (fig. O)—prove that all the pools were used as thermal baths.170 3. Quadriporticus. The large peristyle of the edifice F (stratigraphically ascribed to the second to first century bce) (shown in fig. F; also Area F in fig. C) is surrounded by stone paved porches delimited by a continuous stylobate on which columns with Doric capitals on Attic podia stand. In the past, this was interpreted as an “urban plaza.”171 It is now clear that its south and east sides directly faced the water. A stepped fountain (F20) has been uncovered in the center of the court. Its original foundation consists of ashlar masonry with drafted margins and prominent bosses. The area was accessible by the main paved road through a monumental entrance in the western side, and it gave access to the covered pool E22 to the north. As regards its function, we can hypothesize that it served as a monumental entrance to the city from the

164.  De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex”; see here the earlier bibliography. 165.  Ibid., 10–12, figs. 7–8. 166.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 406–7, pls. 17, 27–28, figs. 97–99. 167.  De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 6; Corbo, “La città romana,” 364, fig. 4. 168.  De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 4–6, figs. 1 and 18. 169.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” figs. 97–99; Corbo, “La città romana,” fig. 11. 170.  Some assemblages are presented in De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” figs. 66, 133, 138; De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 139, fig. 19. 171.  Corbo, “Piazza e villa urbana a Magdala,” 232–36.

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Figure G. View of the main harbor structure. General view of Area F (fig. C), where the plastered Roman quay incorporating the mooring stones (Ms 4–7 in fig. D) and the flight of steps are visible. In the foreground is the stone platform sloping toward the lake. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2011. Photograph by Virginia Sedia.

harbor on the east. In addition, given its physical connection to the thermae, the quadriporticus could also have been used as a palaestra.172 4. Harbor. The phases of the harbor exposed in the southern sector (see figs. C, D, F, and G [photo of harbor structure]) correspond to the strata of the city.173 (a) To the Late Hellenistic phase (and earlier) belong the quadriporticus F with its eastern side used as a quay and where a mooring stone is still preserved in situ (see fig. F and Ms1 in fig. D). In addition to this, an impressive building (E32–33, 35, 37, 39, 41–42 in fig. D)— separated from F by the covered cloaca E20—was built with ashlar masonry with prominent bosses and dressed margins and with a mooring stone in the southeastern corner (Ms2 in fig. 172. De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 417–22, 444; Lena, “Magdala 2008”; Rossi et al., “New Insights,” 359–61, 364–76, figs. 2, 4; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 23, 28–29 n. 183; De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 128–33. 173.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 422–35, pls. 28–33, figs. 14, 114–31; De Luca, “Scoperte archeologiche recenti,” 86–88; Lena, “Il porto di Magdala/Tarichea”; Lena, “Magdala 2008”; De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 128–47.

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D). This edifice (“port tower”) was probably a casemate tower sharing some features with the Hasmonean anchorages around the Dead Sea.174 (b) During the Early Roman period (mid-first century ce), this earlier anchorage was replaced and enlarged by a new dock coated with hydraulic plaster and incorporating four mooring stones found in place (Ms4–7 in fig. D; see fig. G).175 Against this quay, at approximately 1.5 m from the mooring stones, a stone platform that slightly sloped toward the lake was built out of boulders. From this platform, by a flight of monolithic steps near the southeastern corner, one could gain access to the quadriporticus. The port tower was then destroyed and partially occupied by the thermal complex, whereas the eastern side was obliterated by an artificially raised platea (E36) made up of a loose stone foundation of basalt splinters with a surface paved by reused stone blocks from walls. The walls enclosing the platea and facing the water had the same waterproof treatment as the south quay. (c) As testified to by a layer of collapse containing dressed stones, rubble, and fragments of colored plaster, which covered a layer of natural lacustrine sediments, according to the findings, the harbor silted in during the second half of the third century ce, prior to the 363 ce earthquake that completely destroyed the structures. (d) In the Late Roman period, in order to cope with progradations in the lake, a new platform was built approximately 20 m from the staircase toward the lake (F17). This was paved with reused cut stone from walls. (e) In the 1970s, farther eastward, Mendel Nun and Avner Raban documented a landing place with a paved road, a dry dock, and a breakwater including a rough mooring stone at 211 m below sea level (fig. A: h).176 This anchorage was in use with the Byzantine monastery, since the road led to its entrance.177 The average altitude of this Byzantine–Early Islamic dock, which is about 3 m lower than the Late Hellenist–Early Roman piers (with mooring stones at approx. 208 m below sea level) gives a reference for the fluctuations in the level of the Sea of Galilee through the centuries, as is also confirmed by geological studies carried out in the harbor areas.178 174.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 424–27; De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/ Taricheae,” 135, with references. 175.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 422–25, pl. 29–30. 176.  Mendel Nun, Sea of Kinneret: A Monograph (in Hebrew; Tel Aviv: HaKibbutz Hameuchad, 1977), 85–87; Nun, The Sea of Galilee and Its Fishermen in the New Testament (Kibbutz Ein Gev: Kinnereth Sailing Company, 1989), 61; Nun, Sea of Galilee: Newly Discovered Harbors from New Testament Days (Kibbutz Ein Gev: Tourist Department/Kinnereth Sailing Company, 1989), 20–21; Nun, The Sea of Galilee: Water Levels, Past and Present (Kibbutz Ein Gev: Tourist Department/Kinnereth Sailing Company, 1991), 13; Nun, “Ports of Galilee,” BAR 25, no. 4 (1999): 28–29; Avner Raban, “The Boat from Migdal Nunia and the Anchorages of the Sea of Galilee from the Time of Jesus,” International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 17 (1988): 322–23, 318, figs. 7–10. 177.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 430–35, pl. 33; De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 141–42, 146–47, 129, fig. 5. 178.  See esp. De Luca and Lena, “Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae,” 143–44, fig. 20; Lena, “Il porto di Magdala/Tarichea”; Giovanni Sarti et al., “Magdala Harbour Sedimentation (Sea of Galilee, Israel), from Natural to Anthropogenic Control,” Quaternary International 303 (2013): 120–31; Rossi et al., “New Insights.” See also Sarti et al., “The Magdala Site (Kinneret Lake, Israel) and Its Harbour History: Evidences of Anthropogenic

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Overview Uzi Leibner has brilliantly discussed the urban nature of Taricheae by analyzing both the sources and the archaeological data.179 With the new archaeological results, the urban character of the city in the Late Hellenistic–Early Roman period is even more convincing.180 Apart from the extent and population density of the site,181 if one could verify the criteria required to determine a settlement’s degree of urbanization,182 in Magdala/Taricheae one should note the existence of: (1) centers for the management of public affairs (synagogue, agoranomoi) with industrial and residential centers organized in a well-planned urban layout; (2) public buildings such as the harbor, the quadriporticus, the synagogue, the bath complex, the fountains, and the water tower; (3) entertainment structures such as the thermae and the hippodrome recorded by Josephus (Life 132, 138; J.W. 2.599), which has not yet been identified; (4) a system for the distribution of springwaters and runoff wastewater; (5) an agricultural hinterland comprising rural villages, such as probably the H|amam settlement to the west183 and other and Tectonic Climatic Sedimentation Control during the Late Holocene,” in The Transition from Natural to Anthropogenic-Dominated Environmental Change in Italy and the Surrounding Regions since the Neolithic (Proceedings of the AIQUA Congress 15, 17/2/2012; Pisa, 2012); Sarti et al., “Deciphering Natural to Anthropogenic Control on Sedimentation: The Late Holocene Magdala (Kinneret Lake, Israel) Harbour History,” in Proceedings of the European Geosciences Union, General Assembly, Vienna 22-27/4/2012, Geophysical Research Abstracts 14 (2012): http:// meetingorganizer.copernicus.org/EGU2012/EGU2012-9926.pdf; Sarti et al., The Ancient Harbour of Magdala: Its Space-Time History on the Basis of Geological Evidence (Pisa: Università di Pisa, 2013); Veronica Rossi et al., “Ostracod Fauna from the Ancient Magdala Harbor (Kinneret Lake, Israel),” in VI Convegno degli Ostracodologi Italiani, Trieste 20–21/4/2012 (Trieste, 2012), 43–45, http://www.openstarts.units.it/dspace/bitstream/10077/7185/1/ VeronicaRossi_et_al_6ConvegnoOstracodologi.pdf; Rossi et al., “Environmental Changes in the Lacustrine Ancient Harbour of Magdala (Kinneret Lake, Israel) Inferred from Ostracod, Geochemical and Sedimentological Analyses,” in Back to the Future: 17th International Symposium on Ostracoda, Rome 23–26/7/2013, Il Naturalista Siciliano 37 (2013): 331–32; Dario Pacini, “Nuovi dati stratigrafici sull’evoluzione stratigrafico-deposizionale del porto tardo ellenistico-romano di Magdala (Mar di Galilea, Israele)” (PhD diss., Università di Pisa, 2013), http:// etd.adm.unipi.it/t/etd-11212013-103648/. 179. Leibner, Settlement and History, 221–29. 180.  De Luca, “Urban development.” 181.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 441–42. According to Josephus, during the battle 6,700 men died (J.W. 3.531), and with the erection of the tribunal in Taricheae (J.W. 3.532), tens of thousands of rebels were killed (1,200) or enslaved (6,000 were sent to Nero and 30,400 were sold in slavery) after being imprisoned in the stadium of Tiberias (J.W. 3.539–542). Surely the numbers are excessive, as the population of 40,000 Taricheans (J.W. 2.608) is overestimated in comparison with other cities. Josephus, however, may have included the population belonging to Taricheae’s toparchy (J.W. 2.252; Ant. 20.159), including the rebels coming from the surrounding sites (see Life 142; J.W. 3.542). In any case, to present such resistance to the Roman army, the number of the rebels should have been really relevant (Manns, “Magdala dans les sources littéraires,” 316). 182. Peter Garnsey and Richard Saller, The Roman Empire: Economy, Society, and Culture (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987), 27–34, cited in Uzi Leibner, Settlement and History, 221 n. 87. 183.  Leibner, “Excavations at Khirbet Wadi H|amam”; Uzi Leibner and Shulamit Miller, “A Figural Mosaic in the Synagogue at Khirbet Wadi H|amam,” JRA 23 (2010): 238–64; Leibner and Bijovsky, “Two Hoards”; Leibner, Davidovich, and Arubas, “Structure, Date, and Purpose.”

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minor centers to the north; (6) recognition of a special status by the central government as the capital of a toparchy during the Hasmonean period and the reign of Agrippa II. No remains of the city walls mentioned by Josephus have survived (Life 142, 156; J.W. 3.462–465; cf. J.W. 2.606, 609), if we exclude the walling up of the north–south road to the southwest of the synagogue (Mex Area E and IAA Area C in fig. B). This wall reused architectural elements of the synagogue and left the dismantled synagogue outside of the supposed fortification. The wall could be a defensive work built during the First or (perhaps) during the Second Jewish Revolt. In this context, the Middle Roman pottery and an iron sword may have a parallel in the destruction layer identified at the site of Wadi H|amam, which has been reliably dated to 130 ce.184 Contrary to the southern area, which shows a continuity of settlement from the second century bce to the fourth century ce,185 the northern area apparently was progressively abandoned between the end of the first century and the later second century ce. Evidently, large areas of the city were consistently damaged because of the two Jewish Revolts. A level of destruction dating back to 67 ce was also found in the southern sector: for instance, the destruction strata in the pools E22 and in the vat of E19 where pre-70 ce materials were collected along with wooden vessels and iron weapons (cf. fig. D).186 The fact that, except for some areas, the site was continuously inhabited even after the revolt, could reflect the clear distinction made by Josephus between the native (in certain cases aristocratic; see Life 131) inhabitants of the city (ὁ ἐπιχώριος) and the foreigners (ὁ ἔπηλυς), that is, the newcomer rebels from “Trachonitis, and Gaulanitis, and of Hippos, and some of Gadara,” who were captured, killed, or sold into slavery after the capture of the city (J.W. 3.500; 542). In an interesting passage of Life 142, Josephus stresses the warm hospitality (φιλοξενωτάτην, superlative of φιλόξενος, “loving strangers, hospitable”) of the city toward foreigners, who were accommodated there in great numbers. Despite Josephus’s use of rhetoric to explain the causes of the defeat (see also Life 143, 152, and 162, which mention resident aliens), the archaeology has confirmed this attitude. Indeed, the material culture found at the site expresses both Jewish and Greco-Roman sensibilities.187 The predominantly aniconic ornamental motifs in the artwork reflect Jewish tastes in the Early Roman period, as we see in the case of the synagogue decorations and finds. In Life 159, Josephus mentions the residents’ concern about keeping the Sabbath. Other pieces of evidence, understood as ethnic indicators by some scholars,188 also point to a majority Jewish 184.  Leibner, “Excavations at Khirbet Wadi H|amam,” 225–26, fig. 4; Leibner and Bijovsky, “Two Hoards.” See also the article “Khirbet Wadi H|amam in the Early and Middle Roman Periods” by Uzi Leibner in this volume, pp. 343–61. 185.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 435–37. 186.  Ibid., 452–53. 187. De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 445–46, 449–52; Jürgen K. Zangenberg, “Archaeological News from the Galilee: Tiberias, Magdala and Rural Galilee,” EC 1 (2010): 471–84; De Luca, “Il contesto storicoarcheologico della missione”; De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 24. 188.  See Aviam, “First Century Jewish Galilee,” 19–20, 23.

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Figure J. Chalk vessels assemblage. Specimens of different types of chalk vessels collected during the Magdala Project excavations in the southern sector. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2011. Photograph by Virginia Sedia.

Figure M. Glasses assemblage. Some fragments of glass vessels from Area E of the Magdala Project excavations. Courtesy of S. De Luca, © Magdala Project 2011. Photograph by Virginia Sedia.

population. Especially in the Roman period, we found a predominance of Kefar Shikhin and Kefar H|ananya pottery with Herodian lamps and chalk vessels (fig. J) and hundreds of Hasmonean coins spread everywhere in the site, along with other local or imported lamps, kitchenware, tableware, and storage ware, including a considerable number of glass vessels (fig. M). Some elements, however, usually interpreted as indicating the presence of a non-Jewish population, were found among both architectural features (e.g. hippodrome, Roman-style thermae and decorations, Roman port engineering know-how, iconographic and epigraphic themes of mosaics, and so on) and iconic and figurative motifs depicted on various supports, such as the iconography of Tanit-Astarte on a weight, a virile head wearing a pileum engraved on a basalt frieze (fig. T), dolphins (on oil lamps and mosaics, fig. S), erotic and animal scenes on discus oil lamps, a phallic cippus, an intaglio signet ring depicting an eagle standing on a thunderbolt (fig. O), a glass pendant impressed with the image of a lion with a raised tail,

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Figure T. Arch friezes. Drawings of four friezes of an arch retrieved during the SBF excavation of the quadriporticus F. In addition to some classical motifs, the frieze is decorated with a meander pattern that alternates with rosettes and a man’s head wearing a pileum. Courtesy of S. De Luca, drawn by Marcello Forgia, © Magdala Project 2012.

bronze zoomorphic feet, and other things. Several so-called Galilean Coarse Ware (GCW) pithoi—usually identified as local pagan artifacts—were found in the Hellenistic strata. Three Greek inscriptions (on a mosaic, on the lead weight, and on an imported amphora) and one Latin (a seal impression on a Syrian mortarium) were found.189 This evidence is associated with a number of mainly imported luxury goods (marble, fine ware vessels, glass, bronze keys, bone or bronze hairpins and sewing needles, bronze specilla, cosmetic spoons, and so on), which reflect a high standard of living as a consequence of a generally healthy urban and diversified economy. The archaeological and literary evidence draws a picture of a city inhabited by a strongly hellenized and romanized Jewish population.190 The economic indicators, such as the currency and imported goods, appear to result from long-range commercial relationships with the Phoenician and Syrian cities to the north

189. De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 415, fig. 112; Karen Ilardi, “Un bollo di Caius Bellicius Zmaragdus,” in De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 535–39, fig. 137. To these should be added an epigraph in Hebrew (now lost) and another probably in Greek or Latin (also now lost) bearing an engraved cross and the date 1383, apparently from the Christian basilica (Bagatti, Ancient Christian Villages of Galilee, 70; Denys Pringle, The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem: A Corpus [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1993–98; repr. 2008–10], 2:271). 190.  See Richard Bauckham and Stefano De Luca, “Magdala As We Now Know It,” EC 6, no. 1 (2015), 91–118.

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and with the district of the Decapolis to the east.191 Certainly the commercial enterprise took advantage of the town’s strategic location at the intersection of the region’s main routes,192 and from the harbor’s ability to manage a high volume of incoming and outgoing traffic.193 Josephus lists a fleet of 230 boats (J.W. 2.635; cf. Life 155–166) prior to and during the naval battle (J.W. 3.522–531), including some relatively small boats (σκάφη μικρά) used for piracy (λῃστρικά; J.W. 3.523). This type of “piratical” (λῃστρική) boat may roughly correspond to the class of myoparo194 to which the boat at Ygal Allon Center in Ginosar is ascribed.195 Bibliography Abu-‘Uqsa, Hanaa. “The Findings from Two Excavations at Migdal.” In Hebrew with English summary. ‘Atiqot 42 (2001): 9*–25*, 321–22. ———. “Migdal.” ESI 13 (1993): 28. ———. “Migdal.” ESI 16 (1997): 34. ———. “Migdal: Final Report.” HA-ESI 117 (2005): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_ detail_eng.asp?id=238&mag_id=110. Adan-Bayewitz, David. Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Study of Local Trade. Bar-Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture. Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan Universtity Press, 1993. Adinolfi, Marco. “Il Lago di Tiberiade e le sue città nella letteratura greco-romana.” LASBF 44 (1994): 375–80. Adler, Yonatan. “The Archaeology of Purity: Archaeological Evidence for the Observance of Ritual Purity in Erez\-Israel from the Hasmonean Period until the End of the Talmudic Era (164 bce–400 ce).” In Hebrew. PhD diss., Bar-Ilan University, 2011. 191.  De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana,” 446–49. 192.  Ibid., 444. 193.  On this point, it is of some interest that the load of a shipwreck (Charles T. Fritsch and Immanuel BenDor, “The ‘Link’ Expedition to Israel,” BA 24 [1961]: 50–59) with a significant number of unused jugs and cooking wares—identified by David Adan-Bayewitz as a Kefar H|ananya manifacture (Common Pottery in Roman Galilee: A Study of Local Trade [Bar-Ilan Studies in Near Eastern Languages and Culture; Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan Universtity Press 1993], 214)—was found along the coast near Magdala, and that assemblages of so-called Kefar H|ananya pottery were reported from the neighborhoods of Hippos and Gadara (see Chaim Ben David, “Distribution of Kefar H|ananya Type Kitchenware in Roman Period Golan: The Data from the Surveys,” Tel Aviv 41 [2014]: 248–52, with updated references). 194. A type of small Mediterranean boat, easy to handle, fast and with a lower draught, and therefore preferred for acts of piracy (Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971; corr. and exp. ed., Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995], 132). See also De Luca and Lena, “Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex,” 12–15, esp. 13–14. 195.  Shelley Wachsmann, ed., The Excavations of an Ancient Boat in the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret) (‘Atiqot 19; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 1990), 115, 120. Interestingly, a trilobate type of iron arrowhead—comparable to those found at Gamla—was found in the mud removed from the boat (Danny Syon, “The Arrowhead,” in Wachsmann, Excavations of an Ancient Boat, 99–100).

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Baldi, Donato. Enchiridion Locorum Sanctorum: Documenta S. Evangelii loca respicentia. 2nd ed. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1982. Bauckham, Richard. “Further Thoughts on the Migdal Synagogue Stone.” NovT 57 (2015): 113–35. ———. “Magdala and the Fishing Industry of the Lake.” In Magdala, Jewish City of Fish, edited by Richard Bauckham, and Stefano De Luca. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, forthcoming. ———. “Magdala in Rabbinic Literature.” In Magdala, Jewish City of Fish, edited by Richard Bauckham, and Sefano De Luca. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, forthcoming. Bauckham, Richard, and Stefano De Luca, “Magdala As We Now Know It.” EC 6, no. 1 (2015): 91–118. Bauckham, Richard, and Stefano De Luca, eds., Magdala, Jewish City of Fish. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, forthcoming. Ben David, Chaim. “Distribution of Kefar H|ananya Type Kitchenware in Roman Period Golan: The Data from the Surveys.” Tel Aviv 41 (2014): 238–54. Binder, Donald D. “The Mystery of the Magdala Stone.” In A City Set on a Hill: Essays in Honor of James F. Strange, edited by Daniel Warner and Donald D. Binder, 17–48. Mountain Home, Ariz.: Borderstone, 2014. Bonnie, Rick, and Julian Richard. “Building D1 at Magdala Revisited in the Light of Public Fountain Architecture in the Late Hellenistic East.” IEJ 62 (2012): 71–88. Burke, Aaron A. “Magdaluma, Migdalîm, Magdoloi, and Majadil: The Historical Geography and Archaeology of the Magdalu (Migdal).” BASOR 346 (2007): 29–57. Callegher, Bruno. “E le monete di Magdala ci raccontano che.” Terrasanta 4, no. 1 (2009): 49. ———. “Note su un peso fenicio in piombo da Magdala.” Quaderni Ticinesi di Numismatica e Antichità Classiche 37 (2008): 321–29. Casson, Lionel. Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971. Corrected and expanded ed., Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995. Choi, Junghwa. Jewish Leadership in Roman Palestine from 70 C.E. to 135 C.E. Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity 83. Leiden: Brill, 2013. Cinamon, Gilad. “Migdal: Final Report.” HA-ESI 126 (2014): http://www.hadashot-esi.org. il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=11620&mag_id=121. Conder, Claude R. “Notes from the Memoir.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 9, no. 1 (1877): 178–83. ———. “Notes on the Position of Taricheae.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 10, no. 4 (1878): 190–91. Corbo, Virgilio C. “La città romana di Magdala: Rapporto preliminare dopo la IV campagna di scavo: 1 ottobre–8 dicembre 1975.” In Studia Hierosolymitana in onore di P. Bellarmino Bagatti. I: Studi archeologici, edited by Emmanuele Testa, Ignazio Mancini, and Michele Piccirillo, 355–78. SBF Collectio Maior 22. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1976.

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———. “Piazza e villa urbana a Magdala.” LASBF 28 (1978): 232–40. ———. “Scavi archeologici a Magdala (1971–1973).” LASBF 24 (1974): 5–37. Curtis, Robert I. “Sources for Production and Trade of Greek and Roman Processed Fish.” In Ancient Fishing and Fish Processing in the Black Sea Region, edited by Tønnes BekkerNielsen, 31–46. Black Sea Studies 2. Oakville, Conn.: Aarhus University Press, 2005 (digital ed. 2006). Dalman, Gustaf. Orte und Wege Jesu. Gütersloh: C. Bertelsmann, 1921. ———. “Die Zeltreise.” Palästina-Jahrbuch (1912): 25–63. Dark, Ken. “Archaeological Evidence for a Previously Unrecognised Roman Town near the Sea of Galilee.” PEQ 145 (2013): 185–202. De Luca, Stefano. “Capernaum.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology, edited by Daniel M. Master, 1:168–80. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. ———. “La città ellenistico-romana di Magdala Taricheae: Gli scavi del Magdala Project 2007 e 2008. Relazione preliminare e prospettive di indagine.” LASBF 49 (2009): 343–562, 571–572 (English abstract). ———. “Il contesto storico-archeologico della missione di Gesù attorno al Lago di Galilea.” In Con gli occhi degli apostoli: Una presenza che travolge la vita, edited by J. M. Garcia and D. Massara, 14–16. Milano: Piccola Casa, 2011. ———. “Magdala Project: Conferenza nuovi scavi a Magdala.” In Notiziario Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem: Anno Accademico 2011–2012, edited by R. Pierri, 22–23. Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 2012. ———. “Magdala Project 2007.” In Notiziario Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem: Anno Accademico 2006–2007, edited by R. Pierri, 12–17. Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 2008. ———. “Magdala Project 2008–2010.” In Notiziario Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem: Anno Accademico 2009–2010, edited by R. Pierri, 13–18. Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, 2011. ———. “Scoperte archeologiche recenti attorno al Lago di Galilea: Contributo allo studio dell’ambiente del Nuovo Testamento e del Gesù storico.” In Terra Sancta: Archeologia ed esegesi. Atti dei convegni 2008–2010, edited by G. Paximadi and M. Fidanzio, 16–111. ISCAB Series Archeologica 1. Lugano: Eupress, 2013. ———. “Urban Development of the City of Magdala/Tarichaeae in the Light of the New Excavations: Remains, Problems and Perspectives.” In Symposium Greco-Roman Galilee (21st–23rd June 2009, Tel H|ai Academic College-Kinneret College-Macalester CollegeCarthage College). Forthcoming. ———. “Vorgeschichte, Ursprung und Funktion der byzantinischen Klöster von Kafarnaum/ Tabgha in der Region um den See Gennesaret.” In Tabgha 2012: Festschrift zur Einweihung des neuen Klostergebäudes am 17. Mai 2012, edited by Benediktinern der Abtei Dormitio und des Priorats Tabgha, 24–59. Jerusalem: Emerezian, 2012.

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De Luca, Stefano, and Anna Lena. “The Harbor of the City of Magdala/Taricheae on the Shores of the Sea of Galilee, from the Hellenistic to the Byzantine Times: New Discoveries and Preliminary Results.” In Byzas 19—Harbors and Harbor Cities in the Eastern Mediterranean from Antiquity to the Byzantine Period: Recent Discoveries and Current Approaches. Istanbul, May 30–June 1, 2011, edited by Sabine Ladstätter, Felix Pirson, and Thomas Schmidts, 1:113–63. Istanbul: Ege Yayinlari, 2014. ———. “The Mosaic of the Thermal Bath Complex of Magdala Reconsidered: Archaeological Context, Epigraphy and Iconography.” In Knowledge and Wisdom: Archaeological and Historical Essays in Honour of Leah Di Segni, edited by Giovanni C. Bottini, L. Daniel Chrupcała, and Joseph Patrich, 1–33. SBF Collectio Maior 54. Milan: Terra Santa, 2014. Deutsch, Robert. “Coinage of the First Jewish Revolt against Rome: Iconography, Minting Authority, Metallurgy.” In The Jewish Revolt against Rome: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, edited by Mladen Popović, 361–71. JSJSup 154. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Farhi, Yoav. “Stucco Decorations from the Western Quarter.” In Gamla II: The Shmarya Gutmann Excavations 1976–1989. The Architecture, edited by Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor, 175–87. IAA Reports 44. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2010. Flusser, David. Judaism of the Second Temple Period. Translated by Azzan Yadin. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans; Jerusalem: Hebrew University Magnes Press and Jerusalem Perspectives, 2009. Fradkin, Arlene. “Long-Distance Trade in the Lower Galilee: New Evidence from Sepphoris.” In Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods, edited by Douglas R. Edwards and C. Thomas McCollough, 107–16. South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997. Freyne, Seán. The Jesus Movement and Its Expansion: Meaning and Mission: Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014. Fritsch, Charles T., and Immanuel Ben-Dor. “The ‘Link’ Expedition to Israel.” BA 24 (1961): 50–59. Furrer, Konrad. “Noch einmal das Emmaus des Josephus, das Hammat der Bibel, Hammata des Talmud am See Genezaret.” ZDPV 13 (1890): 194–98. ———. “Die Ortschaften am See Genezaret.” ZDPV 2 (1879): 52–74. ———. “Taricheae und Gamla.” ZDPV 12 (1889): 145–51. Garnsey, Peter, and Richard Saller. The Roman Empire: Economy, Society, and Culture. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987. Garza Díaz Barriga, Andrea. “Las cuatro monedas: El dinero que circuló en Galilea; las monedas que conocieron en Magdala y Gamla.” In El Pensador monográficos 1.5 (2013), El proyecto arqueológico Magdala: Interpretaciones preliminares bajo una perspectiva interdisciplinar, edited by Marcela Zapata-Meza and Rosaura Sanz-Rincón, 76–83. Gitler, Haim. “The Coins.” In The Excavations of an Ancient Boat in the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret), edited by Shelley Wachsmann, 101–6. ‘Atiqot English Series 19. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 1990.

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Grootkerk, Salomon E. Ancient Sites in Galilee: A Toponymic Gazetteer. CHANE 1. Leiden: Brill, 2000. Guérin, Victor. Description géographique, historique et archéologique de la Palestine. Part 3, Galilee. Paris: Imprimé par autorisation de l’empereur à l’Impr. Imperial, vol. 1, 1880. Guthe, Hermann. “Zur Lage von Taricheä.” ZDPV 13 (1890): 281–85. Hachlili, Rachel. Ancient Synagogues—Archaeology and Art: New Discoveries and Current Research. Handbook of Oriental Studies, Section 1, Ancient Near East 105. Leiden: Brill, 2013. Hanson, Kenneth C. “The Galilean Fishing Economy and the Jesus Tradition.” BTB 27 (1997): 99–111. Hartal, Moshe. “Tiberias, Survey of the Northern Entrance.” HA-ESI 120 (2008): http:// www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=778&mag_id=114. Hartal, Moshe, Edna Amos, and Avner Hillman. “Tiberias: Preliminary Report.” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1574&mag_id=117. Hernández Grajales, Meztli. “Taricheae o la antigua ciudad de María de Magdala.” In El Pensador monográficos 1.5 (2013), El proyecto arqueológico Magdala: Interpretaciones preliminares bajo una perspectiva interdisciplinar, edited by Marcela Zapata-Meza and Rosaura Sanz-Rincón, 12–20. Hoss, Stephanie. Baths and Bathing: The Culture of Bathing and Baths and Thermae in Israel from the Hasmoneans to the Moslem Conquest. With an Appendix on Ritual Baths (Miqva’ot). BAR International Series 1346. Oxford: Archaeopress, 2005. ———. “From Rejection to Incorporation: The Roman Bathing Culture in Palestine.” In SPA. Sanitas per aquam: Proceedings of the International Frontinus-Symposium on the Technical and Cultural History of Ancient Baths, Aachen, March 18–22, 2009, edited by Ralf Kreiner and Wolfram Letzner, 259–64. Leuven: Peeters, 2012. Ilardi, Karen. “Un bollo di Caius Bellicius Zmaragdus.” In Stefano De Luca, “La città ellenistico-romana di Magdala Taricheae: Gli scavi del Magdala Project 2007 e 2008. Relazione preliminare e prospettive di indagine.” LASBF 49 (2009): 535–39 (Appendix 1). Jensen, Morten H. “Magdala/Taricheae and the Jewish Revolt.” In Magdala, Jewish City of Fish, edited by Richard Bauckham and Stefano De Luca. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, forthcoming. Kitchener, Horatio H. “Lieutenant Kitchener’s Reports II: Camp at Tiberias 30th March, 1877.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 9, no. 3 (1877): 116–25. ———. “Notes on Taricheae.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 10, no. 2 (1878): 79. ———. “Survey of Galilee.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 10, no. 4 (1878): 158–74. Klein, Samuel. Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas. Leipzig: R. Haupt, 1909. Kokkinos, Nikos. “The Location of Tarichaea: North or South of the City of Tiberias?” PEQ 142 (2010): 7–23.

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Qedar, Shraga. “Two Lead Weights of Herod Antipas and Agrippa II and the Early History of Tiberias.” Israel Numismataic Journal 9 (1986–87): 30–33. Raban, Avner. “The Boat from Migdal Nunia and the Anchorages of the Sea of Galilee from the Time of Jesus.” International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 17, no. 4 (1988): 311–29. Reeg, Gottfried. Die Ortsnamen Israels nach der rabbinischen Literatur. Beihefte zum Tübinger Atlas des Vorderen Orients, Reihe B, Geistes Wissenschaften 51. Wiesbaden: L. Reichert, 1989. Reich, Ronny. “The Hot Bath-House (Balneum), the Miqweh, and the Jewish Community in the Second Temple Period.” JJS 39 (1988): 102–7. Reich, Ronny, and Marcela Zapata-Meza. “The Miqwa’ot of Migdal on the Shore of the Sea of Galilee.” In Magdala, Jewish City of Fish, edited by Richard Bauckham and Stefano De Luca. Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, forthcoming. ———. “A Preliminary Report on the Miqwa’ot of Migdal.” IEJ 64 (2014): 63–71. Robinson, Edward. Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai, and Arabia Petraea. 3 vols. London: John Murray, 1841. Romanoff, Paul. Jewish Symbols on Ancient Jewish Coins. Philadelphia: The Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning, 1944. Rossi, Veronica, Alessandro Amorosi, Irene Sammartino, and Giovanni Sarti. “Environmental Changes in the Lacustrine Ancient Harbour of Magdala (Kinneret Lake, Israel) Inferred from Ostracod, Geochemical and Sedimentological Analyses.” In Back to the Future: 17th International Symposium on Ostracoda, Rome 23-26/7/2013. Il Naturalista Siciliano 37 (2013): 331–32. ———. “Ostracod Fauna from the Ancient Magdala Harbor (Kinneret Lake, Israel).” In VI Convegno degli Ostracodologi Italiani. Trieste 20–21/4/2012, 43–45. Trieste, 2012. http://www.openstarts.units.it/dspace/bitstream/10077/7185/1/VeronicaRossi_et_ al_6ConvegnoOstracodologi.pdf. Rossi, Veronica, Irene Sammartino, Alessandro Amorosi, Giovanni Sarti, Stefano De Luca, Anna Lena, and Christophe Morhange. “New insights into the Palaeoenvironmental Evolution of Magdala Ancient Harbour (Sea of Galilee, Israel) from Ostracod Assemblages, Geochemistry and Sedimentology.” Journal of Archaeological Science 54 (2015): 356–73. Rozenberg, Silvia. “Wall Painting Fragments from Area A.” In Jewish Quarter Excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem Conducted by Nahman Avigad, 1969-1982. Vol. 2, The Finds from Areas A, W and X-2: Final Report, edited by Hillel Geva, 302–28. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society and Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University, 2003. Safrai, Ze’ev. The Economy of Roman Palestine. London: Routledge, 1994 (digital ed. 2003). Sarti, Giovanni, Veronica Rossi, Alessandro Amorosi, Duccio Bertoni, Adriano Ribolini, Irene Sammartino, and Gianni Zanchetta. “The Magdala Site (Kinneret Lake, Israel) and Its Harbour History: Evidences of Anthropogenic and Tectonic Climatic Sedimentation Control during the Late Holocene.” In The Transition from Natural to Anthropogenic-

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dominated Environmental Change in Italy and the Surrounding Regions since the Neolithic, 75. Proceedings of the AIQUA Congress 15, 17/2/2012. Pisa, 2012. ———. “Deciphering Natural to Anthropogenic Control on Sedimentation: the Late Holocene Magdala (Kinneret Lake, Israel) Harbour History.” In Proceedings of the European Geosciences Union, General Assembly, Vienna 22-27/4/2012. Geophysical Research Abstracts 14 (2012), http://meetingorganizer.copernicus.org/EGU2012/EGU2012-9926.pdf. Sarti, Giovanni, Veronica  Rossi, Alessandro Amorosi, Stefano De Luca, Anna Lena, Christophe Morhange, Adriano Ribolini, Irene Sammartino, Duccio Bertoni, and Gianni Zanchetta. “Magdala Harbour Sedimentation (Sea of Galilee, Israel), from Natural to Anthropogenic Control.” Quaternary International 303 (2013): 120–31. http://dx.doi. org/10.1016/j.quaint.2013.01.032. Sarti, Giovanni (with contributions from V. Rossi, D. Bertoni, A. Ribolini and G. Zanchetta). The Ancient Harbour of Magdala: Its Space-Time History on the Basis of Geological Evidence, 1–18. Pisa, 2013. http://unimap.unipi.it/cercapersone/prodottodett.php?dpr=155666& iddoc=009215. Schäfer, Peter. The History of the Jews in the Greco-Roman world. 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2003. Schürer, Emil. The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (175 B.C.–A.D. 135). Revised and edited by Géza Vermès, Fergus Millar, Matthew Black, and Martin Goodman. 3 vols. in 4 pts. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1973–87. Shah\ar, Yuval. Josephus Geographicus: The Classical Context of Geography in Josephus. TSAJ 98. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004. Shatzman, Israel. The Armies of the Hasmonaeans and Herod: From Hellenistic to Roman Frameworks. TSAJ 25. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991. Smallwood, E. Mary. The Jews under Roman Rule from Pompey to Diocletian: A Study in Political Relations. SJLA 20. Leiden: Brill, 1981. Spiess, Friedrich. “Die Lage von Taricheä.” ZDPV 8 (1885): 95–99. Stepansky, Yosef. “Kefar Nahum Bay.” ESI 12 (1993): 10–11. ———. “Kefar Nahum Map Survey.” ESI 10 (1991): 87–90. ———. “Migdal.” ESI 71 (1986): 318–22. Stern, Edna J. “The Excavations at Lower Horbat Manot: A Medieval Sugar-Production Site.” ‘Atiqot 42 (2001): 277–307. ———. “Sugar Production in the Lake of Galilee Region as Revealed by Ceramic Vessels Unearthed at Archeological Excavations in Tiberias (Crusader Period, 12th Century ce).” In 45 Years for the Golan Heights Survey: A Conference in Honor of Moshe Hartal, 30 April 2013. Haifa: Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, 2013. Syon, Danny. “The Arrowhead.” In The Excavations of an Ancient Boat in the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret), edited by Shelley Wachsmann, 99–100. ‘Atiqot English Series 19. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 1990. ———. The Coins from Migdal. In Hebrew. ‘Atiqot 42 (2002): 33*–36*.

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———. “The Identification of Gamla.” In Gamla II: The Shmarya Gutmann Excavations 1976–1989. The Architecture, edited by Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor, 1–12. IAA Reports 44. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2010. ———. “Gamla: Portrait of a Rebellion.” BAR 18, no. 1 (1992): 20–37. Taylor, Joan E. “Missing Magdala and the Name of Mary ‘Magdalene’.” PEQ 146 (2014): 205–23. Trakadas, Athena. “The Archaeological Evidence for Fish Processing in the Western Mediterranean.” In Ancient Fishing and Fish Processing in the Black Sea Region, edited by Tønnes Bekker-Nielsen, 47–82. Black Sea Studies 2. Oakville, Conn.: Aarhus University Press, 2005 (digital ed. 2006). Tsafrir, Yoram, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green. Tabula Imperii Romani Iudaea-Palaestina: Eretz Israel in the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods, Maps and Gazetteer. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994. Turnage, Marc. “The Linguistic Ethos of Galilee in the First Century C.E.,” in The Language Environment of First Century Judaea: Jerusalem Studies in the Synoptic Gospels, edited by Randall Buth and R. Steven Notley, 110–81. Jewish and Christian Perspectives 2. Leiden: Brill, 2013 (digital ed., 2014). Vitto, Fanny. “A Jewish Mausoleum of the Roman Period at Qiryat Shemu’el, Tiberias.” ‘Atiqot 58 (2008): 7*–29*. Wachsmann, Shelley, ed. The Excavations of an Ancient Boat in the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret). ‘Atiqot English Series 19. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 1990. Wessely, Carl. Studien zur Palaeographie und Papyruskunde. 23 vols. Leipzig: E. Avenarius, 1901–24. Wilson, Charles W. “The Sites of Taricheae and Bethsaida.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 9, no. 1 (1877): 10–13. Wright, Benjamin G., III. “Jewish Ritual Baths: Interpreting the Digs and the Texts: Some Issues in the Social History of the Second Temple Judaism.” In The Archaeology of Israel: Constructing the Past, Interpreting the Present, edited by Neil Asher Silberman and David Small, 197–214. JSOTSup 237. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997. Zangenberg, Jürgen K. “Archaeological News from the Galilee: Tiberias, Magdala and Rural Galilee.” EC 1 (2010): 471–84. ———. “A Basalt Stone Table from the Byzantine Synagogue at Horvat Kur, Galilee: Publica­ tion and First Interpretation.” In Yizhar Hirschfeld Memorial Volume. Forthcoming. ———. “Ein Dorf auf dem Hügel: Neue Entdeckungen des Kinneret Regional Project in der Synagoge von Horvat Kur.” In Bauern, Fischer und Propheten: Galiläa zur Zeit Jesu, edited by Jürgen K. Zangenberg and Jens Schröter, 131–44. Zaberns Bildbände zur Archäologie, Sonderbände der Antiken Welt. Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2012. ———. “From the Galilean Jesus to the Galilean Silence: Earliest Christianity in the Galilee until the 4th Century C.E.” In The Rise and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three

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Centuries of the Common Era, edited by Clare K. Rothschild and Jens Schröter, 75–108. WUNT 301. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013. ———. Magdala am See Gennesaret: Überlegungen zur sogenannten “Mini-sinagoga” und einige andere Beobachtungen zum kulturellen Profil des Ortes in neutestamentlicher Zeit.. Kleine Arbeiten zum Alten und Neuen Testament 81. Waltrop: Spenner 2001. ———. “Observations on the Function, Character and Location of the New Testament Toponym Γεννεησαρητ (Mk 6:53; Mt 14:34).” In Jesus, Paul, and Early Christianity: Studies in Honour of Henk Jan de Jonge, edited by Rieuwerd Buitenwerf, Harm W. Hollander, and Johannes Tromp, 439–70. NovTSup 130. Leiden: Brill, 2008. ———. “Performing the Sacred in a Community Building: Observations from the 2010– 2013 Kinneret Regional Project Excavations in the Byzantine Synagogue of Horvat Kur (Galilee).” In Spaces in Late Antiquity: Cultural, Theological and Archaeological Perspectives, edited by Juliette Day, Raimo Hakola, Ulla Tervahauta-Helin, and Maijastina Kahlos. London: Ashgate, forthcoming. Zangenberg, Jürgen K., Stefan Münger, Raimo Hakola, and Byron R. McCane. “The Kinneret Regional Project Excavations of a Byzantine Synagogue at Horvat Kur, Galilee, 2010– 2013: A Preliminary Report.” Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel 4, no. 2 (2013): 557–76. Zangenberg, Jürgen K., and Jens Schröter, eds. Bauern, Fischer und Propheten: Galiläa zur Zeit Jesu. Zaberns Bildbände zur Archäologie, Sonderbände der Antiken Welt. Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2012. Zapata-Meza, Marcela. “Introduccíon general: Proyecto arquelógico Magala.” In El Pensador monográficos 1.5 (2013), El proyecto arqueológico Magdala: Interpretaciones preliminares bajo una perspectiva interdisciplinar, edited by Marcela Zapata-Meza and Rosaura SanzRincón, 6–20. ———. “Los mikva’ot de Magdala un encuentro con los sacro.” In El Pensador monográficos 1.5 (2013), El proyecto arqueológico Magdala: Interpretaciones preliminares bajo una perspectiva interdisciplinar, edited by Marcela Zapata-Meza and Rosaura Sanz-Rincón, 58–65. ———. “Neue mexikanische Ausgrabungen in Magdala–Das Magdala Archaeological Project.” In Bauern, Fischer und Propheten: Galiläa zur Zeit Jesu, edited by Jürgen K. Zangenberg and Jens Schröter, 85–98. Zaberns Bildbände zur Archäologie, Sonderbände der Antiken Welt. Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern, 2012. Zapata-Meza, Marcela, Dina Avshalom-Gorni, and Danny Syon. “Magdala Archaeological Project (2010-2012): Preliminary Report,” ‘Atiqot. Forthcoming. Zapata-Meza, Marcela, and Rosaura Sanz-Rincón, eds. El Pensador monográficos 1.5 (2013), El proyecto arqueológico Magdala: Interpretaciones preliminares bajo una perspectiva interdisciplinar, http://issuu.com/revistaelpensador/docs/el_pensador_n___5.

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15 Khirbet Wadi H|amam in the Early and Middle Roman Periods Uzi Leibner Khirbet Wadi H|amam is located in the eastern Lower Galilee above Wadi Arbel (H|amam), two kilometers west of the Sea of Galilee (see Maps 3 and 4B in the color gallery of this volume). The site (map ref. 2460/7480) is situated opposite Mount Arbel, on a steep slope at the base of the massive cliffs of Mount Nitai (fig. A). This odd location was apparently chosen due to its proximity to the cliffs and the isolated mountaintop, both of which could be used as places of refuge during unstable periods. Surrounded on three sides by the riverbeds of Wadi Arbel and Wadi Savyona and by cliffs on the fourth, the site is naturally fortified. The settlement, whose ancient remains cover some thirty to forty dunams (7.4–10 acres), was one of the largest villages in this area in the Roman period. A flowing spring right below the site, as well as its proximity to the ancient route that led from the Sea of Galilee through Wadi Arbel to central Galilee and from there to the Mediterranean coast, can explain the development of this large settlement. Despite its size, central location, and nearness to continuously settled sites such as Tiberias (6 km), the ancient name of this village has long disappeared.1 Kh. Wadi H|amam may be identified with Migdal Z\aba‘aya (‫)מגדל צבעיא‬, a site mentioned several times in Palestinian rabbinic literature of the Amoraic period (third–fourth centuries ce). Literary sources indicate that Migdal Z\aba‘aya should be located somewhere near Tiberias, and it is described as a prosperous settlement that was probably destroyed during the Jewish revolts against Rome but is mentioned again in the Late Roman period.2 1.  The Arabic name H|amam (pigeon), derived from the flocks of pigeons nesting in the nearby cliffs, is the name of an agricultural plot recorded in the Ottoman census of the sixteenth century. 2. See, e.g., y. Ta‘an. 1:6, 64c; 4:5, 69a; y. Pesah\. 4:1, 30d; Lev. Rab. 17:4 (ed. Mordechai Margulies; Jerusalem: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1953–60), 1:379 (in Hebrew).

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Figure A. Khirbet Wadi Ḥamam (Areas A, B, C, F), the Mount Nitai fortification (Area D), and the Mount Nitai Caves (Area E), as seen on a 5-m contoured topographical map. Note the location of ‘En Arbel south of the ruin. Drawing by B. Arubas.

Its ruins were first identified in the nineteenth century by the Survey of Western Palestine, and Joseph Braslavsky was the first to draw attention to architectural elements at the site that seem to belong to a “Galilean”-type synagogue.3 An intensive surface survey accompanied by shovel-test sampling was conducted at the site as part of the Eastern Galilee Survey. Nearly six hundred identified pottery sherds were collected and found to belong to the first centuries ce, none postdating around the late fourth century.4 3.  See Claude R. Conder and Horatio H. Kitchener, The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology, vol. 1, Galilee (London: Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881), 409; Joseph Braslavsky, “Remains” (in Hebrew), Bulletin of the Jewish Palestine Exploration Society 1, no. 2 (1925): 140. The synagogue remains were surveyed again in the 1970s and 1980s by Gideon Foerster and Zvi Ilan; see Foerster, “The Synagogues of the Galilee,” in The Lands of the Galilee (in Hebrew; ed. Avshalom Shmueli, Arnon Sofer, and Nurit Kliot; Haifa: Ministry of Defense, 1983), 243; Ilan, Ancient Synagogues in Israel (in Hebrew; Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense, 1991), 128. 4. Uzi Leibner, Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee (TSAJ 127; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), 71–74, 205–10.

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The Hebrew University Excavations The main objectives of the Hebrew University expedition were (1) to shed new light on the much-debated issue of the dating of “Galilean”-type synagogues; (2) to illuminate the character, communal organization, and economic basis of a Galilean village in the Roman period; (3) to understand better the processes of decline that affected Galilean settlements in the Early Byzantine period; and (4) to date the massive fortification located on Mount Nitai and to determine its purpose and relationship to the village. As the excavation progressed and unanticipated finds came to light, new questions arose, first and foremost the interpretation of an early-second-century destruction layer and the question of the Galilee’s involvement in the Bar-Kokhba revolt. The six excavation seasons conducted at the site, from 2007 to 2012, extended over four areas and generally reached bedrock: Area A, in the center of the site, yielded the remains of an Early Roman public building and two phases of a Late Roman monumental synagogue; Area B, north of the synagogue, exposed domestic structures and an olive-oil press; Area F, south of the synagogue, also revealed domestic structures and an olive-oil press; and Area C, at the southern edge of the site, uncovered domestic structures. All told, the excavations unearthed some ten residential structures, two olive-oil presses, alleys, and a monumental synagogue. The abundance of material remains from this site sheds important light on the life and culture of Roman rural Galilee. These include some 9,000 identifiable pottery vessels, nearly 500 coins, and hundreds of oil lamps, glass vessels, stone and metal objects, archaeozoological remains, and architectural fragments. Four strata were identified during the excavations: Stratum I: Byzantine, Umayyad, Crusader, Mamluk, and Ottoman periods. Sporadic surface finds of sherds and coins from these periods are unrelated to any architectural remains and apparently belonged to passersby or shepherds who visited the site. Stratum II: Third to fourth centuries ce: domestic structures, oil presses, alleys, and two phases of a “Galilean”-type synagogue. Stratum III: First century bce to early second century ce (Second Temple period to the beginning of the Middle Roman period): domestic structures, alleys, and part of a public building. Stratum IV: Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age I periods: hundreds of sherds and flint tools, and several stone vessels, mainly from fills beneath structures of Strata II and III. Although no architectural elements from this stratum were identified, the large quantity of finds indicates that the site was settled during these periods.5 In addition to our excavations inside the village, explorations were carried out along the fortification wall on Mount Nitai, right above the settlement, and an intensive survey was 5.  See Uri Davidovich, Mika Ullman, and Uzi Leibner, “Late Prehistoric Occurrences in Har Nitai and Khirbat Wadi H|amam, Northeastern Lower Galilee,” Journal of the Israel Prehistoric Society 43 (2013): 186–204.

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conducted in nearly two hundred caves in the cliffs between the village and the mountaintop. The focus in this paper will be on the Early and Middle Roman periods (Stratum III). Our conclusions regarding the other strata and the above-mentioned objectives (1) and (3) will be described only briefly. Stratum III: The Second Temple Period to the Beginning of the Middle Roman Era The finds indicate that the site was apparently first settled in the Hasmonean period. Due to intensive later construction, only a few architectural remains could be clearly dated to this period. Nevertheless, Late Hellenistic pottery found in the fills beneath the Early Roman structures—a dozen Seleucid and autonomous Phoenician coins from second-century bce Akko-Ptolemais and Tyre (mainly the second half of that century), and some 90 Hasmonean coins—indicate that occupation here began around the early first century bce. The settlement expanded and developed during the Early Roman period. In this stage, the village apparently peaked in terms of size and prosperity, as is evident from the domestic structures and rich finds from this period found in all excavated areas. Wide-scale construction took place at the site around the first half of the first century ce. This included quarrying, leveling, and the building of retaining walls for supporting domestic structures. These massive walls, some of which extended for dozens of meters and reached heights of 4–5 m, served as retaining walls for platforms on which houses were built as well as back walls for houses built at the foot of these walls. This large-scale project, which required great resources, strong communal organization, and careful planning, lent the village its terraced appearance, which is preserved until today. The domestic structures from this period—two-story houses of trimmed basalt stones built in the “Hauran building technique”—resemble some of the Early Roman houses exposed at Gamla.6 The main features of this technique are built-in wall cupboards, partition walls with “Korazim windows”7 to let light and air into the inner rooms, and corbeled courses projecting from the walls on which the floor of the second story rested (fig. B). Bell-shaped subterranean caves hewn into bedrock were discovered beneath four houses from this period. The entrance to these caves was through shafts hewn in the floors of the houses and covered with long basalt slabs. A house from this period that was excavated in Area C includes a large courtyard surrounded by walls in front of the house. A tabun, a staircase 6.  This building technique is common in basaltic areas such as the Golan and the Hauran and is based on dry masonry, without mortar. Second stories and roofs rest on corbeled courses projecting from the side walls and also on interior arches or “window walls” in spacious rooms. For similar first-century domestic structures at Gamla, see Danny Syon and Zvi Yavor, Gamla, vol. 2, The Architecture: The Shmarya Gutmann Excavations 1976–1988 (IAA Reports 44; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2010), 66, 79–80, 153–54. 7.  These interior partition walls have rows of “windows” built in the post-and-lintel technique that allow light and air to reach the inner rooms. Many such walls were discovered in the 1960s in Korazim, hence the name.

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Figure B. Early Roman domestic structure in Area A, looking west. A partition wall with a doorway and two rows of “Korazim windows” separates the front and back rooms. A tabun and the entrance from the courtyard appear in the front. In Stratum II, the entire structure was buried beneath the synagogue (top left) and the alley leading to it from the north. Photograph by G. Laron.

Figure C. Reconstruction of an Early Roman domestic structure and courtyard in Area C, looking west. Note the subterranean bellshaped cave beneath the courtyard and the staircase leading up to the second floor. Drawing by B. Arubas and M. Edelcopp.

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Figure D. Plan and section of a burial cave east of the village. Drawing by R. Sabar.

leading up to the second story, and an entrance to a subterranean bell-shaped cave (2.5 m deep x 2.5 m in diameter) whose opening was sealed with two basalt slabs covered with earth (fig. C), were uncovered in the courtyard. Two burial caves with loculi that were documented by the expedition near the modern village on the hill east of the site should probably also be associated with Stratum III. One of these caves is exceptional in size and contains fourteen loculi (fig. D). The Public Building In the first half of the first century ce, a 17-m-wide terrace was leveled in the center of the village, overlooking the beautiful scenery of the Sea of Galilee and the Arbel cliffs. In order to prepare this steep area for construction, the builders erected a retaining wall to support a huge artificial fill, over 5 m deep in some places. Only a small part of the original superstructure that stood on this terrace has survived, since in the Late Roman period (Stratum II) it was dismantled and replaced by a “Galilean”-type synagogue. Nevertheless, what has survived allows us to conclude that the Early Roman structure that stood here was also a public building. Four rooms in the western section of this first-century building have survived; three of them were sealed behind the western wall of the “Galilean”-type synagogue when it was constructed, and the fourth was incorporated into it, although the floor was raised and some modifications were implemented (fig. E). In its early stage, this room (extant dimensions 2.5 x 3.8 m) was built of well-dressed basalt blocks, was surrounded by low benches along the walls, and had a plastered floor with a plastered element of unknown purpose (0.6 x 0.8 m) in its center. The plan resembles that of the side room in the Second Temple–period synagogue at Gamla, which Shmarya Gutmann called “the study room.”8 A side room surrounded by low benches was also 8.  Syon and Yavor, Architecture, 56.

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Fig. E. Rooms in the Early Roman “public building” sealed behind the western wall of the “Galilean”-type synagogue. Note the benches surrounding the room on the right. Photograph by Itay Arbel.

discovered recently in the Second Temple–period synagogue at nearby Magdala.9 South of the side room at Kh. Wadi H|amam is another room with a plastered floor and with walls coated with fine white plaster that have survived to a maximal height of over 2 m. Negative impressions in the wall and floor plaster indicate that this room as well originally had benches along its walls. As noted, most of the early structure that stood on this terrace did not survive. Many fragments of painted plaster of walls, however, and some building stones decorated with painted plaster were found in trenches excavated into the terrace, beneath the floor of the Late Roman synagogue (fig. F). The designs of these wall paintings, produced in the secco technique (painting on dry plaster), are typical of the first century ce and resemble those found on the walls of the synagogue in Magdala. The trenches also yielded stucco fragments of flutings on Doric columns. It seems that remains from the early structure were used while the terrace was leveled again before the “Galilean”-type synagogue was erected. Thus the size of the terrace and its central location, the quality of the building and the special plan of the rooms that have survived in the west, and the style of the architectural decorations indicate that this early structure was of a public nature. The only public buildings in Jewish villages of this period that are known from historical sources are synagogues; the points of resemblance between features of 9.  See Dina Avshalom-Gorni and Arfan Najar, “Migdal,” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi.org. il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=2304&mag_id=120.

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Figure F. Plastered building stone painted by the secco technique. The stone was found in a fill beneath the floor of the “Galilean” synagogue and apparently originated in the Second Temple–period synagogue. Photograph by G. Laron.

our building and the excavated synagogues of Gamla and Magdala strengthen this identification. It should be noted that remains of Second Temple–period “public buildings” were also found beneath the Late Roman synagogues in H|amath Tiberias and Gush H|alav.10 It is probable that these buildings were synagogues as well. The “public buildings” in Kh. Wadi H|amam, H|amath ­Tiberias, and Gush H|alav, together with those discovered at sites such as Qiryat Sefer and Umm el-‘Umdan, indicate that the distribution of synagogues in rural areas during the Second Temple period was greater than what scholars had previously thought. The Destruction Layer The affluent Early Roman phase at Kh. Wadi H|amam came to an abrupt end in a massive destruction documented wherever our excavations were carried out. The ample numismatic finds, and mainly the two hoards discussed below, enabled us to pinpoint the destruction to the reign of Hadrian, c. 125–135 ce.11 The rich assemblages of finds found sealed beneath the 10.  Moshe Dothan, Hammath Tiberias, vol. 1, Early Synagogues and the Hellenistic and Roman Remains (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1983), 15–19; Eric M. Meyers, Carol Meyers, and James F. Strange, Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush Halav (Meiron Excavation Project 5; Winona Lake, Ind.: Published for the American Schools of Oriental Research by Eisenbrauns, 1990), 62–64. See also the articles “H|amath Tiberias” (Carl Savage) and “Gush H|alav” (James F. Strange) in this volume, pp. 211–16, 389–403. 11.  For a detailed presentation of the hoards, see Uzi Leibner and Gabriela Bijovsky, “Two Hoards from Khirbat Wadi H|amam and the Scope of the Bar Kokhba Revolt,” Israel Numismatic Research 8 (2013): 109–34.

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Figure G. A lathe-made chalkstone krater (qalal) found in the early-second-century destruction layer in a house in Area B. ­Photograph by T. Rogovski.

destruction debris provide unique evidence of early-second-century Galilee’s material culture. It is now possible to determine, for example, what types of pottery vessels known from contexts of the First Jewish Revolt (e.g., Yodefat and Gamla) continued into the second century and what new types were added to the repertoire. An analytic study of the pottery vessels from the destruction layer conducted by Michael Osband reveals that the vast majority of cooking vessels originated in the workshops of Kefar H|ananya while the majority of storage vessels came from the workshops of Shikhin; these sites lie 13 and 23 km from Kh. Wadi H|amam, respectively. Chalkstone vessels, such as a large krater (qalal) and mugs were also found in the assemblages of the destruction layer (fig. G). These finds support the opinion that ritual purity laws continued to be observed after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 ce.12 These assemblages are also indicative of the continued presence of sagged glass bowls that were thought to have disappeared earlier, the absence of “Herodian,” knife-pared oil lamps, and the presence of mold-made oil lamps, some of which resemble the contemporaneous “Darom” lamps from the Judean lowlands (fig. H).13 The most extensive evidence of the destruction was found in Areas A and B. A massive ash layer was excavated in the two southernmost rooms of the “public building” in Area A, in which the rich assemblages included a hoard of eleven coins, the latest of which are provincial 12.  See David Amit and Yonatan Adler, “The Observance of Ritual Purity after 70 ce: A Reevaluation of the Evidence in Light of Recent Archaeological Discoveries,” in “Follow the Wise” (B. Sanhedrin 32b): Studies in Jewish History and Culture in Honor of Lee I. Levine (ed. Zeev Weiss, Oded Irshai, Jodi Magness, and Seth Schwartz; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010), 121–43. 13.  Editor’s note: see discussion of ceramic oil lamp production in the chapter on Kefar Shikhin in this volume, pp. 88–108.

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Figure H. Mold-made oil lamps from the early-second-century destruction layer. The two lamps on the right resemble the Darom-style lamps. Drawing by S. Halbreich.

Figures Ia and Ib. Spatha and spearhead found in the early-second-century destruction layer of a house in Area B. Photograph by T. Rogovski.

coins of Hadrian. Additional Early Roman structures were found buried beneath the northern part of the synagogue and the alley bordering the synagogue from the north. Excavations in Area B unearthed a Late Roman structure containing an olive-oil press. More extensive excavations in this area revealed that the oil press was built on top of massive stone debris that buried an impressive Early Roman dwelling up to the beginning of the second story; the northwestern room and a large courtyard of this early dwelling were excavated. The floor of the second story was constructed of wooden beams that rested on corbeled courses projecting from the walls. A massive ash layer, roughly 50 cm thick, was excavated above the floor of the room and the courtyard, indicating that the house was destroyed by fire before its collapse. Numerous large nails and charcoal negative impressions of the wooden beams from the floor of the second story were found in the ash layer in the room. A hoard of 60 bronze and silver coins was discovered in its northeastern corner, beside the doorway. The latest coins are a silver dinar of Hadrian and a worn Roman provincial copper coin bearing a countermark of the Legio VI Ferrata, roughly dated to c. 123–135 ce. A spatha (type of sword) (fig. Ia) and spearhead (fig. Ib)—both types used by Roman cavalrymen—were found in the northwestern corner of this room (fig. I). A laboratory examination demonstrated that these weapons were probably hidden beneath a haystack or some other organic material.

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The date of the destruction and its dramatic nature raise the possibility that it was connected to the Bar Kokhba revolt. No evidence of local participation in the revolt has previously been found in the Galilee, and most scholars assume that the region did not participate in it. Clearly, this area was not controlled by the rebels, who were concentrated in Judea; nevertheless, a few hints may point to sporadic warfare that took place outside of Judea proper. It is also possible that the destruction had something to do with local unrest upon the arrival of a Roman legion to the Galilee a few years before the revolt. The Mount Nitai Caves and Fortification In an attempt to study the village in the context of its surroundings, investigations were also carried out in two nearby archaeological complexes on Mount Nitai: a fortification and numerous caves. Our inquiry revealed that these complexes, for the most part, correlate chronologically with Stratum III of the village. In this light, it would be appropriate to present a summary of our findings at these related sites before continuing with the history of the village. Mount Nitai is a triangular-shaped plateau pointing east (see the map in fig. A; the wider base of the triangle faces west and the vertex points east). Steep cliffs descend from the mountaintop to the riverbeds of Wadi Arbel on the south and Wadi Savyona on the northeast. On the mountaintop itself, right above the village, stands a 286-m-long massive wall enclosing an open area of c. 25,000 sq m. The enclosure is protected on three sides by the cliffs, while the open western side is protected by the wall containing nine towers projecting westward. The wall has been surveyed repeatedly since the early nineteenth century, and various suggestions have been made regarding its date and purpose. None of these suggestions, however, could be verified due to the complete lack of datable finds. Our investigations included a detailed survey (which included metal detecting) of the enclosure, the wall, and a strip outside it as well as a series of soundings along the wall and inside the enclosure (fig. J).14 Excavations revealed that the history of the fortification was far more complex than previously assumed, as it contained five different construction phases attesting to at least three different chronological stages. The restricted number of datable finds in sealed contexts did not allow the assignment of a fixed date to each of the stages. Nevertheless, the finds in general all seem to belong to the first and second centuries ce. At least one of the stages should probably be identified with the wall Josephus claimed to have built during the First Jewish Revolt to protect the caves in the vicinity of the Sea of Galilee (J.W. 2.573). Besides guarding access to the caves from above, the enclosure itself may also have been prepared as a place of refuge for a large population. The isolated and naturally fortified nature of Mount Nitai, together with its proximity to large Jewish settlements in the Early Roman period (for example, Kh. Wadi 14.  For a detailed presentation of the excavations on Mount Nitai, see Uzi Leibner, Uri Davidovich, and Benjamin Arubas, “The Structure, Date, and Purpose of the Fortification on Mount Nitai” (in Hebrew), ErIsr 31 (Ehud Netzer Volume) (2015): 236–46.

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Figure J. Excavation along the fortification wall on Mt. Nitai, looking east. On the right, tower no. 3. Photo by U. Davidovich.

Figure K. Panoramic view of Kh. Wadi Ḥamam (lower right) and Mount Nitai, looking northwest. Note the fortification on the mountaintop. Photograph by G. Laron.

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Figure L. Plastered water cistern in Cave-complex B on the cliffs of Mt. Nitai. Photo by M. Ulman.

H|amam, Arbel, Magdala), made it an ideal place for refuge (fig. K). The fortification apparently continued to be used in the second century ce, as implied by a few Middle Roman– period finds. This activity may be connected to the same events that eventually brought about the destruction of the village below. The vertical cliffs and steep slopes of Mount Nitai contain many isolated man-made caves and cave complexes, as well as several natural caves. By using panoramic photos and full-coverage fieldwalking of the mountain slopes and cliffs (using rappelling techniques), 171 caves were detected. Of these, 119 caves located between the village and the mountaintop were systematically surveyed. Each was mapped, and small finds such as pottery, coins, and arrowheads were collected from the surface and slopes near the cave’s entrance. While the finds in the natural caves point to human activity as early as the Chalcolithic period, those in the man-made caves do not predate the first century bce. It seems, therefore, that the preparation and activity in these caves began around the same time that the village below was first settled. The finds suggest that the most intensive period of activity in these caves was the Early Roman period. Plastered water cisterns and storage facilities were discovered in a few caves high up on the cliffs, indicating that they were prepared as caves for refuge (fig. L). Restorable Early Roman storage jars found in one of these cisterns suggest that the caves were indeed in use during this period. Josephus explicitly mentions the caves in the Arbel area as a stronghold of Jewish rebels during two historical events: the struggle of the Galileans against Herod c. 39–38 bce (J.W. 1.307–314) and the First Jewish Revolt in 66–67 ce (J.W. 2.573). Chronologically, these jars can fit either of these events.

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Since the period of Stratum II is beyond the scope of this volume, I will summarize below a few points of special interest to students of the ancient Galilee. Following the second-century destruction, the site seems to have been abandoned for a few decades or at least suffered a serious decline, as is evident from the decrease in the quantities of coins dating to the latter part of that century (that is, from the reign of Antoninus Pius onward). A wide range of evidence for habitation alongside the massive construction of new structures reappears around the end of the second or early third century ce. Remains of Stratum II were uncovered in all four excavation areas, indicating that Kh. Wadi H|amam flourished again in the third and early fourth centuries ce. The structures of Stratum III were not restored but were systematically blocked and filled (in some cases to heights of 3 and 4 m), while new structures, alleys, and installations were built on top of them. The covering of the Early Roman structures together with the new large-scale construction required enormous manpower and resources, which undoubtedly points to the existence of a strong communal organization. Reconstruction of the village was based mostly along the lines of the early terraces, but the plans of the domestic structures and the general layout of the village differed from that of the previous period. A “Galilean”-type synagogue was built in the center of the village, where the “public building” and dense domestic structures once stood. The excavation of this building was one of the focal points of our research, since the dating of “Galilean”-type synagogues is highly debated and has far-reaching historical and archaeological implications. The selection of this location for the synagogue probably resulted from the builders’ need to find a terrace wide enough for this large structure. Nevertheless, in light of our conclusion that a synagogue already stood here in the Second Temple period, this choice may reflect a notion of the continuity of a sacred site, a phenomenon well known from other synagogues and from the ancient Near East in general. This point is of special interest, since we have only meager information about the evolution of the synagogue from Second Temple times until the Middle and Late Roman periods. Relying on the ancient terrace for support, the new synagogue and its façade did not face directly south, toward Jerusalem, but rather to the southeast (148°). Two alleys were paved on the northern and southern sides of the new synagogue, and beyond them large insulae containing domestic structures and agricultural installations were built. The synagogue, alleys, and insulae are all built in parallel lines resembling a grid scheme, and it is clear that the entire area was both preconceived and constructed simultaneously. Excavation of the surrounding alleys and structures, therefore, provides indirect testimony for the date of the synagogue, because it became clear they were all built at the same time. The chronological history of the “Galilean”-type synagogue is divided into two distinct phases spanning the Middle Roman to Early Byzantine eras.15 The first phase is characterized 15.  For a preliminary report on the synagogue excavations, see Uzi Leibner, “Excavations at Khirbet Wadi Hamam (Lower Galilee): The Synagogue and the Settlement,” JRA 23 (2010): 220–37.

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Figure M. Plan of the mosaic in the second phase of the synagogue. Preserved fragments are indicated in gray. Drawing by M. Edelcopp.

by an elaborate façade as well as interior columniation and benches carved in high quality out of white limestone, which is why the building is called “the white synagogue.” The nave of this basilica-shaped building was separated from the aisles by three rows of columns. This phase was dated to the first half of the third century on the basis of its architectural style, associated pottery and coins, its relation to surrounding structures, and by the fact that it stratigraphically antedates the next phase. The synagogue was severely damaged in the late third century, when its entire eastern half collapsed. A hoard of 37 coins, mainly silver tetradrachmas and dinarii, was found in the collapse, among the building stones of the eastern synagogue wall. The latest coins in the hoard are of Gallienus and provide a terminus post quem for the collapse, not before—and apparently not long after—264–265 ce. The prominent feature of the second phase of the synagogue is a splendid figurative mosaic.16 Segments of four figurative scenes have survived in the eastern and western aisles, and additional fragments were uncovered in all three aisles. Taken together, the extant fragments indicate that the mosaic in the aisles was probably divided into twelve panels, each occupying the space between a pair of columns and each depicting what was most likely a biblical narrative (fig. M). One surviving panel depicts Pharaoh’s army drowning in the Red Sea; another shows Samson smiting the Philistines with the jawbone of an ass; and a third portrays artisans constructing a monumental structure, possibly Solomon’s temple. No parallels to these specific 16.  See in detail Uzi Leibner and Shulamit Miller, “A Figural Mosaic in the Synagogue at Khirbet Wadi Hamam,” JRA 23 (2010): 238–64.

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Figure N. Aerial view of the later phase of the “Galilean” synagogue, looking west. Note the mixture of limestone and basalt architectural elements as well as the Early Roman structures buried beneath the northern alley (right) and sealed behind the western wall of the synagogue. Photo by I. Arbel.

scenes or, in general, to the plan of the mosaic, currently are known from ancient synagogues. Additional characteristics of this phase are a mixture of building materials, extensive secondary use of architectural elements from the first phase, and a whole new array of benches made of basalt, resulting in the labeling “the black synagogue” (fig. N). This phase was assigned to the end of the third through the beginning of the fourth century, mainly on the basis of stratified assemblages sealed beneath the mosaic floor. Poorly executed renovations in this phase were classified as Subphase IIb, characterized primarily by the replacement of large segments of the mosaic with a simple plaster floor and the addition of a stone bema against the southern wall. These modifications were assigned to the late fourth century based mainly on associated coins and the overall picture emerging from the surrounding structures. The debris inside the synagogue and the finds sealed beneath them indicate that the final phase of the synagogue may have collapsed in an earthquake in the late fourth or early fifth century ce. As for the general picture of the village, the latest finds in most of the structures of Stratum II date to the mid-fourth century. The abandonment may be connected to the severe earthquake of 363 ce, although it should be noted that most structures seemed to have been abandoned in an organized manner as they were mostly empty. Evidence of later activity was

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documented only in a restricted area in the center of the site: around the synagogue in Area A and the northern oil press in the adjacent Area B. The recovered materials included early Byzantine pottery, as well as minimi (tiny bronze coins) dating to the late fourth century ce. No later stratified remains were found. These data indicate that occupation of the site ceased at the end of the fourth or beginning of the fifth century ce. Conclusions The excavations at Kh. Wadi H|amam have contributed a great deal to our knowledge of an array of subjects regarding ancient rural Galilee. The site was first settled in the Hasmonean period around the early first century bce. It should be noted that the data gathered from the Eastern Galilee Survey point to a large wave of settlement in the region during this period. This wave should probably be associated with the expansion of the Hasmonean kingdom and its occupation of the Galilee. Kh. Wadi H|amam is part of a wide phenomenon of Jewish villages first settled in the Hasmonean era.17 It seems that the village reached its peak in terms of size and prosperity in the Early Roman period, when large-scale infrastructural and building projects were carried out. A public building with fluted Doric columns, secco-plastered walls, and side rooms surrounded by benches was built in the center of the site in the first half of the first century ce. All indications lead us to believe that this was a synagogue, and therefore the second known Second Temple– period synagogue in the Galilee. The Early Roman village came to an abrupt end in a dramatic destruction sometime between 125 and 135 ce, apparently relating to the events of the Bar Kokhba revolt. This is the first archaeological evidence for violent events in the Galilee that may relate to this revolt. After the destruction, the village was probably abandoned for a few generations, or it at least suffered a severe decline. Clear evidence of resettlement appears around the end of the second century or in the early third century ce, when the village enjoyed another period of prosperity into the third and early fourth centuries. A “Galilean”-type synagogue with finely carved architectural elements of white limestone was built in the center of the village during the first half of the third century ce and then was severely damaged in the second half of that century. It was restored shortly thereafter (second phase of the synagogue) with a magnificent mosaic floor, but the restored building generally lost the splendid architectural appearance that had characterized its first phase. These data are of special importance in light of the debate regarding the date of “Galilean”-type synagogues, since both phases of our synagogue are clearly dated to the Roman period, before the rise of imperial Christianity. The finds demonstrate that the architectural 17. Leibner, Settlement and History, 315–31. On the Hasmonean takeover of the Galilee, see in detail Leibner, “The Origins of Jewish Settlement in Galilee in the Second Temple Period: Historical Sources and Archaeological Data” (in Hebrew), Zion 74, no. 4 (2012): 437–69.

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tradition of the “Galilean”-type synagogue indeed goes back to the Roman period, at least to the third century, and did not emerge only in the Byzantine period, as some scholars claim.18 Archaeological evidence for a severe decline in the settlement surfaces in the mid-fourth century, when most of the village was abandoned. The latest stratified remains at the site date to the last decades of the fourth century, and village life seems to have ceased entirely at the end of that century or in the early fifth. Bibliography Amit, David, and Yonatan Adler. “The Observance of Ritual Purity after 70 ce: A Reevaluation of the Evidence in Light of Recent Archaeological Discoveries.” In “Follow the Wise” (B. Sanhedrin 32b): Studies in Jewish History and Culture in Honor of Lee I. Levine, edited by Ze’ev Weiss, Oded Irshai, Jodi Magness, and Seth Schwartz. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010. Avshalom-Gorni, Dina, and Arfan Najar. “Migdal.” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashotesi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=2304&mag_id=120. Braslavsky, Joseph. “Remains.” In Hebrew. Bulletin of the Jewish Palestine Exploration Society 1, no. 2 (1925): 139–42. Conder, Claude R., and Horatio H. Kitchener. The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology. Vol. 1, Galilee. London: Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881. Davidovich, Uri, Mika Ullman, and Uzi Leibner. “Late Prehistoric Occurrences in Har Nitai and Khirbat Wadi H|amam, Northeastern Lower Galilee.” Journal of the Israel Prehistoric Society 43 (2013): 186–204. Dothan, Moshe. Hammath Tiberias. Vol. 1, Early Synagogues and the Hellenistic and Roman Remains. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1983. Foerster, Gideon. “The Synagogues of the Galilee.” In Hebrew. In The Lands of the Galilee, edited by Avshalom Shmueli, Arnon Sofer, and Nurit Kliot, 231–56. Haifa: Ministry of Defense, 1983. Ilan, Zvi. Ancient Synagogues in Israel. In Hebrew. Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense, 1991. Leibner, Uzi. “Excavations at Khirbet Wadi Hamam (Lower Galilee): The Synagogue and the Settlement.” JRA 23 (2010): 220–37. ———. Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee. TSAJ 127. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. ———. “The Origins of Jewish Settlement in Galilee in the Second Temple Period: Historical Sources and Archaeological Data.” In Hebrew. Zion 74, no. 4 (2012): 437–69. 18.  See, for example, Jodi Magness, “The Question of the Synagogue: The Problem of Typology,” in Judaism in Late Antiquity, Part 3, Where We Stand: Issues and Debates in Ancient Judaism, vol. 4, The Special Problem of the Synagogue (Handbook of Oriental Studies: The Near and Middle East 53; Leiden: Brill, 2001), 1–48.

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Leibner, Uzi, and Gabriela Bijovsky. “Two Hoards from Khirbat Wadi H|amam and the Scope of the Bar Kokhba Revolt.” Israel Numismatic Research 8 (2013): 109–34. Leibner, Uzi, Uri Davidovich, and Benjamin Arubas. “The Structure, Date, and Purpose of the Fortification on Mount Nitai.” In Hebrew. ErIsr 31 (Ehud Netzer Volume) (2015): 236–46. Leibner, Uzi, and Shulamit Miller. “A Figural Mosaic in the Synagogue at Khirbet Wadi Hamam.” JRA 23 (2010): 238–64. Margulies, Mordechai, ed. Leviticus Rabbah. In Hebrew. Jerusalem: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1953–60. Meyers, Eric M., Carol Meyers, and James F. Strange. Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush Halav. Meiron Excavation Project 5. Winona Lake, Ind.: Published for the American Schools of Oriental Research by Eisenbrauns, 1990. Syon, Danny, and Zvi Yavor. Gamla. Vol. 2, The Architecture. The Shmarya Gutmann Excavations 1976–1988. IAA Reports 44. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2010.

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16 H|uqoq in the Late Hellenistic and Early Roman Periods Matthew J. Grey and Chad S. Spigel For over a century, archaeological surveys and excavations have explored the ancient village of H|uqoq, a Jewish agricultural settlement to the northwest of the Sea of Galilee1 (see Map 4B in the gallery at the front of the volume). The most prominent of these efforts is the recent and ongoing work of the H|uqoq Excavation Project (HEP), directed by Jodi Magness of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.2 At the time this chapter was written, HEP had completed four seasons of excavations (2011–2014), which focused especially on remains of the Late Roman and Byzantine periods (fourth to sixth centuries ce). These remains include a large domestic structure, a monumental Late Roman synagogue building, and the synagogue’s mosaics depicting biblical and possibly apocryphal scenes, all of which have been summarized in preliminary and popular reports.3 1.  For explorations, surveys, and limited excavations of H|uqoq between the 1870s and the early 2000s, see Victor Guérin, Description géographique, historique et archéologique de la Palestine: Galilée (Paris: L’imprimerie nationale, 1880), 354–59; Claude R. Conder and H. H. Kitchener, The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology, vol. 1, Galilee (London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881), 364–65, 420; B. Ravani and P. P. Kahane, “Rock-Cut Tombs at H|uqoq,” ‘Atiqot 3 (1961): 121–47; Yigal Tepper and Y. Shahar, “Subterranean Hiding Complexes in the Galilee” (in Hebrew), in The Hiding Complexes in the Judean Shephelah (ed. Amos Kloner and Yigal Tepper; Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1987), 311–13; Yigal Tepper, G. Dar‘in, and Y. Tepper, The Nah\al ‘Amud District: Chapters on the Settlement Process (in Hebrew; Tel Aviv, 2000), 25, 84–85; and Uzi Leibner, Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of the Eastern Galilee (TSAJ 127; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), 151–55. 2.  Shua Kisilevitz of the Israel Antiquities Authority is assistant director. In 2014 the HEP Consortium included the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Brigham Young University, Trinity University (Texas), the University of Toronto, and the University of Wyoming. Wofford College and the University of Oklahoma participated in the consortium in earlier seasons. 3.  For preliminary reports of the first three excavation seasons, see Jodi Magness, “H|uqoq—2011 Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 124 (2012): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1959; Jodi Magness,

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Figure A. A map of the areas excavated as part of the Ḥuqoq Excavation Project from 2011–2013. The ancient synagogue and modern village are located in Area 3000, the Late Roman/Byzantine village is located in Area 2000, and an ancient miqveh is located in Area 4000. Map by J. Bucko. Used by permission.

In addition to these more prominent finds, the HEP and previous surveys of the site have uncovered material of the Late Hellenistic, Early Roman, and Middle Roman periods.4 These Shua Kisilevitz, Matthew Grey, Chad Spigel, and Brian Coussens, “H|uqoq—2012 Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=3331&mag_id=120; Jodi Magness, Shua Kisilevitz, Matthew Grey, Chad Spigel, and Brian Coussens, “H|uqoq—2013 Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 126 (2014): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/Report_Detail_Eng.aspx?id=12648&mag_id=121; and Jodi Magness, Shua Kisilevitz, Karen Britt, Matthew Grey and Chad Spigel, “H|uqoq (Lower Galilee) and Its Synagogue Mosaics: Preliminary Report on the Excavations of 2011–13,” JRA 27 (2014): 327–55. Popular reports of the site and synagogue mosaics include Jodi Magness, “Samson in the Synagogue,” BAR 39, no. 1 (2013): 32–39, 66–67; and Magness “New Mosaics from the H|uqoq Synagogue,” BAR 39, no. 5 (2013): 66–68; and Matthew Grey with Jodi Magness, “Finding Samson in Byzantine Galilee: The 2011–2012 Archaeological Excavations at H|uqoq,” Studies in the Bible and Antiquity 5 (2013): 1–30. 4.  Excavations and surveys have also uncovered remains from the Early Bronze Age, Iron Age, Persian period, and Early Hellenistic period, which lie beyond the scope of this chapter. Ira Schwartz at the University of Toronto is currently writing an MA thesis on the Hellenistic remains at H|uqoq.

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finds are limited, do not include any architecture, and do not yet provide a cohesive picture of the village during these earlier centuries. The material, however, confirms the existence of a Jewish settlement at H|uqoq, allows us to make some tentative and preliminary observations about the development of the site, and adds to our understanding of ancient agricultural villages in Lower Eastern Galilee. In light of the historical time frame explored in the present volume (the late Second Temple to Mishnaic periods), this chapter will summarize and contextualize the findings at H|uqoq from the first century bce to the third century ce: the time of the Hasmoneans, the Jesus movement, the Jewish revolts, and the early rabbis. The Setting and Historical Development of H|uqoq H|uqoq is located approximately 3 km to the northwest of the Sea of Galilee (12.5 km north of Tiberias).5 The village is spread out on a broad terrace on a moderate hill of 25 to 30 dunams (between 6.1 and 7.4 acres) and is surrounded by arable lands with alluvial plains to the west. At the base of its northern slope is a perennial freshwater spring that H|uqoq shared with the nearby settlement at Skeikh Nashi, a more dominant and naturally defensible hill 400 m to the east.6 H|uqoq lies in a transitional geological zone characterized by limestone to the west and basalt to the east; the ancient structures at the site appear to have been built of limestone hewn from nearby quarries,7 while the later structures employed both basalt fieldstones and reused limestone blocks.8 The earliest mention of the site is in the biblical book of Joshua, which lists H|uqoq (h\ûqōqâ, ‫ )חּוק ָֺקה‬as a village apportioned to the tribe of Naphtali after the Israelite conquest of Canaan (Josh. 19:34).9 There is also a reference to “H|uqoq [h\ûqōq, ‫ ]חּוקֺק‬with its pasture lands” in 1 Chron. 6:75, but this text locates the village farther west in the tribal lands of Asher and likely represents an orthographic mistake made by the Chronicler.10 These passages provide no information about H|uqoq’s size or population, but they do suggest that the village was 5.  Descriptions of H|uqoq’s natural setting are found also in Leibner, Settlement and History, 151–52; and Magness, “H|uqoq–2011.” 6.  The current name of this site derives from the presence of a sheikh’s tombs from a later period, but its occupation in antiquity was roughly contemporary with H|uqoq. For a description and discussion of Sheikh Nashi, see Leibner, Settlement and History, 155–58. 7.  Evidence for limestone quarrying in antiquity can be seen near the site; see Magness, “H|uqoq–2011”; Gilad Cinamon, “H|uqoq, Survey,” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng. aspx? id=5385&mag_id=120 (especially site no. 9); and Edna Dalali-Amos, “H|uqoq,” HA-ESI 126 (2014): http://www. hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=12661&mag_id=121 (see Area A and sites D, G, and H in Area B). 8.  Magness, “H|uqoq–2011.” 9.  For the identification of the site with the biblical H|uqoq, see Nurit Lissovsky and Nadav Na’aman, “A New Look on the Boundary System of the Twelve Tribes,” UF 35 (2003): 291–332, esp. 293–97. 10.  See H. G. M. Williamson, 1 and 2 Chronicles (New Century Bible Commentary; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982), 76; Sara Japhet, I and II Chronicles (OTL; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1993), 145; Lissovsky and Na’aman, “New Look,” 294.

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occupied in the Iron Age, when material for the Deuteronomistic History was taking shape, if not already in the Late Bronze Age, when Joshua is said to have allotted the tribal lands. Although no architecture dated to these centuries has been uncovered, pottery collected in surveys and HEP excavations suggests that there was occupation at H|uqoq during the Bronze and Iron Ages, as well as in the Persian period.11 There are no direct references to H|uqoq in later Second Temple–period sources,12 but archaeological research indicates that it was a Jewish agricultural village during the Late Hellenistic, Early Roman, and Middle Roman periods (see below). During these periods, the small but growing village of H|uqoq appears to have developed alongside a fortification and settlement at Sheikh Nashi to the east;13 the settlements were in close proximity to each other, shared a water source, and likely cultivated the same lands. This relationship has led some scholars to speculate that the Jewish occupation at H|uqoq began as a civilian settlement supporting the military outpost at Sheikh Nashi, perhaps during the Hasmonean colonization of the region.14 Further excavations at both sites would be necessary to confirm or refine this scenario,15 but surveys have suggested that H|uqoq’s easier access to the spring and agricultural 11.  For example, Bezalel Ravani’s surveys of the site collected pottery from the Bronze Age, the Iron Age, and the Persian period, although he did not provide quantities or descriptions of the sherds; see Leibner, Settlement and History, 151. 12.  According to some secondary scholarship, the site was called Hucuca (a transliteration of its Hebrew name in Josh. 19:34) during the Early Roman period, but the ancient support for this claim is not clear; see, for example, Walid Khalidi, ed., All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948 (Washington, D.C.: Institute for Palestinian Studies, 1992), 546. Emmanuel Damati suggested that H|uqoq was Josephus’s “missing” fortress of Caphareccho (καφαρεκχω) from the late first century ce (Josephus J.W. 2.573; cf. Life 188) (“Kefar Ekho-H|uqoq: The Unknown Fortress of Josephus Flavius” [in Hebrew], Cathedra 39 [1986]: 37–43). This identification has been rejected by some scholars (for example, Leibner, Settlement and History, 153; and Mordechai Aviam, Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods [Land of Galilee 1; Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 2004], 97), while some remain open to Damati’s suggestion (for example, Yinon Shivtiel, “Cliff Settlements, Shelters and Refuge Caves in the Galilee,” in In the Hill-Country, and in the Shephelah, and in the Arabah (Joshua 12, 8): Studies and Researches Presented to Adam Zertal in the Thirtieth Anniversary of the Manasseh Hill-Country Survey (ed. Shay Bar; Jerusalem: Ariel, 2008), 227. 13.  The remains of fortification at Sheikh Nashi include a platform structure on the upper portion of the hill, indistinct remains that surround it, and the natural defenses provided by the steep slopes of the hill; see Leibner, Settlement and History, 155–56. 14.  This suggestion was first made by Albrecht Alt in 1931 following his visit to the site; see Alt, “Das Institut in den Jahren 1929 und 1930,” Palästinajahrbuch 27 (1931): 5–50, esp. 40 n. 2; cf. Tepper, Dar‘in, and Tepper, Nah\al ‘Amud District, 25, 45; and Leibner, Settlement and History, 158. 15.  For example, we do not yet understand H|uqoq’s transition from the Persian to the Hellenistic period. As discussed previously, pottery collected on the surface of the site indicates occupation at the site in both periods, and at least one coin found in excavations dates to the Early Hellenistic period. This Tyrian coin was minted by Ptolemy II Philadelphos (285–246 bce) and depicts Zeus Ammon on the obverse, with an eagle, thunderbolt, and Greek legend (PTOLEMAIOU BASILEUS) on the reverse. The coin was found in the domestic area of the village over 50 cm beneath a Byzantine-period living surface.

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terraces allowed it to expand and flourish after the fortification at Shiekh Nashi fell into disuse sometime after the Early Roman period.16 The Jewish presence at H|uqoq in the Early Roman period raises further possibilities regarding the village’s relationship to the Galilean ministry of Jesus. H|uqoq is not mentioned by name in the New Testament, but its close proximity to the Sea of Galilee places it within walking distance of some of the most prominent locations in the Gospels. The village is located 5.1 miles (8.2 km) to the west of Capernaum (the hometown of Peter, Andrew, James, John, and Matthew; see Mark 1:16–21) and 4.5 miles (7.2 km) to the northwest of Magdala (the hometown of Mary Magdalene; see Luke 8:1–3), making it near the center of Jesus’ activities and the residences of his earliest disciples. These geographical considerations suggest that Jesus and his disciples might have interacted with the inhabitants of H|uqoq as they “went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom” (Matt. 4:23).17 H|uqoq’s integration with the local Galilean village network in the Roman period is confirmed by the presence of paved or semipaved roads linking the H|uqoq hills with the region’s main thoroughfares. The most important road ran near the site between the Amiad-Acre highway to the north (the ancient road linking Bethsaida, Chorazim, and Kefar H|ananya with Ptolemais) and the Via Maris (connecting Capernaum, Magdala, and Tiberias) to the south18 (see roads in Map 4B in gallery at the front of this volume). A road also provided access from H|uqoq to the villages across Nah\al Amud.19 Only traces of these smaller roads survive, including broad patches of quarried steps near the village. It seems, however, that the roads, or less-developed predecessors, were in use as early as the Roman period.20 Although the precise 16.  Leibner suggested that the extent of occupation at Sheikh Nashi covered 4–11 dunams (0.9–2.7 acres) in the Hellenistic through Early Roman periods, while the occupation at H|uqoq was negligible in the Hellenistic period, quickly grew from 4–10 dunams (0.9–2.4 acres) in the Early Roman period, and reached a possible 25 dunams (6.1 acres) by the Late Roman period (Settlement and History, 155, 157–58). These estimates, however, are based on surface pottery collected from surveys of the sites and are not exact. 17.  It should be noted, however, that the only synagogue remains that have been excavated at H|uqoq date to the fifth century. To date, no clear evidence has been found for a first-century synagogue building. 18.  Such a road does not appear in Yoram Tsafrir, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green, eds., Tabula Imperii Romani Iudaea-Palestina: Eretz Israel in the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods; Map and Gazetteer (Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994), map 4. However, traces of Roman roads running through the H|uqoq hills have been noted in surveys; see Zvi Ilan, “Eastern Galilee, Survey of Roman Roads,” Excavations and Surveys in Israel 9 (1991): 14–16, esp. fig. 13; Shivtiel, “Cliff Settlements,” 227–28; Yinon Shivtiel and Amos Frumkin, “The Use of Caves as Security Measures in the Early Roman Period in the Galilee,” Caderno de Geografia 24, no. 41 (2014): 85. 19.  Tepper, Dar‘in, and Tepper, Nah\al ‘Amud District, 100, 105. These roads and connected paths also provided access to a series of cliff caves cut during the revolts against Herod the Great in the Early Roman period. 20.  Nurit Lissovsky discusses the patches of this road that survive near the medieval Tomb of Habakkuk to the north of H|uqoq (“Hukkok, Yaquq and Habakkuk’s Tomb: Changes over Time and Space,” PEQ 140 [2008]: 106–7). Lissovsky suggests that the road was cut and paved in the Roman period and remained in use during subsequent centuries. For a discussion of this road in the Crusader period, see Y. Friedman and A. Peled, “The Map of

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date of the Roman roads is not certain (they might not have been paved until the early second century ce21), first-century coins and regional pottery at H|uqoq confirm the village’s interaction with local trade and traffic (see below). Such access to the larger regional economy likely facilitated the continued growth of H|uqoq in the Middle and Late Roman periods. The Jewish demographics of the village during these centuries are attested in rabbinic literature, in particular the Palestinian Talmud, which occasionally mentions “H|iqoq” (h\îqôq, ‫)חיקוק‬.22 These references mention the agricultural activities of villagers, such as “Yohanan from H|iqoq,” who brought a saddlebag full of bread pieces to R. Hiyya in Tiberias (y. Pesah\. 1:4, 27c), and a visit of R. Simeon b. Lakish to the village, during which he saw locals gathering seeds from wild mustard plants (y. Šeb. 9:1, 38c). Another passage provides the name of a rabbinic sage from the village (R. Hizkiyah of H|uqoq), who interacted with several rabbis active in the early fourth century (y. Sanh. 3:10, 21d).23 These stories and the individuals associated with them point to an active Jewish presence at H|uqoq in late antiquity and show that Jews at that time identified the village with the biblical site of “H|ukkok,” a claim similarly made in contemporaneous Christian literature that transliterates its name as Ειχωχ (Eichōch; Eusebius) and Icoc (Jerome).24 Despite earlier surveys suggesting a gradual decline in occupation from the fourth century onward,25 recent excavations conducted by the HEP indicate that H|uqoq reached the height of its development in the late fourth through early seventh centuries. For example, a large domestic or industrial structure has been excavated and dated to the fifth–sixth centuries, as has the village’s monumental synagogue. Imported pottery, coins, and elegant small finds have been found in both contexts, attesting to a vibrant village economy.26 The synagogue’s ashlar masonry and fine mosaics confirm H|uqoq’s prosperity at this time, and the synagogue’s mosaic depictions of Roads in the Galilee in the Middle Ages” (in Hebrew), in Hikrei Eretz: Studies in the Land of Israel (ed. Z. Safrai, Y. Friedman, and Y. Schwartz; Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University, 1997), 326, 340. For more general discussions of Roman roads and road networks in the region, see Amos Kloner, “Stepped Roads in Ancient Palestine,” ARAM 8 (1996): 111–37; and Dennis C. Duling, “The Jesus Movement and Social Network Analysis (Part 1: The Spatial Network),” BTB 29 (1999): 156–75. Editor’s note: Maps 4A–4D in the front of this volume; see also James F. Strange, “The Galilean Road System,” in Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods, vol. 1, Life, Culture, and Society (ed. David A. Fiensy and James Riley Strange; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014), 263–71. 21.  Jonathan L. Reed argues that long-standing paths in the Galilee region were not paved until Hadrian’s renovation of the road network around 135 ce (Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus: A Re-examination of the Evidence [Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000], 148). 22.  See Lissovsky and Na’aman, “New Look,” 294–95; and Leibner, Settlement and History, 153–54. 23.  R. Yirmiya, R. Huna, and R. Pinhas, who appear with R. Hizkiyah, are all Palestinian Amoraim of the fourth generation; see Leibner, Settlement and History, 153–54. 24.  See Lissovsky and Na’aman, “New Look,” 295, and Lissovsky, “Hukkok,” 105. For the references in Eusebius and Jerome, see R. Steven Notley and Ze’ev Safrai, eds., Eusebius, Onomasticon: The Place Names of Divine Scripture (Jewish and Christian Perspectives 9; Leiden: Brill, 2005), 85. 25.  See Leibner, Settlement and History, 154–55. 26.  See Magness, “H|uqoq—2011”; Magness et al, “H|uqoq—2012”; Magness, “Samson in the Synagogue,” 32–39, 66–67; and “New Mosaics from the H|uqoq Synagogue,” 66–68.

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Samson’s exploits suggest that Jews in the village shared in the revival of apocalyptic nationalism that flourished in the Tiberias region from the third through seventh centuries.27 By the early Middle Ages, the Jewish village of H|uqoq became the Muslim village of ‘Yaquq (an Arabic variation on the Hebrew name), although Jewish pilgrims revering the nearby medieval “Tomb of Habakuk” still visited the site as late as the seventeenth century.28 Government documents from the Ottoman and British Mandate periods indicate that ‘Yaquq continued as a small agricultural village until Israel’s War of Independence in 1948, when it was abandoned.29 Its remains were bulldozed in 1968, and the site was never again reinhabited. Material Culture from the Late Hellenistic and Early Roman Periods With the preceding overview of H|uqoq’s setting and historical development, we are now in a position to examine the surviving material culture of the village from the Late Hellenistic, Early Roman, and Middle Roman periods. Relatively few finds have been uncovered at H|uqoq dating from the first century bce to the third century ce. So far, no architecture or sealed loci that date to these periods have been excavated;30 the Hellenistic and Roman material comes from later, mixed contexts, such as the excavations of the Late Roman/Byzantine domestic or industrial structure and synagogue, leaving us without a cohesive understanding of the village in earlier periods. Nevertheless, surveys and excavations have produced enough material to suggest that H|uqoq developed in ways similar to other Jewish agricultural villages in the region during the late Second Temple and mishnaic periods. Pottery and Coins H|uqoq’s similarity to contemporary Galilean villages is reflected in its ceramic and numismatic profile.31 For example, during the late first century bce and early first century ce, H|uqoq’s 27.  See Matthew J. Grey, “‘The Redeemer to Arise from the House of Dan’: Samson, Apocalypticism, and Messianic Hopes in Late Antique Galilee,” JSJ 44, no. 4 (2013): 553–89. 28.  See Lissovsky, “Hukkok,” 103–18. 29.  See Khalidi, All That Remains, 546–57. 30.  We have already noted the architectural features at nearby Sheikh Nashi, and surveys have observed remains of walled structures from the Roman period just south of H|uqoq on the western cliff of modern Highway 65 (see Cinamon, “H|uqoq, Survey,” site no. 10). However, the only early traces of architecture so far uncovered at H|uqoq itself are an architectural block and column base found below the foundations of the later synagogue’s east wall; see Magness et al, “H|uqoq–2012.” 31.  Previous surveys of the site collected and recorded pottery from both periods, although the forms were not described in detail. After collecting over two hundred sherds from the surface, Leibner found only two jars from the Late Hellenistic period, and only a small percentage (19 percent) of his collection dated to the Early Roman period (see Leibner, Settlement and History, 151, 154–55). After four years of excavation at the site, the HEP now

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Figure B. Obverse side of the coin of Alexander Janneaus (ca. 103–76 bce) with a Seleucid anchor. Photo courtesy of Nathan Elkins.

pottery assemblage included wares produced at nearby Kefar H|ananya and Shikhin, including tall, bag-shaped storage jars, open cooking pots or casseroles (KH3a), and closed cooking pots (KH4a).32 The assemblage from this period also included imported red-slipped terra sigillata fine wares (Eastern Sigillata A), which were manufactured on the Syrian coast. Examples of terra sigillata imports found at H|uqoq include incurved rim bowls and plates, and one ESA fish-plate. Numismatic finds from this period include two coins minted by the Hasmonean dynasty; the first was minted by Alexander Jannaeus (r. 103–76 bce),33 but the precise date of the second is undetermined.34 Similar to other Galilean villages, between the first and third centuries ce, H|uqoq’s ceramic assemblage contained a large amount of local wares.35 These include nearly every pottery form produced at Kefar H|ananya, such as broad cooking bowls and pans (KH1a and KH1b), open cooking pots or casseroles (KH3a and KH3b), and closed cooking pots (KH4a, 4b, and 4c).36 The few imports from the Early and Middle Roman periods include wheel-made knife-pared (“Herodian”) and mold-made lamps produced in semi-fine buff-colored wares (probably from

has a much larger sample of pottery from H|uqoq and can provide a more representative assessment of the site’s ceramic profile. We thank Daniel Schindler—the HEP pottery specialist—for providing the reading and analysis contained in the following summary. 32.  The latter two forms were produced between the mid-first century bce and the mid-second century ce. 33.  This coin was found above the Byzantine synagogue’s mosaic floor and beneath a Mamluk fill; on its obverse is a Seleucid anchor with a Greek legend ([BASILEUS ALEXA]NDR[OU]), while its reverse depicted a wheel with eight spokes and a Hebrew inscription that is likely the name of the king. We thank Nathan Elkins—the HEP numismatist—for providing the readings and analysis of all the coins mentioned in this chapter. 34.  This coin was found in an unsealed fill outside the east wall of the Late Roman synagogue; it contains a Hebrew inscription set within a wreath, and double cornucopiae with a pomegranate. 35.  For similar patterns in villages throughout Galilee, see Andrea M. Berlin, “Romanization and antiRomanization in pre-Revolt Galilee,” in The First Jewish Revolt: Archaeology, History, and Ideology (ed. Andrea M. Berlin and J. Andrew Overman; London: Routledge, 2002), 57–73. 36.  For description, analysis, and dating of these forms, see David Adan-Bayewitz, Common Pottery in Roman Galilee (Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993).

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northern Israel), along with a few Roman discus lamps.37 For the few semi-luxury and luxury items, the inhabitants of H|uqoq seem to have relied on the coastal market that offered a wider range of forms and wares. However, the high concentration of vessels obtained from regional suppliers of common wares—such as those produced at Kefar H|ananya and Shikhin—suggest that the costs of overland travel into/from the Galilean hills limited buying power and choices. Coins from the Early Roman period also reflect H|uqoq’s interaction with the wider Galilean economy. These include a Nabatean coin minted at Petra by Aretas IV or Shaqilath I (9 bce–40 ce),38 a coin minted at Tiberias by Herod Antipas (c. 20–39 ce),39 and an otherwise unidentifiable procuratorial coin from the first century ce.40 Agricultural Activity Surveys and excavations at H|uqoq have indicated that during the Late Hellenistic and Early Roman periods, the character of the village was largely agricultural. In addition to its access to arable lands and use of terrace farming, ancient agricultural activities are attested by a number of rock-cut features and installations scattered around the site. These include fragments and weights of olive presses found close to the modern olive orchards to the south and west of the site, five wine presses cut into the limestone bedrock, at least three water cisterns (one of which was covered with a circular stone wellhead), and unique installations that some scholars have suggested were used for mustard production.41 Since none of these features has been systematically excavated, their precise date is not known, but they resemble similar agricultural features found at other Roman-era sites. Evidence excavated from Late Roman and Byzantine contexts likely provide a sense of earlier agricultural activities as well. This includes the discovery of grinding stones, an ­Olynthus-type millstone found in secondary use, and remains of crushed olive pits and mustard plant found near the floor of the later domestic or industrial structure.42 The traces of mustard plant and the possible installations for the production of mustard recall not only the 37.  Knife-pared lamps first appear at the end of the first century bce and continued in use until the midsecond century ce. Roman discus lamps appear in the assemblage dating to between the first and third centuries ce; see Shulamit Hadad, The Oil Lamps from the Hebrew University Excavations at Beth Shean (Jerusalem: Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Israel Exploration Society, 2002). 38.  This coin was found in a modern stratum above the Late Roman synagogue; its obverse is obliterated, but its reverse depicts cornucopiae and a legend in Nabatean script. 39.  This coin was found beneath the floor of a Late Roman/Byzantine period room in the domestic part of the village; its obverse is obliterated, but its reverse depicts palm branches and a dotted border, with only a portion of Herod Antipas’s name surviving in the legend. 40.  This coin was found between the Mamluk floor and Late Roman/Byzantine period mosaic floor in the ancient synagogue building; both sides are obliterated. 41. Leibner, Settlement and History, 151–52; Magness, “H|uqoq–2011,” and “Samson in the Synagogue,” 33. For the unique “H|uqoq installations” that might have been used to produce oil from the mustard plant, see Tepper, Dar’in, and Tepper, Nahal Amud, 25, 83–84. 42.  Magness et al, “H|uqoq–2012,” and Magness, “Samson in the Synagogue,” 33–34.

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Figure C. Olive-press installation in the vicinity of Ḥuqoq. Photo courtesy of the H|uqoq Excavation Project.

parables of Jesus relating to mustard seeds,43 but also a debate in the Palestinian Talmud regarding the halakic classification of wild mustard plants that uses the gathering of mustard plants at H|uqoq as a case study.44 Ritual Purity Surveys and excavations at H|uqoq have also demonstrated that Jews in the village observed ritual purity laws during the Roman period. To date only a few fragments of stone (chalk) vessels have been discovered in Late Roman/Byzantine contexts, although earlier strata would presumably contain these vessels in greater quantities.45 Fragments discovered so far have come from three hand-carved mugs, possibly a lathe-turned cup, and possibly a lathe-turned bowl. This repertoire is typical of stone-vessel corpora elsewhere, though the cup and bowl types from H|uqoq reflect unusually fine workmanship and did not have a wide distribution. The forms of all these vessels fit typologies known from the late Second Temple period, but since stone vessels continued to be used into the third and fourth centuries, the precise date of the H|uqoq fragments is not certain. Other ritual-purity features at the site are three or four mikva’ot (Jewish ritual baths) hewn into the limestone bedrock on the eastern, southern, and western peripheries of the 43.  In a Synoptic saying, Jesus taught: “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade” (Mark 4:30–32; cf. Matthew 13:31–32; Luke 13:18–19; Gospel of Thomas 20). 44. In y. Šeb. 9:1, 38c, R. Shimon b. Lakish saw locals in H|uqoq gathering wild mustard plants. In this story, the mustard seed appears as a minor crop used for spice production, showing that it was classified by the rabbis as a wild plant (and not a cultivated vegetable) for halakic purposes. For discussion on the halakic implications of this account, see H. Yalon, “‘Piel,’ ‘Pilpel’ in Hebrew and Aramaic,” Tarbiz 6 (1935): 223–29 [Hebrew]; S. Lieberman, “Sefer Hayishuv (Review),” Sinai 30–31 (1940): 465 [Hebrew]; Y. Feliks, Talmud Yerushalmi Tractate Shevi’it Critically Edited [Hebrew] (Jerusalem: Ruben Maas, 1986), 2:223; Leibner, Settlement and History, 153–54. 45.  We thank Dennis Mizzi—the HEP specialist working on small finds—for sharing his reading and analysis of the stone vessels found at H|uqoq.

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Figure D. The shallow immersion room inside of the southern mikveh at H|uqoq. Photo courtesy of Jim Haberman.

village.46 The southern mikveh was excavated by the HEP in 2011. It contained an entrance from the west consisting of twelve steps (five made of cut stone blocks and seven hewn into the bedrock, all with traces of wear in the center) and a shallow immersion room with a trapezoidal shape.47 Several layers of hydraulic plaster preserved on the walls and ceiling of the immersion room attest to prolonged use, presumably beginning in the Early Roman period and continuing into the Middle Roman period. By the Byzantine period, however, the mikveh appears to have ceased functioning as a ritual bath and was converted into a cistern, as indicated by the Late Roman and Byzantine pottery in layers of silt that had accumulated on the floor and a 3-m-long shaft cut through the plastered ceiling from the ground surface above.48 The location of this mikveh at the southern periphery of the village places it in close proximity to the agricultural terraces and olive-press installations mentioned earlier. Therefore it appears that, like at other Jewish villages in Galilee, the inhabitants of H|uqoq were concerned with the 46.  Mikva’ot on the south and east sides of the site were noted in previous surveys; see Tepper and Shahar, “Subterranean Hiding Complexes,” 311–13; Tepper, Dar’in, and Tepper, Nahal Amud, 25, 83–84, and Leibner, Settlement and History, 151. An additional miqveh was partially exposed and excavated on the west side of the site during a recent salvage excavation; see Dalali-Amos, “H|uqoq” (Area B site A).” 47.  The entrance on the west side of the immersion room was 1.3 m wide with a lintel about 3 m below the surface. The room itself contained two steps (both 0.4 m high) leading into a wide and shallow pool. The ceiling of the room is 2.35 m above the floor; see Magness, “H|uqoq—2011,” and “Samson in the Synagogue,” 34. 48.  Also, ribbed potsherds dating to the Byzantine period were visible in the makeup of the plaster on the east wall of the immersion room. This layer of plaster was likely a part of the installation’s conversion from a miqveh into a cistern around that time; see Magness, “H|uqoq—2011,” and “Samson in the Synagogue,” 34.

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production of ritually pure agricultural produce.49 In addition, the apparent use of the mikveh into the second and third centuries supports recent claims that ritual-purity practices continued in some Jewish communities long after the destruction of the Jerusalem temple in 70 ce.50 Tombs and Ossuaries Other extant features at H|uqoq from the Early and Middle Roman periods are the rock-cut tombs that surround the village. Since the late nineteenth century, surveys have noted numerous cist tombs clustered in three primary burial areas to the south, east, and north.51 These cist tombs are shallow graves cut directly into the limestone bedrock and share characteristics (shape and design) with shaft or trough graves common in the region during the Middle and Late Roman periods. However, because of their common features, they are impossible to date with precision and could have been hewn earlier.52 More precise dates can be assigned to the several rock-cut chamber tombs with loculi niches that have been explored to the north of the village.53 In 1956–1957, Bezalel Ravani discovered and excavated three such tombs that appear to date to the late first or early second century ce.54 Each of these tombs contained a central pit, a small ledge encircling the pit, and loculi niches hewn into the walls.55 Skeletal remains included a few complete adult and child skel49.  For a discussion of this practice, see Yonatan Adler, “Second Temple Period Ritual Baths Adjacent to Agricultural Installations: The Archaeological Evidence in Light of the Halakhic Sources,” JJS 59, no. 1 (Spring 2008): 62–72. 50.  David Amit and Yonatan Adler, “The Observance of Ritual Purity after 70 ce: A Reevaluation of the Evidence in Light of Recent Archaeological Discoveries,” in “Follow the Wise”: Studies in Jewish History and Culture in Honor of Lee I. Levine (ed. Zeev Weiss, Oded Irshai, Jodi Magness, and Seth Schwartz; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010), 121–43. Recent salvage excavations to the west of the site (conducted prior to the expansion of Highway 65) also exposed three cist tombs and five possible burial caves, one of which contained loculi niches and an ossuary; see Dalali-Amos, “H|uqoq” (Area M and sites B, H, and I in Area B). 51.  The first to report on the cist tombs and burial caves around the site was Guérin, Description géographique, 354–59. Later surveys to also note cist tombs and rock-cut tombs include Tepper, Dar’in, and Tepper, Nahal Amud, 116–17; Leibner, Settlement and History, 151; and Magness, “H|uqoq–2011.” Recent salvage excavations to the west of the site (conducted prior to the expansion of Highway 65) also exposed three cist tombs and five possible burial caves, one of which contained loculi niches and an ossuary; see Dalali-Amos, “H|uqoq” (Area M and sites B, H, and I in Area B). 52.  For similar shaft or trench graves at Beth She‘arim and Tiberias from the Late Roman and Byzantine periods, see Nahman Avigad, Beth She‘arim III (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1976), 92–94, and Aviam, Jews, Pagans, and Christians, 264. For the small number of cist graves attested in Galilee from the Hellenistic and Early Roman period, see Aviam, Jews, Pagans, and Christians, 257–58, 263–64. 53.  In addition to the tombs excavated by Ravani (described below), recent surveys have noted features of loculi tombs near H|uqoq close to the medieval “Tomb of Habukkuk”; see Cinamon, “H|uqoq, Survey,” particularly site no.12, fig. 7; cf. sites no.11, no. 13, and fig. 6. 54.  Ravani actually discovered four large rock-cut tombs and two smaller tombs, but for various reasons he only excavated three of the larger tombs (Tombs I, II, and IV). For the description that follows, see Ravani and Kahane, “Rock-Cut Tombs at H|uqoq,” 121–47. 55.  Tomb I contained 9 loculi, Tomb II contained 3 loculi, and Tomb IV contained 9 loculi.

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etons, numerous skulls, scattered bones, and infants placed in small burial niches. Small finds from within the tombs included Early Roman cooking pots, various glass vessels (bottles, ungentaria, flasks, bowls, and a small pot), glass beads, oil lamps (wheel-made and mold-made discus lamps), iron and bronze bands, a possible mirror, and a bronze coin of Trajan (98–117 ce).56 Ravani also found iron nails suggesting the use of wood coffins, and three plain crudely made limestone ossuaries. The ossuaries were roughly dressed, showed heavy chisel marks, had either flat or vaulted lids, and seem to date between 70 and 135 ce. The crudeness of the ossuaries has led some scholars to claim that they reflect the importation of Judean burial customs into the Galilee region following the First Revolt and attest to the lack of local skilled artisans.57 Hiding Complexes One final Early Roman–period feature at H|uqoq is the existence of two or more underground hiding complexes.58 The first was discovered on the village’s northern slope and was explored during an informal survey of the site in the 1970s. This complex was originally a water cistern that was perforated and served as a central room connected by hewn tunnels to three other rooms.59 A second was recently discovered, explored, and mapped by Yinon Shivtiel.60 This second complex uses the cistern in the eastern courtyard of the later synagogue, reaches a depth of 8.5 m, and includes three branches of hiding tunnels. Both of these underground complexes resemble the escape routes and hiding tunnels dug by villagers throughout Galilee in preparation for the First or Second Jewish Revolts against Rome.61 Such complexes typically expanded preexisting caves or cisterns in or around the villages, allowed for the storage of provisions and the hiding of civilians for limited periods, and had camouflaged openings (such as well heads) to hide their location from approaching enemies. 56.  For the glass vessels, see Dan Barag, Glass Vessels in Eretz-Israel in the Roman-Byzantine Period (Ph.D. diss., The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1970), 62–63 [Hebrew]. 57.  For description and images of these ossuaries, see Mordechai Aviam and Danny Syon, “Jewish Ossilegium in Galilee,” in What Athens Has to Do with Jerusalem: Essays on Classical, Jewish, and Early Christian Art and Archaeology in Honor of Gideon Foerster (ed. Leonard V. Rutgers; Leuven: Peeters, 2002), 168, 177–78; L. Y. Rahmani, A Catalogue of Jewish Ossuaries in the Collections of the State of Israel (Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 1994), 116 no. 158/plate 22 (cf. pp. 24–25, 110 no. 126). 58.  Both are listed in Yinon Shivtiel, “The Uniqueness and Distribution of ‘Concealment Complexes’ in the Galilee: Update and Reevaluation,” Cathedra 142 (2011): 12 (nos. 19 and 20) [Hebrew]. 59.  Descriptions of the first hiding complex to be discovered at H|uqoq can be found in Tepper and Shahar, “Hiding Complexes,” 311–13; Yuval Shahar, “The Underground Hideouts in Galilee and Their Historical Meaning,” in The Bar Kokhba War Reconsidered (ed. P. Schäfer; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003), 235; Aviam, Jews, Pagans, and Christians, 128; and Shivtiel, “Cliff Settlements,” 227. 60.  Yinon Shivtiel, Rock Shelters and Hiding Complexes in the Galilee: The History of the Jewish Settlement in the Galilee during the Early Roman Period (Ph.D. diss., Bar-Ilan University, 2009), 53–57 [Hebrew] was the first to discover and report this second complex. For a brief description of Shivtiel’s more recent findings, see Magness, “H|uqoq—2011.” 61.  See fuller descriptions and discussions of such complexes found throughout Galilee, see Aviam, Jews, Pagans, and Christians, 123–32, and Shivtiel, “Cliff Settlements,” 223–35.

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Figure E. Cistern cap in the eastern courtyard of the ancient synagogue. The cistern descends 8.5 m and serves as an entrance to a hiding complex most likely from the First or Second Jewish Revolt. Photo Courtesy of Jim Haberman.

All of these common features apply to the two H|uqoq hiding complexes. However, because the openings of these complexes were usually not sealed (allowing for the penetration of later materials), it is difficult to date them with precision. Based on their construction techniques, geographical distribution, and historical parallels, some scholars have argued that the Galilean hiding complexes were dug in preparation for the First Revolt in the mid 60s ce,62 while others have argued based on associated pottery forms and comparisons with Judean refuge caves that they were built in connection with the beginning of the Second Revolt in 132 ce.63 The biggest challenge to the latter hypothesis is the ongoing debate over the geographical extent of that revolt and its impact on the Galilee region.64 Although the H|uqoq hiding complexes have been surveyed, explored, and mapped, they have never been systematically excavated, making it impossible to know which revolt led to their construction. However, it is clear from the existence and uses of these complexes that the inhabitants of H|uqoq were affected by one or both of those conflicts. Conclusion Although the current excavations at H|uqoq have focused primarily on the Late Roman and Byzantine period strata, this article has shown that there is evidence of occupation during the 62. Aviam, Jews, Pagans, and Christians, 130–31, points to examples of underground tunneling and hiding during the First Revolt, notes that the distribution of Galilean hiding complexes matches the borders of Jewish Galilee as described by Josephus, and lists several such complexes that have been found at sites that were fortified and prepared for battle during the First Revolt. 63.  Shahar, “Underground Hideouts in Galilee,” 217–40. Shahar also points to the statement made by Cassius Dio that Jews during the Bar Kokbha revolt “occupied the advantageous positions in the country and strengthened them with mines and walls, in order that they might have places of refuge whenever they should be hard pressed, and might meet together unobserved underground; and they pierced these subterranean passages from above at intervals to let in air and light” (His. Rom. 69.12.3). 64.  It is also possible that the hiding complexes were constructed after the Second Revolt in anticipation of future troubles, but this position has not been accepted by many scholars; see Shivtiel, “Concealment Complexes,” 21–26.

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Late Hellenistic, Early Roman, and Middle Roman periods. The remains suggest that between the first century bce and third century ce, H|uqoq was a typical Jewish agricultural village whose inhabitants participated in the local and regional economy, were concerned with ritual purity, and were affected by the Jewish revolts. However, since our current understanding of the village in these periods is so fragmentary, we hope that future excavations will shed additional light on H|uqoq in the time of the Hasmoneans, Jesus, and the early rabbis. Bibliography Adan-Bayewitz, David. Common Pottery in Roman Galilee. Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993. Adler, Yonatan. “Second Temple Period Ritual Baths Adjacent to Agricultural Installations: The Archaeological Evidence in Light of the Halakhic Sources.” JJS 59, no. 1 (Spring 2008): 62–72. Alt, Albrecht. “Das Institut in den Jahren 1929 und 1930.” Palästinajahrbuch 27 (1931): 5–50. Amit, David and Yonatan Adler. “The Observance of Ritual Purity after 70 ce: A Reevaluation of the Evidence in Light of Recent Archaeological Discoveries.” In “Follow the Wise”: Studies in Jewish History and Culture in Honor of Lee I. Levine, edited by Ze’ev Weiss, Oded Irshai, Jodi Magness, and Seth Schwartz, 121–43. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010. Aviam, Mordechai. Jews, Pagans, and Christians in the Galilee. Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 2004. Aviam, Mordechai, and Danny Syon. “Jewish Ossilegium in Galilee.” In What Athens Has to Do with Jerusalem: Essays on Classical, Jewish, and Early Christian Art and Archaeology in Honor of Gideon Foerster, edited by Leonard V. Rutgers, 151–85. Leuven: Peeters, 2002. Avigad, Nahman. Beth She‘arim. Vol. 3. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1976. Barag, Dan. Glass Vessels in Eretz-Israel in the Roman-Byzantine Period. Ph.D. diss., The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1970 [Hebrew]. Berlin, Andrea M. “Romanization and anti-Romanization in pre-Revolt Galilee.” In The First Jewish Revolt: Archaeology, History, and Ideology, edited by Andrea M. Berlin and J. Andrew Overman, 57–73. London: Routledge, 2002. Cinamon, Gilad. “H|uqoq, Survey.” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/ report_detail_eng.aspx?id=5385&mag_id=120. Conder, Claude R., and H. H. Kitchener. The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology. Vol. 1, Galilee. London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881. Dalali-Amos, Edna. “H|uqoq,” HA-ESI 126 (2014): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_ detail_eng.aspx?id=12661&mag_id=121.

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Damati, Emmanuel. “Kefar Ekho-H|uqoq: The Unknown Fortress of Josephus Flavius.” Cathedra 39 (1986): 37–43 [Hebrew]. Duling, Dennis C. “The Jesus Movement and Social Network Analysis (Part 1: The Spatial Network).” BTB 29 (1999): 156–75. Feliks, Y. Talmud Yerushalmi Tractate Shevi’it Critically Edited [Hebrew] (Jerusalem: Ruben Maas, 1986). Friedman Y., and A. Peled. “The Map of Roads in Galilee in the Middle Ages.” In Hikrei Eretz: Studies in the Land of Israel, edited by Z. Safrai, Y. Friedman, and Y. Schwartz, 323–41. Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1997 [Hebrew]. Grey, Matthew J. “‘The Redeemer to Arise from the House of Dan’: Samson, Apocalypticism, and Messianic Hopes in Late Antique Galilee.” JSJ 44, no. 4 (2013): 553–89. Grey, Matthew (with Jodi Magness). “Finding Samson in Byzantine Galilee: The 2011–2012 Archaeological Excavations at H|uqoq.” StBA 5 (2013): 1–30. Guérin, Victor. Description géographique, historique et archéologique de la Palestine: Galilée. Paris: L’imprimerie nationale, 1880. Hadad, Shulamit. The Oil Lamps from the Hebrew University Excavations at Beth Shean. Jerusalem: Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Israel Exploration Society, 2002. Ilan, Zvi. “Eastern Galilee, Survey of Roman Roads.” ESI 9 (1991): 14–16. Japhet, Sara. I and II Chronicles. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1993. Khalidi, Walid, ed. All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948. Washington, D.C.: Institute for Palestinian Studies, 1992. Kloner, Amos. “Stepped Roads in Ancient Palestine.” Aram 8 (1996): 111–37. Leibner, Uzi. Settlement and History in Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine Galilee: An Archaeological Survey of Eastern Galilee. TSAJ 127. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Lieberman, S. “Sefer Hayishuv (Review).” Sinai 30–31 (1940): 465 [Hebrew]. Lissovsky, Nurit. “H|ukkok, Yaquq and Habakkuk’s Tomb: Changes over Time and Space.” PEQ 140, no. 2 (2008): 103–18. Lissovsky, Nurit, and Nadav Na‘aman. “A New Look on the Boundary System of the Twelve Tribes.” UF 35 (2003): 291–332. Magness, Jodi. “Samson in the Synagogue.” BAR 39, no. 1 (2013): 32–39, 66–67. ———. “New Mosaics from the H|uqoq Synagogue.” BAR 39, no. 5 (2013): 66–68. ———. “H|uqoq—2011 Preliminary Report.” HA-ESI 124 (2012): http://www.hadashot-esi. org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1959. Magness, Jodi, Shua Kisilevitz, Karen Britt, Matthew Grey, and Chad Spigel. “H|uqoq (Lower Galilee) and Its Synagogue Mosaics: Preliminary Report on the Excavations of 2011– 13.” JRA 27 (2014): 327–55. Magness, Jodi, Shua Kisilevitz, Matthew Grey, Chad Spigel, and Brian Coussens. “H|uqoq—2012 Preliminary Report.” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www.hadashot-esi. org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=3331&mag_id=120.

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———. “H|uqoq—2013 Preliminary Report.” HA-ESI 126 (2014): http://www.hadashot-esi. org.il/Report_Detail_Eng.aspx?id=12648&mag_id=121. ———. “H|uqoq—2014 Preliminary Report.” HA-ESI (forthcoming). Rahmani, L. Y. A Catalogue of Jewish Ossuaries in the Collections of the State of Israel. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 1994. Ravani, B., and P. P. Kahane. “Rock-Cut Tombs at H|uqoq.” ‘Atiqot 3 (1961): 121–47. Reed, Jonathan L. Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus: A Re-examination of the Evidence. Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000. Shahar, Yuval. “The Underground Hideouts in Galilee and Their Historical Meaning.” In The Bar Kokhba War Reconsidered, edited by P. Schäfer, 217–40. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003. Shivtiel, Yinon. “The Uniqueness and Distribution of ‘Concealment Complexes’ in the Galilee: Update and Reevaluation.” Cathedra 142 (2011): 8–26 [Hebrew]. ———. “Cliff Settlements, Shelters and Refuge Caves in the Galilee.” In In the Hill-Country, and in the Shephelah, and in the Arabah (Joshua 12, 8): Studies and Researches Presented to Adam Zertal in the Thirtieth Anniversary of the Manasseh Hill-Country Survey, edited by Shay Bar, 223–35. Jerusalem: Ariel, 2008. ———. Rock Shelters and Hiding Complexes in the Galilee: The History of the Jewish Settlement in the Galilee during the Early Roman Period. Ph.D. diss., Bar-Ilan University, 2009. [Hebrew] Shivtiel, Yinon, and Amos Frumkin. “The Use of Caves as Security Measures in the Early Roman Period in the Galilee.” Caderno de Geografia 24, no. 41 (2014): 77–85. Tepper, Yigal, G. Dar‘in, and Y. Tepper. The Nah\al ‘Amud District: Chapters on the Settlement Process. In Hebrew. Tel Aviv, 2000. Tepper, Yigal, and Y. Shahar. “Subterranean Hiding Complexes in the Galilee.” In Hebrew. In The Hiding Complexes in the Judean Shephelah, edited by Amos Kloner and Yigal Tepper, 279–326. Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1987. Tsafrir, Yoram, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green. Tabula Imperii Romani Iudaea-Palestina: Eretz Israel in the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods; Map and Gazetteer. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994. Yalon, H. “‘Piel,’ ‘Pilpel’ in Hebrew and Aramaic.” Tarbiz 6 (1935): 223–29 [Hebrew]. Williamson, H. G. M. 1 and 2 Chronicles. New Century Bible Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982.

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17 Meiron in Upper Galilee Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers Meiron is located on one of the eastern foothills of Mount Meiron (map reference 1915-2664), just north of Wadi Meiron and barely 1 km north of the roughly contemporary site of Khirbet Shema‘ (see maps 2 and 4B in the front of this volume). Excavations at Meiron began in 1971, when the American team digging at Khirbet Shema‘ was asked by the Department of Antiquities to conduct a limited rescue dig at the site to prevent further encroachment on the ancient ruins by developers and to offset damage occurring during Lag B’Omer festivities, when huge crowds of pilgrims converge there. Because the 1971 dig revealed the site to be very rich and much larger than expected, work at Khirbet Shema‘ was curtailed; and excavations at Meiron continued for four more seasons: 1972, 1974, 1975, and 1977. A comprehensive summary of the Meiron excavations is available in the final report.1 Because the work at both sites proved to be important for understanding the region, two more Upper Galilean sites (Gush H|alav and Nabratein) were subsequently excavated; the four digs were collectively named the “Meiron Excavation Project.”2 Additional rescue excavations, which support the findings of the American project, were conducted southeast of the ancient synagogue in 1987.3 As this was a salvage dig, the team was instructed in the first season to excavate at the bottom of the Meiron hill on the eastern side, near a religious school that was expanding and jeopardizing the ruins. When this area, labeled MI, yielded important information, the decision was made to continue excavating there and to expand work to an adjacent area (MVII) and to other areas farther up the eastern slope (MII, MV) and also to investigate the synagogue (MIII), which had been exposed since the Middle Ages, if not before, and had also been visited 1.  Eric M. Meyers, James F. Strange, and Carol L. Meyers, Excavations at Ancient Meiron, Upper Galilee, Israel, 1971–72, 1974–75, 1977 (Meiron Excavation Project 3; Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1981). This publication is hereafter referred to as “Meiron.” 2.  Summaries of the work at the other three sites can be found in this volume, “Gush H|alav,” 389–403; “Nabratein,” 404–13; “Khirbet Shema‘,” 414–23. 3.  Nurit Feig, “Salvage Excavations at Meiron,” ‘Atiqot 43 (2002): 87–107.

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Figure A. Photograph of the synagogue façade. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

by modern explorers4 (see fig. A). In addition, a tomb complex was excavated, a sounding (MVI) was made to the north in what seems to be an agricultural field house, and another sounding (MIV) was made near the synagogue at a tower, which turned out to be medieval, in the highest part of the site. Scattered artifactual remains of the Late Hellenistic period (Stratum I, c. 200–50 bce) were recovered, as were materials of the Early Roman period (Stratum II, c. 50 bce to 135 ce), especially from the tomb. Although the Stratum I and II materials do not include significant structural remains, they indicate that village formation was underway at the end of the Second Temple period. The modest remains of the Early Roman period indicate that there was a major demographic shift after the wars with Rome, leading eventually to the growth of this site and, indeed, of the entire region. The earliest building complex in the lower part of the site was constructed and expanded in Stratum III (c. 135–250 ce), the Middle Roman period according to the excavation’s chronological scheme. Considerable expansion occurred in the Late Roman period in Stratum IV (c. 250–363/365 ce), when the great basilical synagogue was constructed, and continued until the site was largely, although not entirely, abandoned c. 363/365 ce for several reasons: heavy taxation, drought, and the earthquake of 363 ce. A small Byzantine-period settlement can be identified, and then the site was reoccupied in early medieval times—but those remains are very modest and beyond the scope of this article.

4.  Meiron, 5–7. Heinrich Kohl and Carl Watzinger surveyed the site in the early twentieth century and published their findings in Antike Synagogen in Galilaea (Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 29; Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916; repr., Jerusalem: Kedem, 1973; repr., Osnabrück: O. Zeller, 1975), 80–88.

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Figure B. Drawing of the tomb complex. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

Figure C. Inkwell from the tomb complex. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

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Figure D. Elevation drawing of the synagogue façade. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

The tomb complex (fig. B), which is situated on the plateau just west of the traditional tomb of Shimon bar Yochai, contained many Early Roman materials and continued in use as a family tomb for four centuries, until the end of the Late Roman period. Only the western sector of the tomb was fully cleared. It is an 18-m-long, two-chambered loculus tomb, and each chamber has a maximum width of 6 m. The eastern chamber contains a single loculus (niche for a body) and an adjoining pit used for ossilegium (collecting of disarticulated bones). The pit contained the bones of two adults, and the remains of many other individuals were found on the floor of the chamber. The western chamber has three loculi and two shallow pits cut in the north wall. An ossuary pit was cut in front of one of the loculi. Each loculus contained nails probably used in wooden coffins or ossuaries. As in the east chamber, the entire floor of the west chamber was covered with the disarticulated bones of secondary burials. In all, the remains of 197 individuals were interred or reinterred over the course of four centuries—nothing dates later than the fourth century. Among the most interesting finds is a first-century ce inkwell (fig. C) nearly identical to ones found at Qumran and similar to one from Nabratein.5 The analysis of the skeletal remains proved to be especially illuminating and significant.6 First, the population in the Meiron tomb over the four centuries of its use resembles the population of Jerusalem and Ein Gedi in the same period in terms of stature. Second, infant 5.  Meiron, 109, photo 52:2 and fig. 7.6.11. 6.  By Patricia Smith, Elizabeth Bornerman, and Joseph Zias in Meiron, 110–18, and tables 1–10, fig. 7.5, and photos 56–62.

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Figure E. Cutaway perspective of the synagogue with annexes. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

and child mortality was high—c. 50 percent—because of endemic disease among other factors. Third, the frequency of genetically determined skeletal anomalies is very high, probably because the people buried in this tomb were part of an endogamous family group. The presence of many secondary burials in the tomb, indicating that family members wanted to be reinterred with their own, also supports this datum. The remains of the monumental synagogue on the northeastern summit include a tripledoor façade visible (fig. D) since the medieval period if not before.7 The façade is on the southern, Jerusalem-facing, narrow end of the rectangular building. Its rock-cut floor is carved into a terrace exposed since antiquity, and its western wall was hewn from an outcrop of bedrock. Even its western roofline dips into the outcrop, and water from the roof drained into a plastered channel cut into bedrock. Basilical in plan, the synagogue has two rows of eight columns and a shallow portico with six columns in front of the southern façade (see fig. E). No evidence of a Torah shrine (receptacle for scrolls of the Pentateuch) or bema (raised platform for Torah reading) has been found, but a wooden or more permanent structure may have been located on the interior of the southern wall. Because the floor of the synagogue is bedrock, the only materials that might provide a date for the building came from soundings along the eastern exterior foundations. These soundings revealed an annex and several other rooms that 7.  For a full description of the synagogue and adjoining structures, see Meiron, 9–20.

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Figure F. Perspective drawing of the MI complex. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

were probably integral to the function of the building. Sealed loci containing Stratum III and IV materials—including coins, the latest of which is dated to Emperor Probus, 276–283 ce— were recovered in the annex and suggest that the synagogue was built in the late third century (Late Roman period). The Meiron synagogue, which is 28 m long and 13.5 m wide, is one of the largest of the ancient synagogues in Palestine. Its seating capacity would have been 530 without a gallery and 750 with one.8 The size of the building, along with the nature of several domiciles that were excavated, suggests that the inhabitants of the site, numbering c. 1,000–1,500 people, were more prosperous than the people in nearby sites. With so little to excavate in the synagogue, the excavations focused on domestic areas lower down the Meiron hill, where the depth of debris (2–4 m) meant better preservation. A large portion of a building complex (MI) near the bottom of the hill was extensively excavated (see fig. F).9 Hellenistic and Early Roman materials were recovered in fills over bedrock; and several wall fragments, plaster flooring, a flagstone surface, a pit, and an oven, all dating to the Early Roman period (50 bce–135 ce), were found.10 However, most of the structural remains of the building complex—which included a large internal courtyard and a small external one, an irregular series of rooms, several doorways with well-carved bossed jambs and bolt

8.  See discussion in Chad S. Spigel, Ancient Synagogue Seating Capacities: Methodology, Analysis and Limits (TSAJ 149; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012), 115–19. 9. See Meiron, 23–44. 10.  A Hasmonean coin and several Herodian lamp nozzles helped to date these materials.

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holes, two stairways, and a miqveh and adjoining cistern—date mainly to the Middle and Late Roman periods, especially the third–fourth centuries ce. Several structural features of this building complex can be determined from the surviving walls as well as from materials found in the collapse. The thickness of the walls (65–85 cm) and the presence of stairways point to the presence of second-story rooms in many parts of the complex. Large numbers of plaster chunks were recovered (although none in situ), suggesting that the second-story rooms and floors were plastered. The quantities of iron nails and fittings in the debris indicate that wooden beams of considerable thickness were used to construct the roofs, and the absence of roof tiles and the presence of roof rollers (heavy stone cylinders used to smooth the plaster layer, overlying beams and brush, of roofs) attest to the flat roofs of the building complex. The function of this complex, the full extent of which was not determined after four seasons of excavation, can be suggested on the basis of its size and layout and also from the artifactual evidence. Several of the rooms appear to be “public” or administrative space. For example, the most carefully carved doorjambs flank what seems to be the main entrance, which leads into two small rooms lined with stone benches, perhaps forming one long anteroom leading to the large internal courtyard. Domestic activities, notably food preparation, are represented by the discovery of at least three ovens and many grinding implements (none of which was found in the putative public rooms). Striking remains of ancient technology, perhaps producing items for commercial as well as household purposes, were discovered in a room near the center of the complex. A stone installation in the center of the room, 80 cm in diameter and preserved to the height of 56 cm, is surmounted by a semicircular stone in which a 51-cm square block was placed; and a stone bench, possibly a workbench rising to a level of 85 cm above the floor, runs along a nearby wall. The discovery of a bronze plane or scraper (ma‘as\ad) with an iron handle in the debris on the floor near the installation suggests that woodworking activities took place in this room; perhaps barrels for the thriving olive-oil production centered around Meiron were fashioned here. The edge of another building complex (MVII), separated by a 2-m-wide street from the MI complex and consisting of at least three distinct structures, was identified. Although very little excavation was carried out within these structures, the artifactual material, like that in the MI complex, indicates a combination of domestic and craft activities. This combination also appeared in the structures uncovered about 25 m up the hill from the MI complex, where two Late Roman period buildings were partially excavated.11 The first, dubbed the “Patrician House” (fig. G), was well preserved, with some walls still standing 2–3 m high. This dwelling consists of a large flagstone courtyard with rooms on the north and west. It was entered through a doorway with well-carved jambs leading into the courtyard, and a stairway led from the courtyard to a second story. Roof rollers in the debris attest to the

11.  Meiron, 50–76.

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Figure G. Cutaway isometric drawing of the Patrician House. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

building’s flat roof, and an abundance of nails indicate the use of timbers for the roof and for the floor of the second story. The most remarkable aspect of this structure is that the contents of one of the rooms (fig. G upper left), which had no door and could have been entered only by stairs from the second story, were found in situ; they had apparently been left behind when the house was abandoned sometime in the fourth century ce. Nineteen storage jars, most with their carbonized contents intact, were discovered in this room.12 Two of the jars bear inscriptions: one, in Greek, may be the name (“Julian”) of the household’s owner; the other is the Hebrew word ’ēš (“fire”) and may refer to the charring of the jar’s contents. Other significant finds in room F were a small bronze bell; two large (both over 30 cm in diameter) light-green, blown-glass plates; an iron sickle blade; and five coins, three of which are mid-fourth century. (A fourth is an unattributable fourth-century coin, and the fifth dates to the first century bce.) This remarkable collection of foodstuffs and artifacts, apparently in dead storage, may reflect an act 12.  The contents of most of the jars could be identified: six contained wheat (Triticum), six were full of Egyptian beans (lubiya, or ful), one held king walnuts (Juglans regia), one contained barley (Hordeum), and two probably held olives (Olea europaea).

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of religious piety.13 The contents of the jars seem to have been deliberately rendered inedible by charring, suggesting that they were dedicated to God and thus were too sacred (heqdēš) to use. They were technically temple property, but the temple had been destroyed and so they were placed in permanent storage.14 The second building, probably larger than the Patrician House and also dating to the Late Roman period, is called the “Lintel House” because of the imposing lintel that surmounted the main entrance. Only two rooms of this substantial building were excavated. The lintel doorway led into a room with low benches against two walls, suggesting (as in the MI building) that it was an anteroom and that the building served some public or commercial as well as domestic functions. This impression is supported by the nature of the adjacent room, which held what appears to have been a work platform against one wall and a small bin. The Lintel and Patrician Houses are distinct buildings but yet are linked by a common roof terrace. Although these buildings, like the synagogue, are Late Roman in date, there is some evidence of continued existence in some parts of the site in Stratum V (c. 363/365–750 ce), the Byzantine period. A small structure was discovered, for example, over the western part of the ruins of the Patrician House. In addition, significant amounts of imported terra sigillata wares were recovered from MII in the Patrician and Lintel Houses.15 The excavators had assumed that the site was more or less abandoned at the end of the Late Roman period (in 363/365 ce), but perhaps greater significance should be attributed to Stratum V. The presence of fine wares suggests that people of means resided at Meiron in the Byzantine period, but the excavators did not locate their dwellings on this extensive site. Many of the fine-ware pieces found in MII presumably washed down the slope from unexcavated structures farther up the hill, and further excavation might clarify the situation. Still, the lack of Byzantine period coins indicates a modest settlement in that period.16 The heyday of the Jewish occupation of the site was clearly the Late Roman period, albeit with precursors in the Hellenistic through Middle Roman periods. The Jewish settlement of the Late Roman period is perhaps characterized by religious piety. Although most of the architectural fragments of the synagogue were probably looted in antiquity or later, the apparent lack of figural art and colorful mosaics in the synagogue suggests religious conservatism, as does the possible reason for the room full of inedible foodstuffs and other objects in the Patrician House. Meiron is also characterized by economic prosperity. The large size of the synagogue and of the excavated dwellings indicates the relative wealth of the community in the rabbinic period. On the basis of size alone, Meiron would have ranked among the major towns of the mountainous region known as Upper Galilee. The numismatic 13.  So Martin Goodman, in Meiron, 71–72. 14.  For rabbinic statements on the dedication and disposal of foodstuffs and objects, see, e.g., m. Me‘il. 2:6, 5:1; y. Šeqal. 8:5, 33a; b. Bek. 53a; b. Yoma 66a. 15.  Published by Dennis E. Groh in Meiron, 129–38, and pls. 8.31 and 8.32. 16.  The Meiron coins have been published in a separate volume; see Joyce Raynor and Yaakov Meshorer, with the cooperation of Richard Simon Hanson, The Coins of Ancient Meiron (Meiron Excavation Project 4; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1988).

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profile, with 96 coins coming from Tyre, indicates close commercial ties to the Phoenician coast.17 Marketing oil and perhaps other commodities from this fertile area of Upper Galilee to Tyre and other coastal cities presumably brought wealth to many inhabitants of Late Roman Meiron. Bibliography Feig, Nurit. “Salvage Excavations at Meiron.” ‘Atiqot 43 (2002): 87–107. Hanson, Richard S. Tyrian Influence in Upper Galilee. Meiron Excavation Project 2. Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1980. Kohl, Heinrich, and Carl Watzinger. Antike Synagogen in Galilaea. Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 29. Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916. Reprinted, Jerusalem: Kedem, 1973; Reprinted, Osnabrück: O. Zeller, 1975. Meyers, Eric M., James F. Strange, and Carol L. Meyers. Excavations at Ancient Meiron, Upper Galilee, Israel 1971–72, 1974–75, 1977. Meiron Excavation Project 3. Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1981. Raynor, Joyce, and Yaakov Meshorer, with the cooperation of Richard Simon Hanson. The Coins of Ancient Meiron. Meiron Excavation Project 4. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1988. Spiegel, Chad S. Ancient Synagogue Seating Capacities: Methodology, Analysis and Limits. TSAJ 149. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012.

17.  Richard S. Hanson, Tyrian Influence in Upper Galilee (Meiron Excavation Project 2; Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1980), 52–54.

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18 Gush H|alav James F. Strange Name Gush H|alab or H|alav (‫ )גוש חלב‬is the Hebrew name for a large village or town in Upper Galilee about 8 km north of Safed (see maps 2 and 4B in the front gallery). The name means “block of white” or “clod of fat,” referring either to the local white chalk limestone cliffs or to the area’s fertile soil.1 Josephus always calls the village by the Greek form Γίσχαλα (Gischala), which preserves the Hebrew root. Jerome, writing in Latin, follows the Greek and speaks of the town as “Gischalis” or “Gyschalis.” The toponym in Arabic is ‫ الجش‬or “el-Jish.” Topography of the Site Gush H|alav stands on the top of a chalk hill at 832 m above sea level north of Mount Meiron. Modern excavators have detected a tell, or artificial mound, on the top of the hill that has no modern occupation, as the modern village stands south of the main hill. Ancient occupation extends down the hill to the east above the Wadi Gush H|alav, which runs from north to south with perennial water from the Spring of Jish (Ain el-Jish).2 The excavated synagogue is found east of the hill, so rainfall, cisterns, and probably water transported up from the Wadi Gush H|alav served the inhabitants. The rabbis call the hill of Gush H|alav “the upper city,” which 1.  Jastrow, 227–28, s.v. ‫ גּוּשׁ‬II; Victor Guérin (Description géographique, historique et archéologique de la Palestine, vol. 2, Galilée [Paris: L’imprimerie nationale, 1880], 100) records an etymology according to Rabbi Samuel Laniado at the end of the sixteenth century, who sees Halab in its name as a reference to Allepo. Guérin prefers the explanation that the name refers to the “richness” or “fatness” of the area. 2.  Claude R. Conder and Henry Horatio Kitchener, The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology, vol. 1, Galilee (London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881), 212.

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Figure A. Topographical map of Gush Ḥalav, showing the relationship of the synagogue site to the modern village in 1978. Used by permission of the author and Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers.

suggests that the lower occupation would be “the lower city,” but this is nowhere attested in ancient literature. The remains of two synagogues have stood for centuries on the main hill and 625 m east of the main hill, the latter at 706-m elevation above sea level. Gush Ḥalav in the Hebrew Bible Adolf Neubauer (1868) identifies Gush H|alav with Ah\lab (“fatness”) of Judg. 1:31: “The men of Asher did not conquer the people in Acco or Sidon, nor did they conquer Ahlab.”3 Neither Acco nor Sidon appears in Asher, which implies that Ah\lab is also not in Asher. The Gush

129.

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3.  Adolph Neubauer, La géographie du Talmud (Paris: M. Lévy frères, 1868; repr., Hildesheim: Olms, 1967),

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H|alav known east of Asher since Ernest Renan in 1863 is therefore likely not Ah\lab.4 Matthew Easton followed Neubauer’s identification in 1897 in his very popular Bible dictionary, and many later atlases of the Bible followed Easton.5 Aharoni, however, placed Ah\lab north of Tyre at Kh. El-Mah\alib, which retains the Hebrew root in the Arabic name.6 This leaves no biblical identification. Gischala in Josephus If the Ah\lab of Judges is not Gush H|alav, the name does not appear in the Hebrew Bible, nor does it appear in either the Apocrypha or the New Testament. Yet it is well known to Josephus in its Greek form “Gischala” (Γίσχαλα). Josephus describes how he built defense walls at more than a dozen localities in Galilee in anticipation of the Roman siege. In the course of his discussion, he mentions a wall around Gischala built by John of Gischala, who is known as Josephus’s archrival (J.W. 2.575). Josephus recounts the history of his dealings with John the son of Levi and with Gischala in J.W. 2.585–646.7 Similar information occurs in Life 43 and 189. John built the walls of Gischala and sent representatives to Jerusalem to request that Josephus be removed as commander of the north. In any case, Gischala featured a wall or some form of defense to resist the Roman siege. Titus nevertheless entered the fortified town peacefully and discovered that John had fled, followed by several thousand women and children, who tried to flee to Jerusalem with John. Titus attacked and killed several thousand of John’s men and returned to Gischala with about three thousand women and children. Josephus explains that Titus was disappointed that he had been fooled by John’s trickery, so he secured the city with a garrison, had the wall breached, and departed for Jerusalem (J.W. 4.112–20). We learn no details of the size of the town, but it must have been impressive. So far there are no Roman camp remains to confirm the story, nor is there archaeological evidence for destruction of the town when the garrison left. It seems likely that Gush H|alav was one of the villages from which the Romans derived the administrative term “Tetracomia” (“four villages”) for Upper Galilee. Michael Avi-Yonah suggests that it was “possibly the head village of the whole area.”8

4. Guérin, Description géographique, historique et archéologique, 94–100. 5. Matthew George Easton, Matthew George Easton’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary (3rd ed.; Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson, 1897). 6.  Yohanan Aharoni, The Land of the Bible: A Historical Geography (trans. and ed. Anson F. Rainey; 2nd rev. and enl. ed.; Philadelphia: Westminster, 1979), 430. 7.  Uriel Rappaport, “John of Gischala: From Galilee to Jerusalem,” JJS 33 (1982): 479–93. Rappaport weighs possible reasons for John’s decision to leave Gischala. 8.  Michael Avi-Yonah, The Holy Land from the Persian to the Arab Conquests (536 B.C.–A.D. 649): A Historical Geography (rev. ed.; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1977), 133.

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The manuscript discoveries in the Judean Desert have furnished one possible reference to ­Gischala, namely, in document 92 from the Murabba‘at caves.9 The editors refer to the document as a “reckoning.” It consists of names followed by gentilics (names derived from a place name) followed by quantities of a commodity. In line 4 one reads γεισχα- (geischa-), which the editors suggest may be completed as γείσχαλα (geischala), a variant of γίσχαλα (Gischala) or Gush H|alav. This would date to around 135 ce. The Mishnah represents the rabbis as remembering Gush H|alav as a city as old as Joshua ben Nun. In a discussion of what constitutes a dwelling place in a walled city (m. ‘Arak. 9:6), the rabbis refer to “(a town with) three courtyards, each with two houses, surrounded by a wall from the time of Joshua ben Nun.”10 They then cite eight examples, the first three of which are “the old Qastra at Sepphoris, the upper city (’akkra) of Gush Halab, and old Yodphat.”11 As we will see below, the archaeology makes an Iron Age date for early Gush H|alav plausible. A Tosefta, or an addition to the Mishnah, uses Gush H|alav to establish a ruling on how long olives may be consumed (t. Šeb. 7:15): “They may eat olives until the last (ones) disappear [from the trees of ] Tekoa. R. Eliezer b. Ya‘akov says, Gush Halab.” This information is repeated in b. Pesah\. 53a, associating the village with olive production. There are two sages with the name Eliezer b. Ya‘akov in Jewish tradition, so the reference to Gush H|alav could be either first or second century ce. A later text in the Babylonian Talmud preserves more information about the high quality of the olive oil known from the site (b. Menah\. 85b). This tradition speaks of the Laodiceans (from the Roman province of Asia) sending out a buyer for olive oil of the highest quality, who traveled first to Jerusalem, then to Tyre, and finally to Gush H|alav. Therefore, this village supplied oil of legendary quality. Ecclesiastes (Qoheleth) Rabbah is a heavily edited document that postdates the other midrashic literature; therefore, it is typically dated to the eighth century ce. There are at least two incidental references to Gush H|alav in 2:8 and 11:2. Ecclesiastes Rabbah 2:8 speaks of “silk [‫מתקסא‬, μέταξα, metaksa, a Greek loanword] from Gush H|alav,” which may be 9.  P. Benoit, J. T. Milik, and R. de Vaux, Les grottes de Murabba‘at (DJD 2; Oxford: Clarendon, 1961), 222–23. 10.  Jacob Neusner, The Mishnah: A New Translation (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), 823. The tradition was written down in the third century ce and dates before that. 11.  The reference to an “upper city” is confirmed by the excavations at Gush H|alav; see Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and James F. Strange, Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush H|alav (Meiron Excavation Project 5; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns for the American Schools of Oriental Research, 1990), 8, showing occupation beginning in the Late Bronze period through the Late Arabic period. Rafael Frankel distinguishes between Gush H|alav and Gush H|alav (east) in Rafael Frankel et al., Settlement Dynamics and Regional Diversity in Ancient Upper Galilee: Archaeological Survey of Upper Galilee (IAA Reports 14; Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2001), 41, 42.

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intended to be understood allegorically; 11:2 describes Gush H|alav as the burial place of R. Elazar bar R. Shim‘on (bar Yochai).12 The brief reference sanctions the idea that Gush H|alav was a Jewish town. Eliakim Carmoly compiled several Jewish pilgrim itineraries in Hebrew from the Middle Ages, translating them into French.13 These are primarily lists of sites with burial places of rabbis from antiquity, which implies continuity of Jewish occupation at the site. For example, in 1210, Rabbi Samuel bar Simson reported that the tombs of Shemaia and Abtalion are north of Gush H|alav. In 1258, Rabbi Jakob from France repeats this evidence and adds the tombs of “Andremelec et Scharezer” (p. 184). In 1333, Isaac Chelo wrote “Paths from Jerusalem” (Les Chemins de Jerusalem), in which he simply repeated previous information, adding that one also sees at the foot of the village a great cut-stone monument, caves, and tombs (p. 262).14 Finally, Carmoly cites a Hebrew book, Tombs of the Just, which he attributes to Gerson of Scarmela (seventeenth century ce), in which is described a synagogue at Gush H|alav built by Shim‘on bar Yochai (p. 452). Gush Ḥalav in Jerome (Hieronymus) In On Illustrious Men, composed in Bethlehem in 392–393 ce, Jerome (“Hieronymus” in Greek) wrote, “Paul, who was formerly Saul, (an apostle) outside the number of the twelve apostles, was of the tribe of Benjamin and the town of Giscalis in Judea. When this was captured by the Romans he migrated with his parents to Tarsus in Cilicia.”15 Jerome repeats that Paul is from Gischala (“Gyscalis”) in his commentary on Philemon: “They say that the parents of the apostle Paul were from Gyscalis in the region of Judea.”16 We do not know Jerome’s source for either statement. The Archaeology of Gush Ḥalav In 1864, Ernest Renan was the first to publish a thorough on-foot investigation of several synagogue sites in Upper Galilee, including Gush H|alav.17 He reported the ruins of a synagogue at the foot of the hill of the site. It resembled the synagogue of Bar‘am in its garlands and other ornaments. The “gate” or threshold was well preserved. Renan reported a Hebrew inscription 12.  Qoheleth (Ecclesiastes) Rabbah, Eng. trans. by A. Cohen, in H. Freedman and M. Simon, Mishnah (London: Soncino, 1939). 13.  Eliakim Carmoly, Itinéraires de la Terre Sainte des XIIIe, XIVe, XVe, XVIe et XVIIe siècle, traduits de l’hébreu, et accompagnés de tables, de cartes et d’éclaircissements, 1802–1875 (Brussels: A. Vandale, 1847). 14.  More than a generation ago, Gershom Scholem proposed that this itinerary was a forgery; see G. Scholem, “The Book of the Way to Jerusalem Attributed to R. Isaac Hilo: A Forgery,” Zion 6 (1934): 39–53, 220–21. 15. Jerome Vir. ill. 5: Paulus apostolus, qui ante Saulus, extra numerum duodecim Apostolorum, de tribu ­Benjamin et oppido Judaeae Giscalis fuit, quo a Romanis capto, cum parentibus suis Tarsum Ciliciae commigravit. 16. Jerome Comm. Phlm.: Aiunt parentes apostoli Pauli de Gyscalis regione fuisse Judaeae (PL 20:617). 17.  Ernest Renan, Mission de Phénicie (Paris: Imprimerie impériale, 1864), 761–83, esp. 778 and pl. LXX.

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on a column. He could read all but one word clearly: “Joseph bar Nahum built this [arch]. May a blessing fall upon him.” He suggested that the inscription dated to the fourth or fifth century ce, which would place the synagogue late in our purview. Charles Wilson visited the site in 1869, and H. H. Kitchener visited it in 1877. Both reported two ancient synagogues at the site, the first under the church near the upper city and one “on the western slope of the descent to Wady el-Jish.”18 Neither reported the dimensions of the lower synagogue. Kitchener also noted the eagle in the lower synagogue and the Hebrew inscription on a column.19 From 1872 until 1878, Charles Conder and H. H. Kitchener investigated western Palestine (including el-Jish), which they published in 1881. They reported on the Gush H|alav sarcophagi scattered on the south side of the village. East of the modern church, which sat on the south side of the hill, they found architectural fragments of columns, capitals, and bases that they again associated with a synagogue. They reported its dimensions to be 58 ft x 37 ft (17.4 m x 11.1 m) with a 5-ft (1.5-m) doorway in the south façade. Many stones in the church appeared to be ancient, and there is an attached pilaster in the wall that closely resembles other synagogue pilasters. On the floor in the south were strewn-about fragments of lintels, columns, and double columns. They reprinted Renan’s reading of the Hebrew inscription.20 In 1880, Victor Guérin published a series of trips across Galilee to record its antiquities. He visited Gush H|alav and verified the two synagogues but noticed that most of the stones from the synagogue on the main hill recorded by Renan had been taken to build a new church. He also noticed many tombs on the flanks of the main hill, some open and some blocked. He saw sarcophagi and presumably ossuaries, which he called “sarcophages mobiles.”21 On March 28, 1905, a new expedition set out under the direction of Heinrich Kohl, with Dr. Carl Watzinger as archaeologist. The synagogue expedition of the Deutsche OrientGesellschaft embodied a scientific effort to investigate and record remains of eleven ancient synagogues in the north of Palestine, including three in the Golan Heights. One of these was the lower synagogue at el-Jish or Gush H|alav, partially excavated and recorded June 14–17, 1905.22 Kohl and Watzinger were aware that Jish had two ancient synagogues, and they knew that the larger on the highest point was known to Guérin. From the architectural fragments, Renan had deduced that the façade resembled that of the synagogue at Bar‘am. The second, small synagogue außerhalb der Stadt (outside of the city) to the east drew their attention. Their recovered plan shows a nearly square building about 16.3 m x 13.2 m on the interior (fig. B).23 18.  Henry Horatio Kitchener, “Lieutenant Kitchener’s Reports,” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement (January 1877): 125. 19.  Charles Wilson, “Notes on Jewish Synagogues in Galilee,” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 2 (April 1–June 30 1869): 37–42, esp. 39, 40, and chart p. 42. 20.  Conder and Kitchener, Survey of Western Palestine, 1:206, 224. 21. Guérin, Description géographique, historique et archéologique, 94–100. 22.  Heinrich Kohl and Carl Watzinger, Antike Synagogen in Galilaea (Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 29; Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916; repr., Jerusalem: Kedem, 1973; Osnabrück: O. Zeller, 1975), 107–11. 23.  Kohl and Watzinger, Antike Synagogen, pl. XV.

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Figure B. Kohl and Watzinger’s plan of the eastern synagogue. Used with permission.

They knew this to be an anomaly among the eleven synagogues investigated, all of which had rectangular prayer halls. But they were uncertain where to place the northern wall. They followed Renan’s reading of the inscription but noted that Dalman in 1914 had corrected “ark” to be read “this,” meaning the column. Gustaf Dalman also suggested that the synagogue dated to the third or fourth century ce.24 In 1977–1978, two seasons of excavation were finished by a team directed by Eric M. ­Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and James F. Strange, and a group of college, university, and theological students.25 These excavations took place in the eastern, lower city of Gush H|alav and 24.  Gustaf Dalman, Palästinajahrbuch des Deutschen evangelischen Instituts für Altertumswissenschaft des Heiligen Landes zu Jerusalem X (Berlin: E. S. Mittler & Sohn, 1914), 48. 25.  Meyers, Meyers, and Strange, Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush H|alav.

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Figure C. Plan of the Period I synagogue (250–306 bce), built on the foundations of the large building from the Persian and Hellenistic periods. Used by permission of the author and Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers.

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Figure D. Fragments of painted plaster from the presynagogue building, probably dating to the Hellenistic period. Used by permission of the author and Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers.

gave considerable clarification to the problem of the date and plan of the second synagogue, ­notably, from founding until the first earthquake damage was 250–306 ce. Earthquake destruction took place fifty-seven years later in the earthquake of 363 ce. The occupation and use of the synagogue were a small portion of a much longer occupation of the upper and lower city, namely, beginning in the Iron II period. People returned during the Persian period and lived there continuously until the Arab II period (twelfth century ce) and even later. On the other hand, the excavation gave dramatic confirmation of the hypothesis that the site on the south side of the hill (the upper city) extended east to the lower city, at least to the synagogue and its immediate surroundings.26 Refinement of the archaeological periods represented at Gush H|alav comes from Rafael Frankel and associates in their final report of archaeological survey in Upper Galilee from 1986 to 1990. They report Gush H|alav as two sites, namely, no. 340, “Gush H|alav,” and no. 348, “Gush H|alav (east).” The archaeological periods they report are as follows: Early Bronze II–III, Middle Bronze II, Late Bronze, Iron I, Iron II, Persian, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Crusader/Mamluke, and Ottoman. Therefore, Gush H|alav has seen continual occupation from about 2800 bce to the present.27

(east).

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26. Ibid. 27.  Frankel et al., Settlement Dynamics, 41, 42. Middle Bronze II occupation is not reported for Gush H|alav

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The Galilee of the Early Roman period was built on the growing population of Galilee in the Late Persian period and its continued growth in the Hellenistic period.28 In the Persian and Early Hellenistic period, settlers in eastern Galilee used a rough pottery called “Galilean Coarse Ware.” In the Late Hellenistic period, GCW disappeared from Gush H|alav and other eastern Galilean sites, on the basis of which Aviam has argued that the Early Hellenistic users of GCH were gentiles and the Late Hellenistic settlers who turned to Kefar H|anayah wares were Jewish.29 Aviam reports an unexpected find that tends to confirm the building of first-century ce siege defenses at Gush H|alav. The discovery is a 5-m-high earthwork constructed of alternating earthen layers at an angle of “almost 45ᵒ” on the summit of the hill of Gush H|alav. Embedded in the earthworks were retaining walls and soil mixed with hundreds of pottery sherds. This huge effort in earth moving was dated by the latest pottery within it, which was Early Roman. Furthermore, the presence of quarrying chips from the local stone used in the earthworks suggests that workmen cut a moat into the bedrock around the upper part of the hill. The earthworks represent the glacis or sloping soil defense rampart around the moat. Aviam concludes that this is the work of John ben Levi of Gischla as reported by Flavius J­ osephus (J.W. 2.575; Life 10). The most likely date for the construction of this siegework would have been 67–68 ce.30 A later excavation in 2010 expanded Aviam’s excavation and confirmed that he had indeed excavated the upper part of a defense rampart that dated to the time of the First Jewish War. Subsequently, debris accumulated on the rampart over the course of the third and fourth centuries ce. Hartel thought that a landslide on the bottom part of the slope occurred during the earthquake of 363 ce.31 Another excavation in 2010 at the top of the northern slope of Gush H|alav yielded three strata of the Hellenistic village. The lowest stratum contained Galilean Coarse Ware vessels associated with the cutting and first use of a cistern dated to the pre-Maccabean occupation, according to Aviam. The upper remains were associated with the later Israelite occupation in 28.  Ibid., 108. 29.  See the first chapter in this volume by Mordechai Aviam, pp. 9–21. See also Aviam, “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First-Century Galilee and Its Origins: A Comprehensive Archaeological Synthesis,” in The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (ed. David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins; Early Christianity and Its Literature 11; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013), 5–49. Based on pottery found in Stratum 2 of the northern slope of the hill, Moshe Hartal suggests that production of GCW continued into the first century ce: “(11/10/2010) Gush Halav: Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_ detail_eng.aspx? id=1517&mag_id=117. 30.  Mordechai Aviam, “First-Century ce Earthworks at Gischala (Gush Halav),” in Aviam, Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods (Land of Galilee 1; Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 2004), 106–9. See also Mordechai Aviam, “Gush Halav– 1983,” ESI 3 (1984): 37; Aviam, “Gush Halav,” ESI 5 (1986): 44–45; and Aviam, “The Location and Function of Josephus’ Fortifications in Galilee” (in Hebrew), Cathedra 28 (1983): 33–46. 31.  Hartal, “(11/10/2010) Gush Halav.”

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the Maccabean period, when the Galilean Coarse Wares disappeared and were replaced by Late Hellenistic pottery like that manufactured at Kefar H|ananya.32 Also telling was the discovery of a ritual bath or mikveh and a wall from the Early Roman period. It appears that the rest of the building for the mikveh was destroyed in the earthquake of 363 ce.33 Many tombs or burial caves have undergone investigation at Gush H|alav. For example, in 1991 an investigation of an odd S-shaped tomb revealed three lids for Early Roman jars, but no jars.34 Other tombs were found with ossuaries. For example, a tomb found at Gush H|alav with six kokhim contained no sherds or coins, but it displayed many fragments of stone ossuaries and lids. There were also two large iron rings for a coffin. Since ossuaries become part of Jewish burial rites in the second century in Galilee, this suggests a second- or third-century date for the tomb.35 A tomb excavated in 1934 presaged this discovery.36 Certain tombs were cut into the bedrock on a spur that ascends west toward the highest point in the village of Gush H|alav. Several small excavations carried out in the village unearthed a settlement sequence from the Hellenistic period to the modern era. Hellenistic and Early Roman finds included two house walls. The ceramic finds date mainly to the Hellenistic period (fourth–second centuries bce) but included a rim and neck of an Early Roman jar, which indicate the latest use of the walls.37 Just south of the walls are rock-cut burial caves and a grave site, which in relatively recent times has been identified with the tomb of the prophet Joel, but even Neubauer (1868) rejects such late traditions.38 During October 2004, a salvage excavation at Gush H|alav at the foot of the modern school disclosed rock-hewn installations and wall sections dating to the Roman period (second–fourth centuries ce).39 Coins from Gush Ḥalav In 1954, H. Hamburger published a hoard of 237 coins found in a jar—a chance find—buried in a new foundation trench dug prior to 1948. The distribution was 187 Roman silver tetradrachms from Syria dating from 54 to 232 ce, twenty-two Roman silver denarii from 193 32. Ibid. 33.  Moshe Hartal, “(18/11/2013) Gush Halav (B): Preliminary Report,” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http://www. hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=4378&mag_id=120. 34.  Emmanuel Damati and Hana Abu Uqsa, “Gush Halav,” ESI 10 (1991): 70–73. 35.  Mordechai Aviam, “Gush Halav,” ESI 5 (1986): 44–45. 36.  N. Makhouly, “Rock-Cut Tombs at el-Gish,” QDAP 8 (1938): 45–50, including stone ossuaries and a sarcophagus. 37.  Nimrod Getzov, “(2010/1223), Gush Halav Final Report,” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http://www.hadashotesi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1604&mag_id=117. 38. Neubauer, La géographie du Talmud, 230. 39.  Moshe Hartal, “19/11/2006 Gush Halav,” HA-ESI 118 (2006): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_ detail_eng.aspx?id=443&mag_id=111.

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to 212 ce, and 35 bronze coins from 196 to 249 ce. The earliest coin is of the emperor Nero and shows his head facing right and on the reverse a Roman eagle facing right.40 According to Hamburger, this was a hoard of a businessman who was close to the Roman army. He buried the hoard in about 249 ce at Gush H|alav, perhaps when he retired there. This gives a tantalizingly small but telling clue about the attractiveness of the site to a Jewish merchant and then retiree of means in the third century ce. Perhaps this town was at its peak, and we can speculate that this is when the inhabitants founded the two synagogues. In the 1977–1978 excavations directed by Eric Meyers, 225 coins were found in the stratigraphic excavations, of which all but 26 could be identified. In addition, the team found a hoard of 417 identifiable coins (1,953 coins total) in a Byzantine-period cooking pot in the soil in the long narrow room on the western side of the synagogue. Not including the hoard, the earliest coin in the synagogue excavations was from the Persian period (559–333 bce), but there were also seven eastern Greek (Seleucid)–period coins (223–95 bce). The volunteers found seven Phoenician coins, mostly of Tyre. There were five Hasmonean coins (135–37 bce) and one coin of Herod Antipas (4 bce–40 ce). It was interesting to find that, by contrast, there were two Hasmonean coins in the synagogue hoard, but no Herodian coins, and the next datable coins dated to 268–273 ce.41 The bulk of the coins are Roman bronzes dating between the fourth and early sixth centuries. In other words, this hoard appears to date to the time of the major occupation of Gush H|alav. Richard Simon Hanson noticed that the coins found at the Gush H|alav synagogue excavations had a disproportionately high number of coins from Tyre, in terms of coin finds from other Galilean sites. Hanson argued that Gush H|alav had developed an economic connection with Tyre centered on olive oil. Successful trade by Gush H|alav with Tyre for olive oil would result in Tyrian silver in abundance at the site. Hanson referred to Jewish texts on the quality of olive oil from Gush H|alav (see above), and a story in Josephus relating to Gischala, Tyre, and olive oil. In Life 70–76 and in J.W. 2.590–592, we read that John of Gischala sought Josephus’s support in selling imperial grain stored in Galilee to raise funds to build the defense wall of Gush H|alav. Josephus saw a ruse to sell quality oil to the isolated citizens of Caesarea Philippi at double the market price.42 Joyce Raynor concluded from the coin distributions that there was a small community at Gush H|alav in the Hellenistic/Early Roman period, and this community “continued to thrive until the mid-fourth century C.E.” She also noted the disproportionately high number

40.  H. Hamburger, “A Hoard of Syrian Tetradrachms and Tyrian Bronze Coins from Gush H|alav,” IEJ 4 (1954): 201–26, pls. 18–21. 41.  Joyce Raynor, “Numismatics,” in Meyers, Meyers, and Strange, Ancient Synagogue of Gush Halav, 230– 45. 42.  Richard S. Hanson, Tyrian Influence in the Upper Galilee (Meiron Excavation Project 2; Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1980).

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of coins from Tyre. She suggests that the occupation was smaller in the periods after 350 ce.43 The authors of the final report argue that, although there was an extensive Early and Middle Roman population at the site at Gush H|alav (first century bce to early third century ce), the fluorit of the site took place from the middle of the third century to the middle of the fourth century.44 Conclusion It is not yet possible to estimate the size of the ancient village of Gush H|alav in the Early Bronze, Middle Bronze, or Late Bronze periods. Nor is it possible to guess village size in the Iron I and Iron II periods. The availability of good soil and water, however, made it an attractive site. There was likely a gap in occupation at the end of Iron II in the seventh century bce, but it is worth hypothesizing that locals or returnees from the exile resettled at the very least in the lower city of Gush H|alav in the Persian period and remained there through the Hellenistic periods. In the Persian and early Hellenistic layers, Galilean Coarse Ware was encountered. In the Late Hellenistic period, GCW disappeared from Gush H|alav and other Galilean sites, which suggests that the Late Hellenistic settlers were Jewish. Gush H|alav expanded in the Early Roman period with the growth of Galilean Jewish populations under Herod the Great. The fortunes of the town were connected with oil production, according to the ancient literary citations; that is, Gush H|alav was known as an agricultural town or large village. It had economic ties to Tyre and Antioch, in view of the number of coins from these mints found in excavations. We read nothing of Gush H|alav under Herod or under his son Antipas, but surely it was a thriving Jewish town. During the First Revolt against Rome, Gush H|alav, under its Greek name Gischala, played an active role in the resistance against Titus with John of Gischala and received a moat and earthwork defenses. The height of expansion of the village occurred after the period of our purview and resulted in synagogue building in the lower city and probably elsewhere. There is occupation both in the lower city and in the upper city of the site through the fifth century ce, and it figures in medieval literary sources. Gush H|alav was the traditional burial place of several rabbis in the tradition. Bibliography Aharoni, Yohanan. The Land of the Bible: A Historical Geography. Translated and edited by Anson F. Rainey. 2nd rev. and enl. ed. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1979.

43.  Raynor, “Numismatics,” 230–45; Gabriele Bijovsky, “The Gush Halav Hoard Reconsidered,” ‘Atiqot 35 (1998): 77–106; Eric M. Meyers, “Postscript to the Gush Halav Hoard,” ‘Atiqot 35 (1998): 107–8. 44.  Meyers, Meyers, and Strange, Ancient Synagogue of Gush H|alav, 10.

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Aviam, Mordechai. “First-Century ce Earthworks at Gischala (Gush Halav).” In Jews, Pagans and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods, 106–9. Land of Galilee 1. Rochester, N.Y.: Institute for Galilean Archaeology, University of Rochester, 2004. ———. “Gush Halav.” ESI 5 (1986): 44–45. ———. “Gush Halav–1983.” ESI 3 (1984): 37. ———. “The Location and Function of Josephus’ Fortifications in Galilee.” In Hebrew. Cathedra 28 (1983): 33–46. ———. “People, Land, Economy, and Belief in First-Century Galilee and Its Origins: A Comprehensive Archaeological Synthesis.” In The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus, edited by David A. Fiensy and Ralph K. Hawkins, 5–49. Early Christianity and Its Literature 11. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013. Avi-Yonah, Michael. The Holy Land from the Persian to the Arab Conquests (536 B.C.–A.D. 649): A Historical Geography. Rev. ed. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1977. Benoit, P., J. T. Milik, and R. de Vaux. Les grottes de Murabba‘at. DJD 2. Oxford: Clarendon, 1961. Bijovsky, Gabriele. “The Gush Halav Hoard Reconsidered.” ‘Atiqot 35 (1998): 77–106. Carmoly, Eliakim. Itinéraires de la Terre Sainte des XIIIe, XIVe, XVe, XVIe et XVIIe siècle, traduits de l’hébreu, et accompagnés de tables, de cartes et d’éclaircissements, 1802–1875. Brussels: A. Vandale, 1847. Conder, Claude R., and Henry Horatio Kitchener. The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology. Vol. 1. London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881. Dalman, Gustaf. Palästinajahrbuch des Deutschen evangelischen Instituts für Altertumswissenschaft des Heiligen Landes zu Jerusalem. Berlin: E. S. Mittler & Sohn, 1914. Damati, Emmanuel, and Hana Abu Uqsa. “Gush Halav.” ESI 10 (1991): 70–73. Easton, Matthew George. Matthew George Easton’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary. 3rd ed. Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson, 1897. Frankel, Rafael, et al. Settlement Dynamics and Regional Diversity in Ancient Upper Galilee: Archaeological Survey of Upper Galilee. IAA Reports 14. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2001. Getzov, Nimrod. “(2010/1223), Gush Halav Final Report.” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http://www. hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1604&mag_id=117. Guérin, Victor. Description géographique, historique et archéologique de la Palestine. Vol. 1, Galilée. Paris: L’imprimerie nationale, 1880. Hamburger, H. “A Hoard of Syrian Tetradrachms and Tyrian Bronze Coins from Gush H|alav.” IEJ 4 (1954): 201–26. Hanson, Richard S. Tyrian Influence in the Upper Galilee. Meiron Excavation Project 2. Cambridge, Mass.: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1980. Hartal, Moshe. “(11/10/2010) Gush Halav: Preliminary Report.” HA-ESI 122 (2010): http:// www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1517&mag_id=117.

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———. “(18/11/2013) Gush Halav (B): Preliminary Report.” HA-ESI 125 (2013): http:// www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=4378&mag_id=120. ———. “19/11/2006 Gush Halav.” HA-ESI 118 (2006): http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/ report_detail_eng.aspx?id=443&mag_id=111. Kitchener, Henry Horatio. “Lieutenant Kitchener’s Reports: I—Palestine Survy Camp, Haiffa, 6th March, 1877.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement (April 1877): 70–72. Kohl, Heinrich, and Carl Watzinger. Antike Synagogen in Galilaea. Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 29. Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916. Reprint, Jerusalem: Kedem, 1973. Reprint, Osnabrück: O. Zeller, 1975. Makhouly, N. “Rock-Cut Tombs at el-Gish.” QDAP 8 (1938): 45–50. Meyers, Eric M. “Postscript to the Gush Halav Hoard.” ‘Atiqot 35 (1998): 107–8. Meyers, Eric M., Carol L. Meyers, and James F. Strange. Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush H|alav. Meiron Excavation Project 5. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns for the American Schools of Oriental Research, 1990. Neubauer, Adolph. La géographie du Talmud. Paris: M. Lévy frères, 1868. Reprint, Hildesheim: Olms, 1967. Neusner, Jacob. The Mishnah: A New Translation. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988. Qoheleth (Ecclesiastes) Rabbah. Translated by A. Cohen. In H. Freedman and M. Simon. Mishnah. London, Soncino, 1939. Rappaport, Uriel. “John of Gischala: From Galilee to Jerusalem.” JJS 33 (1982): 479–93. Raynor, Joyce. “Numismatics.” In Excavations at the Ancient Synagogue of Gush H|alav, edited by Eric M. Meyers, Carol L. Meyers, and James F. Strange, 230–45. Meiron Excavation Project 5. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1990. Renan, Ernest. Mission de Phénicie. Paris: Imprimerie Impériale, 1864. Scholem, Gershom. “The Book of the Way to Jerusalem Attributed to R. Isaac Hilo: A Forgery.” Zion 6 (1934): 39–53, 220–21. Wilson, Charles. “Notes on Jewish Synagogues in Galilee.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 2 (April 1–June 30, 1869): 37–42.

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19 Nabratein: Synagogue and Environs Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers Introduction Nabratein (Nevoraia in Aramaic and Niburaya’ in Arabic) is the last of four sites excavated by the Meiron Excavation Project in Upper Galilee1 (see maps 2 and 4B in the front of this volume). Situated north of Safed at map reference 197-267 along the Wadi Dalton, it was surveyed by Carl Watzinger and Heinrich Kohl at the beginning of the twentieth century.2 The final report on the two seasons of excavation (1980 and 1981)3 has attracted considerable attention because of the information it provides about the emergence and development of synagogues as purpose-built structures.4 The dating of Galilean synagogues, in the opinion of the authors, cannot be divorced from the context of the synagogues in the towns and villages in which they were built; the other structures and artifacts of Jewish villages contribute to an understanding of the synagogue as the center of communal life in most periods. Excavations at Nabratein thus included several areas in the village as well as the synagogue.

1.  For the other three sites (Khirbet Shema‘, Gush H|alav, and Meiron) see chapters in this volume, pp. 414– 23, 389–403, 379–88. 2.  Heinrich Kohl and Carl Watzinger, Antike Synagogen in Galilaea (Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 29; Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916; repr., Jerusalem: Kedem, 1973; repr., Osnabrück: O. Zeller, 1975), 101–6. 3.  Eric M. Meyers and Carol L. Meyers, Excavations at Ancient Nabratein: Synagogue and Environs (Meiron Excavation Project 6; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2009). This publication is hereafter referred to as Nabratein. 4.  See the review by Jodi Magness (“The Ancient Synagogue at Nabratein,” BASOR 358 [2010]: 21–28) and the response of the authors (“Response to Jodi Magness’s Review of the Final Publication of Nabratein,” BASOR 359 [2010]: 67–76).

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Nabratein in Ancient Sources Nabratein appears in rabbinic sources mainly in debates about one “Jacob of Nevoraia” (280– 340 ce), who was from Nabratein and later moved to Tyre. Among the debates were the issue of patrilineality, which he favored over matrilineality, and the question of whether fish, like land animals, required ritual slaughtering, which he supposed they did. Jacob and the rabbinic community of the time were “attempting to deal with life in the complex cultural mix of the eastern Mediterranean coast.”5 The rabbinic authorities ultimately decided that Jacob’s views were gravely mistaken, and they labeled him a heretic. Excavation of the Site Jacob’s presence in Nabratein coincided with Synagogue 2, which spanned two phases of the Late Roman period, or Period III in the site’s stratigraphy. A series of synagogues on the same site in the village spanned five centuries, albeit with a gap in the late fourth to mid-sixth century ce.6 The sequence of synagogue construction and rebuilding can be summarized as follows: Synagogue 1 (four-column broadhouse): Middle Roman, c. 135–250 ce Synagogue 2a (six-column basilica): Late Roman, c. 250–306 ce Synagogue 2b (six-column basilica): Late Roman, c. 306–363 ce Synagogue 3 (eight-column basilica): Byzantine–Early Arab, c. 564–700 ce 1. Synagogue 1 The village was settled well before the construction of the first synagogue, for structural and artifactual remains dating to the Early Roman period (1–c. 135 ce) were discovered. In addition, underground chambers beneath Middle Roman levels southwest of the synagogue have been dated to the period of the First Jewish Revolt against Rome (66–73 ce).7 Small amounts of pottery, but no structural remains, from other periods were recovered. Synagogue 1 (fig. A), the oldest synagogue at Nabratein, is a small broadhouse building with the focus of worship on the long wall, that is, the southern façade wall oriented toward Jerusalem. Measuring 11.2 m long and 9.35 m wide, it would have accommodated approximately 83–87 worshipers.8 The main entrance to this building is a doorway in the center of 5.  Steven Fine, “Nabratein in the Ancient Literary Sources,” in Nabratein, 14. 6. See Nabratein, 33–101. 7.  Mordechai Aviam, Jews, Pagans, and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods (Land of Galilee 1; Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 2004), 127, 130–32. 8.  Chad S. Spigel, Ancient Synagogue Seating Capacities: Methodology, Analysis and Limits (TSAJ 149; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012), 91, 95.

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Figure A. Block plan of Synagogue 1. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

the southern wall, with another entrance in the northeastern corner. Two elevated platforms identified as bemas (platforms from which Pentateuch scrolls were read) flank the interior of the southern wall; their foundations incorporate earlier elements, indicating that there was occupation there in the Early Roman period before the synagogue was built. Low benches, plastered on their inner faces, run along each wall except the southern one. The ceiling was likely supported by four columns. The imprint of what was perhaps a reader’s table appears in the center of the floor. The entire floor was plastered, which facilitated the separation of materials from under and above the floor and allowed us to date this first synagogue to the second century ce. 2. Synagogue 2a and b The Late Roman period basilical synagogue, which had two phases, was larger (at 11.2 x 13.85 m) than the preceding one and had six columns instead of four. The additional space increased the seating capacity to c. 150–175, nearly double the capacity of Synagogue 1. This surely reflects the growth and prosperity of the village, perhaps because it was a distribution center for olive oil, as suggested by discoveries in a residential area on the western slope (see below). A special lintel for the southern entrance was probably added at this time, although its inscription is later, dating to Synagogue 3. A portico with four columns was erected in front of the main southern entry, and a secondary doorway was apparently placed on the eastern wall. A stone Torah shrine (receptacle for scrolls of the Pentateuch) can be posited for the first phase because of the discovery of an architectural fragment, reused upside down in the western bema of the second phase of Synagogue 2, which must have been the pediment for a Torah

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Figure B. Block plan of Synagogue 2. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol ­Meyers, Duke University.

shrine. The pediment (figs. C and D), which features two rampant lions and a demi-dome with a place for the eternal light, is perhaps the earliest remnant of a Torah shrine recovered from an ancient synagogue. It was probably damaged, along with other elements of phase 1 of Synagogue 2, in the earthquake of 306 ce, for several broken pilasters were found with it, and dozens of roof tiles for the shrine were found in a nearby pit. The residents of Nabratein apparently sought to rebuild right away after the disturbance of 306 ce, and in so doing they buried damaged elements in the refurbished building. The sculpture and decorated discus lamps associated with Synagogue 2 show that the community was comfortable with visual art and images of both animals (lions, sheep, and large birds [perhaps eagles] on the sculptures) and humans (on the lamps).9 Synagogue 2 and the site itself were abandoned after the 363 ce earthquake. 3. Synagogue 3 Why Nabratein was resettled after two centuries is unclear, but the reconstruction and enlargement of the synagogue likely reflect the desire of villagers in the region to maintain their identity in late antiquity, when conditions were less favorable to the Jewish community than in the Late Roman period. The date of Synagogue 3 (fig. E) is based on numismatic and ceramic evidence and especially on the dedicatory inscription—proclaiming that the synagogue was (re)built 494 years after the destruction of the temple, that is, in 564 ce—that was added to 9.  For a discussion of the carefully carved sculptures (and architectural elements), see John G. Younger, “Architectural Elements and Sculptures,” in Nabratein, 78–91; for the lamps, see Eric C. Lapp, “Material Culture: Lamps,” in Nabratein, 252–83.

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Figures C and D. Torah shrine pediment views. Photo by Eric. Images courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

the Synagogue 2 lintel (fig. F) over the main southern entrance.10 The inscription is unique in relating the (re)construction of the building to the destruction of the Second Temple. The rebuilt basilical synagogue, which used spolia from the preceding Late Roman building, was the largest (16.9 m x 11.6 m) of the succession of Nabratein edifices and now had 10. See Nabratein, 92–101, and Eric M. Meyers, “A Note on an Aramaic Date Formula Found at Nabratein and Zoar,” in Aramaic in Postbiblical Judaism and Early Christianity: Papers from the 2004 National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Seminar at Duke University (ed. Eric M. Meyers and Paul V. M. Flesher; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010), 49–54.

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Figure E. Perspective drawing of Synagogue 3. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

Figure F. Lintel of Synagogues 2 and 3. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

eight columns. A northern entrance was added, and the possible entrance on the east was sealed. The portico remained, but the two bemas were sealed beneath a new, raised floor of fine plaster with small embedded stones. None of the coins sealed under the floor dates to later than 700 ce. No traces of a Torah shrine were recovered. The nature of the shrine, however, is provided by an incised black-ware vessel (fig. G) discovered in a Byzantine period building (see below) just south of the synagogue. The vessel depicts a Torah shrine with hanging lamps,11

11.  The elements and style of the depiction are similar to the Torah shrines depicted in the Beth Alpha and Beth Shean synagogue mosaics; see Nabratein, 144–49.

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Figure G. Torah shrine incised on black-ware sherds. Image courtesy of Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

and the authors conjecture that this depiction was the model for the Torah shrine, perhaps wooden and portable, of Synagogue 3. 4. Excavations in the Village Excavations in the village southwest and west of the synagogue shed further light on the sixthcentury ce settlement of Period IV.12 Immediately to the west is a large (13 m x 5.7 m) pavestone courtyard that may have served as a gathering area for people approaching the synagogue from the west. Walls associated with the courtyard, some using stubs of older walls, all seem to be associated with public space flanking the synagogue. Opposite the synagogue façade on the southwest is a building that may also be related to the synagogue. Founded on bedrock, the building dates to the Byzantine period. Earlier remains in or near the building, however, include fragments of Late Roman walls reused in the Byzantine period, pits with Middle Roman materials, and the Early Roman underground chambers mentioned above. Various items of household life near the building, including ovens, suggest the residential nature of this area for most of the site’s history. The building itself seems to have had only two rooms. Both are paved, the larger one (4.8 m x 3.25 m) with cobbles, the smaller one (4.83 m x 1.88 m) with flagstones. A small stone bin, built into the southeast corner of the larger room, contained many pieces of a decorated black-ware vessel, including the large fragment with the incised image of a Torah shrine. Other fragments of the same vessel (or similar ones) were recovered from loci just above and embedded in the cobbled floor, thus indicating that the vessel is contemporary with the Byzantine period building.13 The incised vessel(s) and the assortment of other materials—including many 12. See Nabratein, 102–12. Note that Period IV occupation continued into the very beginning of the Arab period. 13.  The authors thus disagree with Jodi Magness’s claim (“The Dating of the Black Ceramic Bowl with a Depiction of the Torah Shrine from Nabratein,” Levant 25 [1994]: 199–206) that the sherds are medieval and have an Arabian provenance.

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lamp fragments, quantities of glass fragments, metal objects, beads, and painted plaster— found in and adjacent to the bin suggest that the building had an ornate interior and served a special function. Perhaps the vessel depicting the Torah shrine was used in conjunction with the synagogue liturgy; the room in which it was found may have been the place where the village’s kōhănîm (descendants of the temple priests) had their feet washed before reciting the priestly benediction. Of course, it is also possible that the decorated vessel and the other fine objects were simply the possessions of the residents of the dwelling or adjacent structures. The Early Roman remains in the area around the synagogue, fragmentary though they are, suggest that the village was already occupied in the first century bce; and the synagogues in the Middle and Late Roman periods attest to the continued existence of the village in those later periods. A building complex of those same pre-Byzantine periods was uncovered on the western edge of the site.14 This complex, or at least its several rock-cut rooms, dates to the Early Roman period;15 and clear structural remains, including the construction or rebuilding of the well-made walls and floors, are from the Middle and Late Roman periods as well as from the transition from Early Roman to Middle Roman. Although no single structure in this area was completely excavated, the nature of the rooms, artifacts, and installations point to the activities of an agricultural settlement. Significant quantities of storage jars, ground stone vessels, and bone and stone tools—many in rooms with shallow pits or vats—are all evidence of the household economy of an Upper Galilean village of the first to fourth centuries ce. At the same time, the concentration of so many vessels and pits or vats in this building complex points to the production of a commodity for market beyond the village. The discovery of one and perhaps two inkwells (figs. H and I) in this complex suggests commercial processes; such inkwells are extremely rare in Roman Palestine and imply that business or legal documents were being prepared there.16 A stamp-seal, also used for business or legal proceedings, was recovered in this complex and further indicates the production of an agricultural commodity for commercial processes. Conclusion The excavations at Nabratein shed new light on the Upper Galilee from the end of the Second Temple period to the dawn of the medieval period. The village was settled in the Early Roman 14. See Nabratein, 113–30. 15.  However, differentiating the pottery of the end of the Early Roman period from the beginning of the Middle Roman period is not always possible, and the construction of walls on bedrock also precluded more specific dating. Thus the structure(s) might be from the transition between the Early and Middle Roman periods. Note that an abundance of Hellenistic potsherds in this area suggests a population, albeit a small one, already in that period. 16. See Nabratein, 352–54. The Nabratein inkwell has no exact parallels, but similar ones, dating to the late first century bce or early first century ce, come from Qumran and also from a tomb in Meiron (see the article on “Meiron” in this volume, pp. 379–88).

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Figures H and I. Photo and drawing of ceramic ­inkwell. Images courtesy Eric and Carol Meyers, Duke University.

period if not before, continued to grow and thus needed a synagogue in the Middle Roman period, flourished and enlarged its synagogue in the Late Roman period, was abandoned after suffering earthquake damage in the second half of the fourth century ce, and was reestablished with a rebuilt synagogue in the sixth century ce. The first synagogue is one of the earliest synagogues in the north and possibly the oldest post-70 synagogue in the land; it is also the only one to have used the standard Roman form of measurement, the pes, and also the Pythagorean triangle, a common surveyor’s tool in classical antiquity.17 Its two bemas and possible reader’s table indicate the importance of Scripture reading at an early date, in the second century ce. This evidence for liturgical function at Nabratein (and also Magdala) strengthens the case for the synagogue as a purpose-built structure in the first–second centuries ce.18 The successive synagogue buildings exhibit certain conservative characteristics typical of Upper Galilean synagogues, namely, the absence of Greek inscriptions and colorful mosaics. Yet the sculptures of the Late Roman and perhaps Byzantine-period synagogues, along with the many discus lamps with images, suggest a comfort level with figural art like that in synagogues of the Jordan Valley and Sea of Galilee regions. The discovery of the Torah-shrine pediment, which dates to the first phase of Synagogue 2, indicates that by the third century ce an elaborate structure was required as a repository for sacred scrolls, and the Torah shrine on the black-ware vessel likely reflects the repository of Synagogue 3. The wellcarved architectural and sculptural features are similar to those of other, less isolated areas of 17.  Doron Chen, “The Ancient Synagogue at Nabratein: Design and Chronology,” PEQ 119 (1987): 47. 18.  That this synagogue and its successors were purpose-built structures does not preclude their use for other community functions too. See Eric M. Meyers and Mark A. Chancey, Archaeology of the Land of the Bible. Vol. 3, Alexander to Constantine (AYBRL. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), pp. 211-12 for Magdala and pp. 22729 for discussion of the Torah shrine.

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the north. Although it was a small village, Nabratein apparently participated to some extent in the larger cultural currents of the day. The evidence of commerce in the residential complex on the west similarly points to interactions with other communities, primarily in the north. Bibliography Aviam, Mordechai. Jews, Pagans, and Christians in the Galilee: 25 Years of Archaeological Excavations and Surveys, Hellenistic to Byzantine Periods. Land of Galilee 1. Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 2004. Chen, Doron. “The Ancient Synagogue at Nabratein: Design and Chronology.” PEQ 119 (1987): 44–49. Kohl, Heinrich, and Carl Watzinger. Antike Synagogen in Galilaea. Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 29. Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916. Reprint, Jerusalem: Kedem, 1973. Reprint, Osnabrück: O. Zeller, 1975. Magness, Jodi. “The Ancient Synagogue at Nabratein” (Review Article). BASOR 358 (2010): 21–28. ———. “The Dating of the Black Ceramic Bowl with a Depiction of the Torah Shrine from Nabratein.” Levant 25 (1994): 199–206. Meyers, Eric M. “A Note on an Aramaic Date Formula Found at Nabratein and Zoar.” In Aramaic in Postbiblical Judaism and Early Christianity: Papers from the 2004 National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Seminar at Duke University, edited by Eric M. Meyers and Paul V. M. Flesher, 49–54. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2010. Meyers, Eric M., and Mark A. Chancey. Archaeology of the Land of the Bible. Vol. 3, Alexander to Constantine. AYBRL. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012. Meyers, Eric M., and Carol L. Meyers. Excavations at Ancient Nabratein: Synagogue and Environs. Meiron Excavation Project 6. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2009. ———. “Response to Jodi Magness’s Review of the Final Publication of Nabratein.” BASOR 359 (2010): 67–76. Spigel, Chad S. Ancient Synagogue Seating Capacities: Methodology, Analysis and Limits. TSAJ 149. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012.

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20 The Ancient Synagogue and Village at Khirbet Shema‘ Eric M. Meyers The excavations at Khirbet Shema‘, which began in the summer of 1970, were the result of a survey conducted by the author in the summer of 1969. The project was begun with the encouragement of G. Ernest Wright of Harvard, then president of the American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR), and with the assurance of major funding from the Smithsonian Institution. It was Wright’s vision that American archaeologists needed to turn their attention to the history of the early synagogue, especially in relation to the rise of early Christianity in the Holy Land and to refine the ceramic typology of the post–Hebrew Bible periods, which had begun so successfully by Paul Lapp. In appointing me to lead this effort, Wright added the charge that the project should develop a cadre of young scholars who would make the classical periods a major part of what was then nearly universally called “biblical archaeology.” Several key considerations were part of the criteria for site selection during the 1969 survey. Chief among them were these: (1) the site should be in Galilee, where early Judaism took root especially after 70 ce and where Christianity began; (2) the site should be one that had not previously been excavated; (3) the site should be a village that was somewhat off the beaten track and could reveal a pristine picture of village life unlike what might be found in an urban setting. Khirbet Shema‘ (which had been perhaps the Teqo‘a of Galilee) was considered a positive site despite its modest literary pedigree—if indeed it has one.1 In the course of the survey, it became clear that the early-nineteenth-century survey of Galilean sites by Heinrich

1.  A possible reference is m. Menah\. 8:3; see the discussion in Eric M. Meyers, A. Thomas Kraabel, and James F. Strange, Ancient Synagogue Excavations at Khirbet Shema‘, Upper Galilee, Israel 1970–1972 (AASOR 42; Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1976), 12–16. For all details, the reader is referred to this final publication (hereafter referred to as Khirbet Shema‘ ), rather than to dictionary or encyclopedia entries.

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Figure A. Aerial photograph of the synagogue and adjacent structures, looking northeast. Image courtesy of Eric Meyers, Duke University.

Figure B. Photo of Tomb of Shammai with tomb complex beneath. Image courtesy of Eric Meyers, Duke University.

Kohl and Carl Watzinger2 had left many questions unanswered and that most of their sites required further and fuller examination. In fact, the three other Upper Galilee sites (Meiron, Gush H|alav, and Nabratein) subsequently excavated by our young team had already been surveyed and partially excavated by the Germans.3 Investigating sites in the same region was stimulated by my own interest in regionalism, a topic not yet in vogue for the classical periods.4 Professor Wright had asked David Noel Freedman, then director of the Albright Institute in Jerusalem, to visit my final three choices of sites before submitting a formal application for a license to excavate. One of them was Khirbet Shema‘, which had already been identified by modern explorers in the nineteenth-century Survey of Western Palestine.5 The site is situated 760 m above sea level on a foothill of Mount Meiron, map coordinates 1914.2647, some 400 2.  Heinrich Kohl and Carl Watzinger, Antike Synagogen in Galilaea (Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 29; Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916; repr., Jerusalem: Kedem, 1973; Osnabrück: O. Zeller, 1975). They did not visit Khirbet Shema‘. 3.  Editor’s note: see the articles on these sites in this volume, pp. 379–88, 389–403, 404–13. 4.  My first foray into this area was an essay in honor of my mentor G. E. Wright: “Galilean Regionalism as a Factor in Historical Reconstruction,” BASOR special issue, G. Ernest Wright Memorial Issue 221 (1976): 93–103. 5.  Charles Warren and Claude R. Conder, Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology, vol. 1, Galilee (London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1871), 246–47.

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m to the south of the modern village of Meiron as the crow flies (see maps 2 and 4B in the front of this volume). Although it is not easily accessible, it was already a destination of pious Jewish pilgrims, who believed that the mausoleum (fig. B) there commemorated Shammai, the well-known contemporary of Hillel the Elder. Freedman was less than happy with this site, seeing the absence of an access road as a major impediment. After much consultation with Nathaniel Tefilinski, the inspector of antiquities in the Upper Galilee, and for the reasons enunciated above, Freedman agreed and we all celebrated. The difficulties of access were solved by the preparation of a field road to the base of the hill, which left about a fifteen- to twenty-minute climb that was happily made by the staff and students who constituted the excavation team. Tools and equipment were brought to the site by four-wheel-drive vehicles. I add these details by way of introduction because they are important in considering each of the four sites eventually excavated under the aegis of what was to be called the Meiron Excavation Project. Three seasons of excavations, 1970–1972, focused on the tombs that could still be legally excavated at the time, a ritual bath complex, a small industrial area with a cistern, and a large structure that we supposed was the remnant of an ancient synagogue (fig. C). Because logistical challenges remained, and because in 1971 the Department of Antiquities asked us to carry out rescue work at nearby Meiron, where the antiquities were endangered by construction and by vandalism at the time of Lag B’Omer when pilgrims visited there annually in large numbers, our soundings in the village remained more limited than originally intended. Examination of the tombs proved to be especially interesting because the Tomb Mausoleum attributed to Shammai and its underground components with arcosolia, loculi, and pit graves were just tens of meters southwest of the main entrance to the synagogue.6 Just north of the Mausoleum is Tomb 31, which is closer still to the synagogue entrance; it has an exposed entrance, the bedrock apparently having been too hard to allow the original carved entrance to be completed. Most of the tombs at the site were robbed in antiquity, but it is clear that they are similar to Late Roman and Byzantine–period tombs found all over ancient Palestine. This means that the tombs and the Mausoleum near the synagogue were contemporary with the main phases of the synagogue building. I know of no other such dramatic placement of an ancient tomb complex so close to a synagogue. The rules of corpse defilement and priestly defilement (Semah\ot 4) make the location of the tomb complex problematic, at least to the modern observer. There is also the tradition of having tombs placed outside the city or town limits and downwind (m. B. Bat. 2:9; b. Ta‘an. 16a). Even more surprising than the proximity of the tomb complex to the synagogue was the discovery under the floor of the synagogue of several declivities, several of which had human remains in them and had likely served as tombs in a pre-synagogue period. While this may seem contrary to rules about purity, we have only to look at nearby Meiron, where a modern synagogue in an orthodox yeshiva is built over an ancient burial ground and 6.  The site map locating the tombs and mausoleum in respect to the synagogue is in Khirbet Shema‘, 120, fig. 5.1

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Figure C. Top plan of Synagogue II at Khirbet Shema‘. Note preexistent miqveh in NW corner and declivity under the western stairway. Image courtesy of Eric Meyers, Duke University.

incorporates the venerated tomb of Shimon Bar Yoh\ai. It should also be noted that the Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) demonstrators who at one point had tried to stop the expedition from clearing tombs had no trouble traipsing over the tombs to get to us. In addition to the location of tombs, a notable feature is that many ossuary fragments, although found in a poor state of preservation, provide evidence for the widespread practice of secondary burial in family tombs. Also interesting was the miqveh (ritual bath) discovered on the eastern slope, for it is unusual in several respects.7 Its location on the steep slope created a number of construction challenges that were met by creative use of the bedrock outcrops that faced the valley below. The placement of a small rock-cut chamber just above the entrance to the immersion pool was a surprise, and only after the visit of several rabbinic authorities did we arrive at a suitable explanation of its purpose: it was a place to prewash or rinse before total immersion. Many recreational pools today require a shower before going into the pool, and that may be the same 7.  Khirbet Shema‘, 113–16.

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Figure D. Photo of bema with earlier bench running beneath it. Image courtesy of Eric Meyers, Duke University.

Figure E. Drawing of menorah lintel from northern entryway. Image courtesy of Eric Meyers, Duke University.

idea explaining the immersion pool as a place to carry out a talmudic practice called h\afifah (m. Miqw. 9:1–3; b. Nid. 66b). The pool itself is nicely plastered, with seven steps leading into it; and the bottom is 2.4 m x 2.35 m. The 3-m-high walls are sufficiently high to allow the minimum of 40 seahs of pure water and total immersion. If filled to a height of 1.5 m, the pool would hold at least 10.38 cu m. An assortment of Early Byzantine–period pottery, which represents the latest use of the miqveh, was recovered from a nearby cistern. We assume that the ritual bath was used in the periods of the main use of the synagogue and occupation of the site, although because of its location on the slope much of the ceramic evidence in the miqveh itself has washed away. At the end of the first season, Robert J. Bull, adviser to the project, thought the remains of the large building (which was a focus of excavation) might be a church and not a synagogue. The building appeared to be oriented to the east, and no definitive Jewish iconography had yet been discovered. Still, the miqveh had already been uncovered, suggesting that the village had Jewish inhabitants and thus that the building was likely a synagogue; but the orientation of the building was puzzling. I have already referred to one of the underground declivities in the build-

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Figure F. Cutaway reconstruction drawing of Khirbet Shema‘ Synagogue I, late third century ce, looking southwest. Note Torah Shrine on long southern wall. Image courtesy of Eric Meyers, Duke University.

ing containing some human remains, and the certain identification of the northeast declivity as another miqveh8 also contributed to the likelihood that the building was a synagogue. After the excavation of the bema (raised platform for Torah reading) (fig. D) on the southern long wall and the discovery of the menorah lintel (fig. E) at the northern entryway in 1972, all doubts about its identification as a synagogue vanished. It was clear that we had a broadhouse building with internal columniation and with the focus of worship on the long southern wall, facing Jerusalem. It was the first of its kind; although two broadhouse synagogues were known from the south (Susiyeh and Eshtemo‘a in the Hebron Hills) and one from Syria (Dura Europos), this was the first in the north of Israel, albeit with significant differences (fig. F). The building clearly made use of preexisting installations, and sections of the long walls that ran west–east on the north and south clearly took advantage of the steep slope. People entering from the west, for example, had to descend seven steps to enter the sanctuary, meaning that the synagogue was not on the height of the site. By making use of the natural terrain, however, and by reusing older architectural elements, the building was situated in the very heart of the settlement. For the most part, the size (9.3 m x 13.9 m, or 129.27 sq m), shape, and interior of the building remained constant over time, though in its later stages the building lost some of its luster. While some have challenged the excavators’ dating of the various phases, it seems clear 8.  Khirbet Shema‘, 40–41 and figs. 3.4 and 3.5.

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Figure G: Drawing of eagle from doorjamb in western entrance. Image courtesy of Eric Meyers, Duke University.

that the first building was erected in the third century ce and that, after being damaged by an earthquake in 306 ce, it was repaired extensively but with many of the architectural elements, including capitals, being repaired and reused. A probe into the bema produced a coin of Constantius (337–341 ce)9 showing that the first phase of the building had only a bench on the southern wall and that the bema there had been added around the mid-fourth century ce. Whether there was a portable ark or Torah shrine10 in the third century is impossible to say with certainty; but the base of a small column and other carved fragments that could have been a part of such a structure, and even in sections of the southern wall, were found in the stylobate bedding and in the makeup of the floor. Other features common to all phases are the great stairway at the western entrance; a chamber, identified in the reports as a genizah (storage area for Torah scrolls and Hebrew documents), underneath the western stairway; a plastered chamber, probably used for storage of scrolls not in use, adjoining the possible genizah; a small gallery, perhaps for extra seating, over the plastered chamber; a grand cobbled walkway into the northern entrance with the menorah lintel; and to the northwest a stairway and a room that may have served as a study hall and/or guest room. The doorjambs of the two entrances survived in all phases; the southern doorjamb of the western entrance was decorated with an eagle carved in it (fig. G), but it is impossible to know when that occurred. More information may be inferred about the fourth-century building: the bema was added on the south wall; a gray and white simple mosaic floor, which has not survived, replaced the older floor; additional benches were added to the northern wall; and all the capitals and bases from the earlier building were reused and refitted in the new building. Additional repairs were undoubtedly required after the 363 ce earthquake, and the menorah lintel and the eagle on the western doorjamb may have been added then. It seems obvious that the artisans were local and not overly sophisticated in their training or execution. Both the eagle11 and menorah12 would be considered “low” art. The plastered walls under the gallery were painted with a red 9.  Khirbet Shema‘, 49; cf. Eric M. Meyers, “Shema‘, Khirbet,” NEAEHL 4:1360. 10.  Khirbet Shema‘, 49–54. 11.  Khirbet Shema‘, 48, fig. 3.7. 12.  Khirbet Shema‘, 75, fig. 3.13; and note by Carol L. Meyers, 75–76.

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Figure H. Isomteric drawing of Khirbet Shema‘ Synagogue II, fourth– fifth century ce. Source: Duke University. Image courtesy of Eric Meyers, Duke University.

and green design impossible to reconstruct. This decorated space may have been used to store scrolls not in use or to keep a charity container for donated coin or prayer items such as vessels for ritual hand or foot washing, but its use is uncertain. The entrance to the gallery along the stairway may also have been added at this time. The date for the end of the second synagogue is the first third of the fifth century. One of the problems with establishing dates for the two main phases of the Khirbet Shema‘ synagogue is that the first phase is built very close to bedrock or on bedrock,13 and that the several renovations in the later synagogue had to go down to original floor levels in most places. This means that the destruction material associated with Synagogue II helps us date its demise to Stratum IV (early fifth century ce) as a result of an earthquake, judging from the nature of the collapse in the Early Byzantine period; and the material sealed in the underground declivities along with associated key critical loci allowed us to posit in the final report that Synagogue I was constructed in Stratum III (the latter half of the third century ce) in the Late Roman period. The ceramic evidence associated with these deposits, therefore, reflects more of the later history than the early history simply because of the manner of the building’s construction and the character of its violent collapse. The dating is supported by the numismatic profile, and the absence of coins from 425 ce to the end of the century indicates that the site was abandoned after the collapse of the building.14 13.  See esp. the stone-by-stone drawings in Khirbet Shema‘, figs. 3.1 and 3.2. 14.  Khirbet Shema‘, 147–69, esp. 167–68.

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The small finds are very modest and reflect the village life that we associate with a site of this size. Chad Spigel estimates the seating capacity of both synagogues to be a maximum 230 and the village population to be 400–500.15 The presence of a small amount of imported red wares suggests that the village was not totally outside the orbit of regional trade, a fact also borne out by the numismatic record pointing to trade with the Phoenician coast. The few notable finds are a single incised cross on terra sigillatta ware and a carnelian gemstone, no doubt a family treasure, carved with a bust of Athena.16 The construction of the broadhouse synagogue at Khirbet Shema‘ in the third century ce and the addition of a bema on the long southern wall sometime in the fourth century ce proved to be the death of older theories about whether the building of synagogues in Galilee occurred in three distinct stages.17 Nonetheless, viewing the structure along the east–west axis shows that the building is basilical in style and thus in keeping with the strong process of romanization that reached even into the interior of the Galilean highlands. The publication of the Khirbet Shema‘ synagogue, showing its uniqueness in all its phases, led to a much more flexible understanding of the growth of the synagogue as a purpose-built structure and to a greater appreciation of the importance of local tastes, the influence of topography, and the (un)availability of professional artisans to accomplish the necessary tasks. The setting is somewhat apart from the major Roman roads in the heart of Upper Galilee, and it is therefore not surprising that communities there exhibited a conservative and pragmatic approach to funding and designing public structures. The near total absence of colorful mosaics in this area surely reflects in part the sensibilities and social demography of the region and place it closer to the remains of Jewish life in Gaulanitis (the Golan Heights). The survival of the small mountainous community of Khirbet Shema‘, even after the abandonment of nearby Meiron, is a tribute to the tenacity of its inhabitants, whose vision and fortitude led to the establishment of the village and its unique and beautiful synagogue. Bibliography Avi-Yonah, Michael. “Ancient Synagogues.” Ariel 32 (1973): 29–43. Kohl, Heinrich, and Carl Watzinger. Antike Synagogen in Galilaea. Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 29; Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916. Reprint, Jerusalem: Kedem, 1973. Reprint, Osnabrück: O. Zeller, 1975. 15. Chad S. Spigel, Ancient Synagogue Seating Capacities: Methodology, Analysis and Limits (TSAJ 149; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012), 101–13. 16.  Khirbet Shema‘, photos 8.4 and 8.7 17.  In his last article on this subject, Michael Avi-Yonah admitted as much; see his “Ancient Synagogues,” Ariel 32 (1973): 29–43. See also my recent essay “Synagogues, Palestine,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology (ed. Daniel M. Master; New York: Oxford University Press, 2013).

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Meyers, Eric M. “Galilean Regionalism as a Factor in Historical Reconstruction.” BASOR special issue, G. Ernest Wright Memorial Issue 221 (1976): 93–103. ———. “Khirbet Shema‘.” NEAEHL 4:1359–61. ———. “Synagogues, Palestine.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology, edited by Daniel M. Master, 2:249–58. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Meyers, Eric M., A. Thomas Kraabel, and James F. Strange. Ancient Synagogue Excavations at Khirbet Shema‘, Upper Galilee, Israel 1970–1972. AASOR 42. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1976. Spigel, Chad S. Ancient Synagogue Seating Capacities: Methodology, Analysis and Limits. TSAJ 149. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012. Warren, Charles, and Claude R. Conder. Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology. Vol. 1, Galilee. London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1871.

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21 Kedesh of the Upper Galilee Andrea M. Berlin and Sharon C. Herbert Location and Literary Sources The site of Kedesh of the Upper Galilee (see maps 2 and 4B [Cadasa] in the front of this volume) comprises a large double mound at the head of a small, fertile valley situated at the eastern edge of the plateau that extends inland from the Mediterranean port city of Tyre (fig. A). At the base of the mound is a natural perennial spring and a small precinct with a well-built stone temple and an adjacent cemetery with a standing mausoleum and stone sarcophagi. The name of the site has remained the same since the second millennium bce, when Kedesh was first cited in Egyptian texts. In First Temple times, the site was initially associated with Canaanites (Josh. 12:22) and then was named as an Israelite city of refuge (Josh. 20:7; 21:32). In the Second Temple period, a variety of authors refer to Kedesh. The Ptolemaic official Zenon mentions it in two papyrus documents, both dating to 259 bce. In one, his official traveling party stops at Kedesh and collects two artabas of flour for their food supply; in a second, Zenon records taking a bath here.1 The author of 1 Maccabees, writing around 100 bce, cites Kedesh as the place to which the Hasmonean Jonathan chased the forces of the Seleucid king Demetrius II after a battle in around 144/143 bce (1 Macc. 11:63-67), a story that the historian Josephus repeats (Ant. 13.154–162) (although see further below on this point). The site’s final Second Temple–period textual citations are also by Josephus, twice in his Jewish War, both occurring in 66 ce, the first year of the revolt. First, Jews attacked “Tyrian Kedesh” in retaliation for the massacre at Caesarea (J.W. 2.459); shortly thereafter, the Roman general Titus encamped at Kedesh during his siege of Gischala. In reference to this last event, Josephus describes the place as “a strong Mediterranean village of the Tyrians, which always hated 1.  C. C. Edgar, Zenon Papyri: Catalogue Général des Antiquités Égyptiennes du Museé du Caire nos. 59001– 59139 (Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologies Orientale, 1925). W. L. Westermann, C. W. Keyes, and H. Liebesny, Zenon Papyri: Business Papers of the Third Century B.C. Dealing with Palestine and Egypt, vol. 2 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1940).

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Figure A. Aerial view of Tel Kedesh, looking southwest, with PHAB visible at southeastern end. Photo by SkyView. Used by permission of the Tel Kedesh Excavations.

and made war against the Jews. It had a great number of inhabitants and was well fortified, which made it a proper place for such as were enemies of the Jewish nation” (J.W. 4.104). These Second Temple–period sources suggest that Kedesh was an administrative center under the Ptolemies and a possible military garrison under the Seleucids, and that by the early to mid-first century ce it was a sizable, fortified village within the hinterland of the Phoenician city of Tyre. Summary of Excavation History In 1881, a compilation of the results of the Survey of Western Palestine was published in which Charles Wilson describes the still-standing remains of a Roman mausoleum at the base of the mound along with the Roman temple and adjacent cemetery.2 The mound itself was first examined in 1953 by Yohanan Aharoni, via a 17-m-long step trench in the northwestern edge of the upper, northern mound; largely on the basis of ceramic remains, he identified successive occupation layers from the Early, Middle, and Late Bronze Ages, Iron I and II (First Temple period), Hellenistic (Second Temple period), and historic Arab times.3 Several 2.  Wilson in Claude R. Conder and H. H. Kitchener, The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology, vol. 1, Galilee (London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881), 226–30, Sheet IV, p. 228. 3.  Yohanan Aharoni, The Settlement of the Israelite Tribes in Upper Galilee (in Hebrew; Jerusalem: Magnes, 1957).

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Figure B. Aerial view of the PHAB after the 2010 excavation season. Photo by SkyView. Used by permission of the Tel Kedesh Excavations.

teams conducted further surveys and excavations in the temple precinct in the 1970s and early 1980s.4 Finally, from 1997 through 2012, Sharon Herbert and Andrea Berlin explored the lower, southern mound.5 These excavations concentrated largely on the southeastern tip, where they found substantial remains of an enormous compound dating to the early Second Temple 4.  Mordechai Aviam made an initial survey for the Israel Antiquities Authority (then the Department of Antiquities): Aviam, “A Second-First Century B.C.E. Fortress and Siege Complex in Eastern Upper Galilee,” in Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods (ed. D. R. Edwards and C. T. McCullough; South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997), 97–105, n. 14. Aviam and Yuval Portugali followed this with a more thorough survey, though it was never published. In 1976 and 1977, Asher Ovadiah, Moshe Fischer, and Isaac Roll again surveyed the area, and in the early 1980s excavated in and around the temple; see A. Ovadiah, M. Fischer, and I. Roll, “An Inscribed Altar from the Roman Temple at Kedesh (Upper Galilee),” ZPE 49 (1982): 155–58; M. Fischer, A. Ovadiah, and I. Roll, “The Roman Temple at Kedesh, Upper Galilee: A Preliminary Study,” Tel Aviv 11 (1984): 146–72; A. Ovadiah, M. Fischer, and I. Roll, “The Architectural Design of the Roman Temple at Kedesh” (in Hebrew), ErIsr 18 (1985): 353–60 (English summary, p. 77*); A. Ovadiah, M. Fischer, and I. Roll, “The Epigraphic Finds from the Roman Temple at Kedesh in the Upper Galilee,” Tel Aviv 13–14 (1986–87): 60–66; A. Ovadiah, M. Fischer, and I. Roll, “Deity and Cult in the Roman Temple at Kedesh” (in Hebrew), in Sepher Ze’ev Vilnay (Jerusalem, 1987), 2:168–73. 5.  S. C. Herbert and A. M. Berlin, “A New Administrative Center for Persian and Hellenistic Galilee: Preliminary Report of the University of Michigan/University of Minnesota Excavations at Tel Kedesh,” BASOR 329 (2003): 13–59; A. M. Berlin and S. C. Herbert, “Excavating Tel Kedesh: The Story of a Site and a Project,” Archaeology 65 (2012): 24–29; A. M. Berlin and S. C. Herbert, “Tel Kedesh,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology (ed. Daniel M. Master; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 373–81.

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period, consisting of a single huge building measuring some 2,300 sq m (almost 25,000 sq ft) with adjacent smaller structures to the west and north (fig. B). Archaeological Remains of the Second Temple Period: The Persian-Hellenistic Administrative Building (PHAB) The single building in the site’s far southeastern corner (hereafter the PHAB, for PersianHellenistic Administrative Building) was built in around 500 bce, when the region lay under the rule of the Achaemenid Persians. It was substantially remodeled early in the third century bce, when the southernmost Levant was part of the Ptolemaic empire, and remodeled again in the early second century bce, after the Seleucid ruler Antiochus III wrested control from the Ptolemies. Abundant archaeological evidence testifies to the hasty abandonment of the building and its surrounding structures shortly after the middle of the second century bce, possibly related to the battle between Jonathan and Demetrius II around 144/143 bce. In the last third of the second century bce, people with a strikingly different and poorer lifestyle than that of its previous occupants briefly reoccupied portions of the building (but see further below). This reoccupation provides the last structural evidence for Second Temple–period habitation so far recovered on the mound, although robbing trenches with occasional fragments of first-century ce pottery suggest removal of stones at this time, perhaps for other buildings also situated on the southern mound but away from the edges. The PHAB in the Achaemenid Period The architectural remains reflect an ambitious structure measuring 56 m east–west by 40 m north–south. The eastern sector is marked by two substantial lengths of white limestone blocks with circular setting marks, meaning they were stylobates that originally supported columns. Short column shafts were found in later walls built nearby. One stylobate framed a π-shaped colonnaded entry court facing east. The second led into another open-air courtyard with a thick plastered flooring dominating the building’s western half. Attic pottery found in fill deposits date the PHAB’s construction to around 500 bce. From the fifth- and fourth-century bce occupation come personal luxuries, utilitarian household goods, and commercial or administrative items. Residents enjoyed dishes of polished, hard stone, perfume bottles of glass and alabaster, bronze bracelets with animal finials, silver earrings, a faience amulet in the form of Horus (a god of Egyptian origin), and small lumps of kohl (a cosmetic), along with two glass seals and a green jasper scarab. One seal shows the Persian king dominating two lions. The second shows the Phoenician deity Melqart in a similar pose. The scarab carries a finely carved profile head. Phoenician workshops produced seals and scarabs of these materials and styles. Their owners were likely well-connected Phoenicians who admired the ruling Persian political culture.

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Household goods include bronze chisels, a pruning knife, and a sickle, along with cooking vessels, bowls, pitchers, and jars. Almost all of the cooking vessels came from coastal suppliers, demonstrating a regularly plied route west to the sea, while almost all of the bowls, pitchers, and jars come from the eastern Upper Galilee and Huleh Valley. Jars dominate the assemblage: there are fragments of over two thousand, constituting over 65 percent of this period’s pottery—too many for standard household use. There are two forms, one suitable for transporting liquids and the other better for dry commodities. Clearly at least one activity here was the regular collection of agricultural produce: wheat, wine, and oil. The final item of note is a stamped bulla that originally bound a papyrus document. The impression, made by a conical stone seal, shows two rampant gazelles propped against a stylized sunflower, their heads turned outward, and a lunate crescent above. Both seal and image style are Neo-Babylonian. Two almost identical seals impressed thirteen tablets in the Murasu archive from Nippur, business records from a well-connected family dating between 427 and 404 bce. Kedesh is nowhere named in the archive, but Tyre or Tyrians appear in six tablets, all in the context of business transactions. The totality of the evidence suggests that the bulla was imprinted with a seal belonging to a Murasu family member or one of their associates, but not in Nippur since the Kedesh bulla sealed papyrus rather than a clay tablet. Instead, the seal’s owner probably came to Tyre, where a commercial document was written and sealed, and eventually conveyed to Kedesh. Who built the PHAB, and why? The substantial size and colonnaded entry court reflect a ceremonial function, while its eastward-facing orientation anticipated regular communication from that direction, along with an interest in impressing visitors. Its situation at the mound’s far southeastern end would have facilitated receiving goods from the valley and locales further south and east, and the many local transport jars reflect collection of agricultural products. Other finds suggest occupants of means, with coastal connections and Tyrian affiliations. The establishment of the PHAB should be seen in a regional context. It was built at the same time as, and directly north of, a small Phoenician sanctuary atop Mount Mizpe Yammim, situated just above the juncture of roads connecting the Huleh and Jezreel Valleys.6 Together, the two sites demarcated the eastern edge of the Tyrian highland plateau. They were probably built by the Tyrian royal house who, though nominally under imperial Achaemenid rule, enjoyed economic freedom and relative political autonomy. The PHAB at Kedesh and the sanctuary at Mizpe Yammim delineated an expansive territory with great agricultural potential and also underscored the strength and favor accorded to the kings of Tyre.7 6.  A. M. Berlin and R. Frankel, “The Sanctuary at Mizpe Yammim: Phoenician Cult and Territory in the Upper Galilee during the Persian Period,” BASOR 366 (2012): 25–78. 7.  J. Elayi, “Studies in Phoenician Geography during the Persian Period,” JNES 41 (1982): 83–110. J. Weinberg describes Achaemenid political practice as one that included “provinces and autonomous or semi-autonomous formations” (“Transmitter and Recipient in the Process of Acculturation: The Experience of the Judean Citizen-Temple-Community,” Transeuphratène 13 [1997]: 91–105; quotation from 97). Vadim S. Jigoulov uses

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The PHAB in the Ptolemaic Period The PHAB’s Tyrian occupants probably abandoned the building around the time of Alexander the Great’s siege of their city in 332 bce. Datable Attic pottery indicates reoccupation by around the year 300 bce, almost certainly under official Ptolemaic auspices. The new residents kept the building’s footprint and the large western courtyard but changed almost everything else. They made their most significant alteration to the colonnaded entry court: they took down the columns, closed off the entrance, and subdivided the space into small rooms, using the column shafts and a gritty grey limestone as building materials. They built a narrow entrance on the north side, leading into a long hallway demarcated by the now bare stylobates. Off of this hallway they inserted a large reception room with stucco-covered walls. It was to this complex that Zenon came in the year 259 bce. The building’s plan and finds reveal the activities of Ptolemaic officials. Rooms south of the courtyard were given thick plaster floors to support a series of plastered bins of varying shapes and sizes, apparently to collect and measure dry goods. The third-century bce ceramic corpus includes almost four thousand jar fragments, just over 40 percent of the third-century pottery. As in the previous Persian-era Tyrian phase, these jars were made in the immediate environs, in forms designed for the bulk storage of agricultural commodities. Thus, under the Ptolemies, the PHAB remained a depot for the collection (and probably also shipment) of agricultural products. Residue analysis of two jars dating to the PHAB’s Seleucid phase offers a clue to the type of product: they had contained bread wheat (Triticum aestivum). This was an unusual grain for this time and place; the common wheat strain here is Triticum durum. Triticum aestivum seems to be the modern name for a strain known from Ptolemaic papyri as “Syrian wheat,” a type whose cultivation began during the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphus. Thus, although the jars and their residues date to the mid-second century bce, it is probable that the Ptolemies brought the cultivation of Triticum aestivum to the area.8 The origins of third-century bce pottery reveal the routes that supplied the PHAB. Petrographic analyses indicate that residents acquired utility vessels such as water pitchers and grinding bowls from the Huleh Valley, jugs and juglets for table use from the area of Tyre, cooking vessels from Acco-Ptolemais, and bowls and saucers for dining from the Carmel plain. Two points stand out: first, the connection with the Huleh Valley for household necessities; and, second, the number of vessels from coastal suppliers, which reflects Zenon’s route directly from Kedesh to Acco-Ptolemais. The evidence of steady coastal traffic might suggest that PHAB officials enjoyed a regular supply of Mediterranean niceties such as imported wine and fancy dishes, but the recovered the term “managed autonomy” (“Administration of Achaemenid Phoenicia: A Case for Managed Autonomy,” in Exile and Restoration Revisited: Essays on the Babylonian and Persian Periods in Memory of Peter R. Ackroyd [ed. Gary N. Knoppers and Lester L. Grabbe, with Dierdre N. Fulton; Library of Second Temple Studies 73; London: T&T Clark, 2009]: 138–51; quotation from 138–39). 8.  A. M. Berlin, T. Ball, R. Thompson, and S. C. Herbert, “Ptolemaic Agriculture, ‘Syrian Wheat,’ and Triticum aestivum,” Journal of Archaeological Science 30 (2002): 115–21.

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remains do not bear this out. In fact, a tally of the third-century pottery by origin is astonishing: of 8,346 total fragments, a mere 26 derive from places beyond the coast, including only three Aegean amphorae.9 The importation of Attic pottery ceased completely, and no other eastern Mediterranean table wares appeared in its place. In contrast to the site’s Persian-era Tyrian residents, who had enjoyed an array of small luxuries, their Ptolemaic successors made do with only basic goods. This coheres with the dismantling of the PHAB’s palatial colonnaded entry court, the use of rough gray limestone for the new walls, and the division of open spaces into smaller rooms and chambers. In Ptolemaic times, the PHAB was a less elegant and more workaday establishment. Consideration of local settlements sheds further light on the character of Ptolemaic rule. Several changes date to the third century bce: the Phoenician sanctuary at Mizpe Yammim was abandoned; a new shrine to the Greek god Pan was established at the foot of Mount Hermon;10 and several small farmsteads appeared in the Huleh Valley, such as Tel Anafa, where a few families farmed, raised flocks, and produced textiles.11 All this taken together with the evidence of the remodeling of the PHAB, its apparent function as a depot for the collection of an experimental cultivar, and residents’ demonstrable links to the Huleh Valley suggests that the Ptolemies used the PHAB to receive produce from the Huleh Valley, which they commandeered as King’s Land for tenant farmers.12 Many of the papyri from the Zenon archive attest to this practice elsewhere in the region, most famously the large Galilean estate at Beth Anath, where tenant farmers cultivated grapes, figs, and wheat.13 Ptolemaic annexation of the PHAB and the Huleh Valley, along with the establishment of the Paneion at its northeastern corner, imposed a new regime in this portion of the Upper Galilee. The PHAB in the Seleucid period Antiochus III’s victory over Ptolemy V in 197 bce ended Ptolemaic rule in the southern Levant, but not the role of the PHAB as an imperial administrative center.14 Under the Seleucids, the PHAB continued as a depot for the collection and storage of agricultural goods. The bin rooms 9.  Peter J. Stone, “‘Provincial’ Perspectives: The Persian, Ptolemaic, and Seleucid Administrative Center at Tel Kedesh, Israel in a Regional Context” (PhD diss., University of Cincinnati, 2012), 101, 316. 10.  A. M. Berlin, “The Archaeology of Ritual: The Sanctuary of Pan at Banias/Caesarea Philippi,” BASOR 315 (1999): 27–46. 11.  S. C. Herbert, Tel Anafa I, i: Final Report on Ten Years of Excavation at a Hellenistic and Roman Settlement in Northern Israel (JRASS 10.1; Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 1994), 13–14; A. M. Berlin, Tel Anafa II, i: The Hellenistic and Roman Pottery: The Plain Wares (JRASS 10.2.1; Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 1997), 18–19. 12.  V. Tscherikower, “Palestine under the Ptolemies: A Contribution to the Study of the Zenon Papyri,” Mizraim 4–5 (1937): 9–90, esp. 21–24. 13.  J. S. Kloppenborg, The Tenants in the Vineyard: Ideology, Economics, and Agrarian Conflict in Jewish Palestine (WUNT 195; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006), 284–90, 359–64, 367–76. Kloppenborg carries the implications of these practices forward and connects them with the parable of the tenants in the Synoptic Gospels (especially Mark 12), and aspects of the social justice movement also known as Christianity (pp. 289–90). 14.  For the date of the battle of Paneion and the Seleucid takeover of Coele-Syria and Palestine, see now C.

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Figure C. Large storage jar from the northwestern store room. Photograph by Howard Smithline, Israel Antiquities Authority. Used by permission of the Tel Kedesh Excavations.

south of the courtyard were expanded, while rooms to the north and west were used to hold store jars of unusually large capacity, about 130 liters each (fig. C). The reception room was remodeled, and two more rooms with painted walls, molded stucco, and mosaic floors were added, increasing the spaces for dining and entertainment. Additional rooms were devoted to food preparation, with ovens, grinding installations, and multiple drainage systems (fig. D). The most significant change was the reuse of three rooms in the northwestern corner to accommodate an archive. Excavations here recovered over 2,000 stamped sealings, with about 1,765 readable impressions. Of these, only about 5 percent carry images and/or writing that definitely indicate imperial, provincial official, or civic origin.15 These include a few seals with Seleucid symbols such as the anchor (seven examples); fifteen impressions from a seal with the Phoenician deity Tanit above an Aramaic/Phoenician inscription reading, “He who is over the land,” likely the property of a regional administrator (fig. E, left); and five impressions of the Lorber, “Numismatic Evidence and the Chronology of the Fifth Syrian War,” in Judea and the Judeans in the Long Third Century B.C.E. (ed. Oded Lipshitz and Nitsan Shalom; forthcoming). 15.  D. T. Ariel and J. Naveh, “Selected Inscribed Sealings from Kedesh in the Upper Galilee,” BASOR 329 (2003): 61–80.

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Figure D. Plan of the PHAB in its Seleucid state. Plan by Molly Lindberger. Used by permission of the Tel Kedesh Excavations.

dolphin, which represented Tyre. One impression denotes a seal of the city itself, with a shaft of wheat, a bunch of grapes, and the name KΥ∆ISS[OΣ (fig. F, center). Writing the city’s name in Greek contrasts with the Phoenician Tanit sealing and may reflect multiple officials and a nested authority structure. It is possible that some local administrators belonged to a long-lived line of well-connected Tyrians now working on behalf of distant imperial rulers. Among the remaining sealings, about 75 percent are Greek mythological/anthropomorphic figures, and another 20 percent carry male portraits in both idealized and realistic styles. Determining which of these came from the rings of private individuals and which were official is by no means straightforward. One working hypothesis is frequency of use. The vast majority of the seals used in the archive appear only once. In contrast, four nearly identical seals of Apollo as an archer appear on over eighty-one impressions (fig. G, right). We infer that the individuals using these seals were operating in some sort of official capacity. In addition to the sealings, several unusual imported objects were found in the archive complex, including a large lagynos (a type of wine bottle) from the Aegean island of Chios, a stamped platter from Italy, and small jars of Mesopotamian glazed pottery. These unique items may have been gifts from diplomatic visitors. Most spectacular was the discovery of a solid

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Fig. F     Fig. G

Figures E–G. Sealings from the Seleucid-era archive, from left: Tanit with Aramaic/Phoenician inscription “He who is over the land”; city sealing of Kedesh; sealing with Apollo, probably belonging to a Seleucid official. Photographs by Clara Amit, Israel Antiquities Authority. Used by permission of the Tel Kedesh Excavations.

gold mnaieion, the largest gold issue struck in antiquity, minted in Kition, Cyprus, in 191/190 bce, under the aegis of Ptolemy V (fig. H).16 The coin may have been brought to Kedesh by a Ptolemaic official coming to meet a Seleucid counterpart. Pottery continued to be the most sizable category of remains. As in preceding centuries, the assemblage comprised jars and utility vessels made in the immediate region, serving vessels from the area of Tyre, and cooking vessels from Acco-Ptolemais. Now, however, in the period of Seleucid rule, there also appear nicely slipped table vessels from the area of Antioch (fig. I), over forty Aegean wine jars, and perfume flasks from Cyprus—creature comforts attesting to an elevated standard of living and possibly the higher status of the officials posted here.17 Imperial Seleucid rule ended abruptly and dramatically. In several rooms of the PHAB as well as in a small building to the west, floors were covered with whole and freshly broken vessels. Datable evidence (sealings, imported amphorae, coins) reflect activity down to the year 144 bce, although there is evidence of a grisly postscript. Sometime after this disturbance, the archive room was purposefully set on fire: petrified mud brick from the upper portions of the 16.  C. Lorber, “A Gold Mnaieion of Ptolemaic Cyprus at Tell Kedesh: Background and Context,” Israel Numismatic Research 5 (2010): 41–57. 17.  A. M. Berlin, S. C. Herbert, and P. Stone, “Dining in State: The Table Wares from the Persian-Hellenistic Administrative Building at Kedesh,” in Pottery, Peoples, and Places: Study and Interpretation of Late Hellenistic Pottery (ed. Pia Guldager Bilde and Mark L. Lawall; Black Sea Studies 16; Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 2014), 307–21.

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Figure H. A gold mnaieion of Ptolemaic Cyprus from Tell Kedesh. Photograph by Susan Webb. Used by permission of the Tel Kedesh Excavations.

Figure I. Red slipped dishes from Antioch area. Photo by Ze’ev Radovan. Used by permission of the Tel Kedesh Excavations.

walls filled the room, iron roofing nails from ceiling beams were encased within, wall stones were cracked from heat. Beneath the mud-brick layer were two infant burials, at least one of which had been mutilated.18 The order of deposition and character of the remains is such that the burning and the burials seem to have occurred after the initial disturbance and abandonment—although not very long afterward, probably sometime from a few months to a year or so later. The identities of the perpetrators of both incidents are unknown. According to 1 Maccabees (11:63-67), probably written c. 100 bce as a court history of the rise of the Jewish Hasmonean state, around the year 143 bce or so there was a battle in this area between Jonathan, a younger brother of Judah Maccabee, and the Seleucid ruler Demetrius. The text claims that Jonathan’s men chased the Seleucid force to Kedesh, killed three thousand, encamped briefly, and then returned to Jerusalem. It is tempting to connect the remains in the PHAB with this battle, especially since the dates of both—sometime between 144 and c. 142 bce—match perfectly. Yet such a connection gives rise to several questions. What brings the Maccabees this far north at this time? Why did Jonathan not take control of the PHAB, along with its ample supplies and territorial influence, and use his victory to advance Hasmonean expansion? Why 18.  Herbert and Berlin, “New Administrative Center,” 21–27 and fig. 11.

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did imperial or provincial officials not return? The building was an enormous investment and ongoing resource. Damage was minimal, and it could have been restored to use quite easily. Instead, the evidence of abandonment suggests serious Seleucid political and military weakness, at a date a full generation earlier than is generally thought on the basis of the literary sources. In fact, the evidence from Kedesh—taken in concert with other archaeological evidence connected with the Hasmoneans—suggests a scenario different from that provided by the author of 1 Maccabees. The relatively light damage within the PHAB is commensurate with a small local uprising or even abandonment by provincial officials rather than a full military battle. The evidence for deliberate “pollution” of the archive room may reflect an effort to curtail the return of imperial rule to this place. Finally, since the earliest Hasmonean coins appear only c. 125 bce, and Hasmonean expansion outside of Judea is not archaeologically attested until c. 112 bce, with the destruction of Maresha (followed closely by the destructions at Samaria and Beth Shean-Scythopolis) it may be that there was never any Maccabean involvement up here at this time. Instead, the author of 1 Maccabees, writing almost fifty years later, might have “borrowed” an episode that properly belonged to Tyrian history, in order to create a heroic persona for Jonathan.19 The Final Occupation of the PHAB From around 135 to 125 bce, portions of the PHAB were reoccupied. The new residents were definitely not officials; they blocked connecting corridors with flimsy walls and built openair ovens inside some rooms (fig. J). Their identity and purpose for settling here are unclear, although their belongings reveal something of their connections. Their coins were from the mints of Acco-Ptolemais and Tyre, and some of their goods from coastal suppliers, including red-slipped Eastern Sigillata A dishes, cast glass bowls, and Rhodian amphorae. Other household pottery such as jugs and jars were made near the site itself, while their cooking vessels were of clay from near the Sea of Galilee. The forms of these utilitarian vessels are similar to ones made in the regions of Samaria and Judea. At the same time as new occupants moved into the ruins of the PHAB, other small, short-lived settlements with a similar array of pottery sprang up in the eastern Upper Galilee.20 By the last quarter of the second century bce, however, these were abandoned in favor of a new pattern of settlement: new villages and residences in the northern Huleh Valley, at Tel Wawi19.  This idea is in line with much recent scholarship on the dubious historical character of 1 Maccabees. See, e.g., K. Berthelot, “Reclaiming the Land (1 Maccabees 15:28–36): Hasmonean Discourse between Biblical Tradition and Seleucid Rhetoric,” JBL 133 (2014): 539–59; S. Honigman, Tales of High Priests and Taxes: The Books of the Maccabees and the Judean Rebellion against Antiochus IV (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2014); J. Ma, “Re-examining Hanukkah,” themarginaliareview.com 2013a (http://marginalia.lareviewofbooks.org/re-examininghanukkah/), pp. 1–8. 20.  M. Aviam and A. Amitai, “Excavations at Khirbet esh-Shuhara” (in Hebrew), in Eretz Zafon: Studies in Galilean Archaeology (ed. Z. Gal; Haifa: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2002), 119–34.

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Figure J. Large storage jar from the Seleucid phase of the PHAB reused as an oven in the building’s final Hellenistic occupation. Photograph by Sharon C. Herbert.

yat, Kfar Blum, and Tel Anafa.21 The Huleh Valley settlers maintained coastal contacts and enjoyed a cosmopolitan lifestyle, with decorated villas, imported wine, cast glass drinking cups, and Eastern Sigillata A dishes.22 They may represent the latest generation of well-connected Tyrians (or other Phoenicians) to lay claim to this corner of the Upper Galilee, at a time when the power of the Hellenistic empires was fading and that of the nascent Hasmonean state was still centered in Judea.23 21.  For Wawiyat, see A. Onn, “Tell el-Wawiyat,” ESI 7–8 (1988–89): 181–83; A. Onn, R. Greenberg, I. Shaked, and Y. Rapuano, “Tell el-Wawiyat (Tel Tannim)–1993,” ESI 15 (1996): 10–12; D. Avshalom-Gorni and N. Getzov, “Tell el-Wawiyat–1999,” ESI 113 (2001): 1–3; D. Avshalom-Gorni and N. Getzov, “Tell el-Wawiyat–2001,” ESI 115 (2003): 1–2. For Kfar Blum, see G. Davidson Weinberg, “Notes on Glass from Upper Galilee,” Journal of Glass Studies 15 (1973): 35–51. For Anafa, see Herbert, Tel Anafa I, i, 14–19; Berlin, Tel Anafa II, i, 20–29. 22.  See D. T. Ariel and G. Finkielstejn, “Stamped Amphora Handles,” in Herbert, Tel Anafa I, i, 183–240; K. W. Slane, “The Fine Wares,” in Excavations at Tel Anafa II, i: The Hellenistic and Roman Pottery: The Fine Wares (JRASS 10.2; Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 1997); David Grose, “The Glass,” in Tel Anafa II, ii: Glass Vessels, Lamps, Objects of Metal, and Groundstone and Other Stone Tools and Vessels (ed. A. M. Berlin and S. C. Herbert; JRASS 10.2; Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 2012). 23.  A. M. Berlin, “From Monarchy to Markets: The Phoenicians in Hellenistic Palestine,” BASOR (1997): 75–88. At this same time, in eastern Lower Galilee, close to the Sea of Galilee, there appeared clusters of small houses with utilitarian pottery of local manufacture, but in Judean forms, suggesting that people moved up here from the south. The similarities between some of the household goods of the PHAB’s final occupants and these

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Figure K. Façade of the monumental temple. Photograph courtesy of James Riley Strange.

Figure L. Double sarcophagus near the monumental temple. Courtesy of James Riley Strange.

new settlers is striking and may suggest a connection between the residents of these settlements; see A. M. Berlin, “Identity Politics in Early Roman Galilee,” in The Jewish Revolt against Rome: Interdisciplinary Perspectives (ed. M. Popović; JSJSup 154; Leiden: Brill, 2012), 69–106; A. M. Berlin, “Manifest Identity: From Ioudaios to Jew. Household Judaism as Anti-Hellenization in the Late Hasmonean Era,” in Between Cooperation and Hostility: Multiple Identities in Ancient Judaism and the Interaction with Foreign Powers (ed. R. Albertz and J. Wöhrle; Journal of Ancient Judaism Supplements 11; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2013), 151–75. Danny Syon has made the same suggestion based on the evidence of coins of Antiochus VII Sidetes struck in the Jerusalem mint appearing at this

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Early in the second century ce, a monumental temple (fig. K) with forecourt was built on a low rise below and immediately northeast of the mount. Excavations suggest that it remained in use until the earthquake of 363 ce, when portions of the walls and forecourt collapsed. One inscription attests to the worship of Baalshamin, “The Lord of Heaven,” an important Syro-Phoenician god during Roman times. Several aspects of the building’s plan, notably the open-air cella, raised central portal, and side niches for liquid offerings, suggest that it may also have functioned as an oracular shrine, possibly of Apollo.24 Immediately west are a number of large, richly ornamented, stone sarcophagi (fig. L) and a small mausoleum, all likely contemporary with the temple. Their presence suggests that the sanctuary was not a completely isolated rural shrine, and that some settlement must have existed in the vicinity, even if only for priests and functionaries of the cult. The temple’s situation marks the edge of Phoenician territory in general and, probably, Tyrian territory in particular, while its monumental east-facing façade seems intended to broadcast a message to viewers and travelers coming from that direction. In that regard, it is notable that the temple at Kedesh was one of several elaborate religious structures in Roman style built in this corner of the eastern Upper Galilee in the second century ce. It is joined by the Temple of Zeus at the Sanctuary of Pan at Caesarea Philippi (Paneas), built in around 100 ce, the Roman temple immediately across the Huleh Valley at H|orvat Omrit, expanded in around 150 ce, and, to the south of Kedesh, the mountaintop shrine in honor of Septimius Severus at Qazion, also built in the early second century ce.25 The temple at Kedesh joined these other structures to create an imposing reflection of Roman cultural dominance, one that demanded of local residents respect, if not belief. Bibliography Aharoni, Yohanan. The Settlement of the Israelite Tribes in Upper Galilee. In Hebrew. Jerusalem: Magnes, 1957. time at sites in the Galilee (“Numismatic Evidence of Jewish Presence in Galilee before Hasmonean Annexation,” Israel Numismatic Research 1 [2006]: 21–24). 24.  J. Magness, “Some Observations on the Roman Temple at Kedesh,” IEJ 40 (1990): 173–81; contra A. Ovadiah, I. Roll, and M. Fischer, “The Roman Temple at Kedesh in Upper Galilee: A Response,” IEJ 43 (1993): 60–63. 25.  For the Temple of Zeus, see Z. U. Ma’oz, “Banias,” NEAEHL 1:136–43; Z. U. Ma’oz, “Banias, Temple of Pan 1991/1992,” ESI 13 (1996): 2–7; Z. U. Ma’oz, “Banias, Temple of Pan 1993,” ESI 15 (1996): 1–5; For Omrit, see J. Andrew Overman and Daniel N. Schowalter, eds., The Roman Temple Complex at Horvat Omrit: An Interim Report (BAR International Series 2205; Oxford: Archaeopress, 2011); For Qazion, see A. Killebrew, “Qazion: A Late Second–Early Third Century ce Rural Cultic Complex in the Upper Galilee Dedicated to Septimius Severus and His Family,” Journal of Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology and Heritage Studies 1 (2013): 113–60.

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Ariel, D. T., and G. Finkielstejn. “Stamped Amphora Handles.” In S. C. Herbert, Tel Anafa I, i: Final Report on Ten Years of Excavation at a Hellenistic and Roman Settlement in Northern Israel, 183–240. JRASS 10.1. Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 1994. Ariel, D. T., and J. Naveh. “Selected Inscribed Sealings from Kedesh in the Upper Galilee.” BASOR 329 (2003): 61–80. Aviam, Mordechai. “A Second-First Century B.C.E. Fortress and Siege Complex in Eastern Upper Galilee.” In Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Graeco-Roman and Byzantine Periods, edited by D. R. Edwards and C. T. McCullough, 97–105. South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 143. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997. Aviam, M., and A. Amitai, “Excavations at Khirbet esh-Shuhara.” In Hebrew. In Eretz Zafon: Studies in Galilean Archaeology, edited by Z. Gal, 119–34. Haifa: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2002. Avshalom-Gorni, D., and N. Getzov. “Tell el-Wawiyat–1999.” ESI 113 (2001): 1–3. ———. “Tell el-Wawiyat–2001.” ESI 115 (2003): 1–2. Berlin, A. M. “The Archaeology of Ritual: The Sanctuary of Pan at Banias/Caesarea Philippi.” BASOR 315 (1999): 27–46. ———. “From Monarchy to Markets: The Phoenicians in Hellenistic Palestine.” BASOR (1997): 75–88. ———. “Identity Politics in Early Roman Galilee.” In The Jewish Revolt against Rome: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, edited by M. Popović, 69–106. JSJSup 154. Leiden: Brill, 2012. ———. “Manifest Identity: From Ioudaios to Jew. Household Judaism as Anti-Hellenization in the Late Hasmonean Era.” In Between Cooperation and Hostility: Multiple Identities in Ancient Judaism and the Interaction with Foreign Powers, edited by Rainer Albertz and Jacob Wöhrle, 151–75. Journal of Ancient Judaism Supplements 11. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2013. ———. Tel Anafa II, i: The Hellenistic and Roman Pottery: The Plain Wares. JRASS 10.2.1. Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 1997. Berlin, A. M., T. Ball, R. Thompson, and S. C. Herbert. “Ptolemaic Agriculture, ‘Syrian Wheat,’ and Triticum aestivum.” Journal of Archaeological Science 30 (2002): 115–21. Berlin, A. M., and R. Frankel. “The Sanctuary at Mizpe Yammim: Phoenician Cult and Territory in the Upper Galilee during the Persian Period.” BASOR 366 (2012): 25–78. Berlin, A. M., and S. C. Herbert. “Excavating Tel Kedesh: The Story of a Site and a Project.” Archaeology 65 (2012): 24–29. ———. “Tel Kedesh.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Archaeology, edited by Daniel M. Martin, 373–81. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Berlin, A. M., S. C. Herbert, and P. Stone. “Dining in State: The Table Wares from the PersianHellenistic Administrative Building at Kedesh.” In Pottery, Peoples, and Places: Study and

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Interpretation of Late Hellenistic Pottery, edited by Pia Guldager Bilde and Mark L. Lawall, 307–21. Black Sea Studies 16. Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 2014). Berthelot, K. “Reclaiming the Land (1 Maccabees 15:28–36): Hasmonean Discourse between Biblical Tradition and Seleucid Rhetoric.” JBL 133 (2014): 539–59. Conder, Claude R., and H. H. Kitchener. The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology. Vol. 1, Galilee. London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881. Edgar , C. C. Zenon Papyri. Catalogue Général des Antiquités Égyptiennes du Museé du Caire nos. 59001-59139. Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologies Orientale, 1925. Elayi, J. “Studies in Phoenician Geography during the Persian Period.” JNES 41 (1982): 83–110. Fischer, Moshe, Asher Ovadiah, and Isaac Roll. “The Roman Temple at Kedesh, Upper Galilee: A Preliminary Study.” Tel Aviv 11 (1984): 146–72. Grose, David. “The Glass.” In Tel Anafa II, ii: Glass Vessels, Lamps, Objects of Metal, and Groundstone and Other Stone Tools and Vessels, edited by A. M. Berlin and S. C. Herbert, i–xx, 1–98. JRASS 10.2. Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 2012. Herbert, S.C. Tel Anafa I, i: Final Report on Ten Years of Excavation at a Hellenistic and Roman Settlement in Northern Israel. JRASS 10.1. Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 1994. Herbert, S. C., and A. M. Berlin. “A New Administrative Center for Persian and Hellenistic Galilee: Preliminary Report of the University of Michigan/University of Minnesota Excavations at Tel Kedesh.” BASOR 329 (2003): 13–59. Honigman, S. Tales of High Priests and Taxes: The Books of the Maccabees and the Judean Rebellion against Antiochus IV. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2014. Jigoulov, Vadim S. “Administration of Achaemenid Phoenicia: A Case for Managed Autonomy.” In Exile and Restoration Revisited: Essays on the Babylonian and Persian Periods in Memory of Peter R. Ackroyd, edited by Gary N. Knoppers and Lester L. Grabbe, with Dierdre N. Fulton, 138–51. Library of Second Temple Studies 73. London: T&T Clark, 2009. Killebrew, A. “Qazion. A Late Second–Early Third Century ce Rural Cultic Complex in the Upper Galilee Dedicated to Septimius Severus and His Family.” Journal of Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology and Heritage Studies 1 (2013): 113–60. Kloppenborg, J. S. The Tenants in the Vineyard: Ideology, Economics, and Agrarian Conflict in Jewish Palestine. WUNT 195. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006. Lorber, C. “A Gold Mnaieion of Ptolemaic Cyprus at Tell Kedesh: Background and Context.” Israel Numismatic Research 5 (2010): 41–57. ———. “Numismatic Evidence and the Chronology of the Fifth Syrian War.” In Judea and the Judeans in the Long Third Century B.C.E., edited by Oded Lipshitz and Nitsan Shalom. Forthcoming.

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Ma, J. “Re-examining Hanukkah.” themarginaliareview.com 2013a, http://marginalia.lareview ofbooks.org/re-examining-hanukkah/. Magness, J. “Some Observations on the Roman Temple at Kedesh.” IEJ 40 (1990): 173–81. Ma’oz, Z. U. “Banias.” NEAEHL 1:136–43. ———. “Banias, Temple of Pan 1991/1992.” ESI 13 (1996): 2–7. ———. “Banias, Temple of Pan 1993.” ESI 15 (1996): 1–5. Onn, A. “Tell el-Wawiyat.” ESI 7–8 (1988–89): 181–83. Onn, A., R. Greenberg, I. Shaked, and Y. Rapuano. “Tell el-Wawiyat (Tel Tannim)–1993.” ESI 15 (1996): 10–12. Ovadiah, Asher, Moshe Fischer, and Isaac Roll. “The Architectural Design of the Roman Temple at Kedesh.” In Hebrew. ErIsr 18 (1985): 353–60 (English summary, p. 77*). ———. “Deity and Cult in the Roman Temple at Kedesh.” In Hebrew. In Sepher Ze’ev Vilnay, 2:168–73. Jerusalem, 1987. ———. “The Epigraphic Finds from the Roman Temple at Kedesh in the Upper Galilee.” Tel Aviv 13–14 (1986–87): 60–66. ———. “An Inscribed Altar from the Roman Temple at Kedesh (Upper Galilee).” ZPE 49 (1982): 155–58. Ovadiah, A., I. Roll, and M. Fischer. “The Roman Temple at Kedesh in Upper Galilee: A Response.” IEJ 43 (1993): 60–63. Overman, J. Andrew, and Daniel N. Schowalter, eds. The Roman Temple Complex at Horvat Omrit: An Interim Report. BAR International Series 2205. Oxford: Archaeopress, 2011. Slane, K. W. “The Fine Wares.” In Excavations at Tel Anafa II, i: The Hellenistic and Roman Pottery: The Fine Wares. JRASS 10.2. Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of the University of Michigan, 1997. Stone, Peter J. “‘Provincial’ Perspectives: The Persian, Ptolemaic, and Seleucid Administrative Center at Tel Kedesh, Israel in a Regional Context.” PhD diss., University of Cincinnati, 2012. Syon, Danny. “Numismatic Evidence of Jewish Presence in Galilee before Hasmonean Annexation.” Israel Numismatic Research 1 (2006): 21–24. Tscherikower, V. “Palestine under the Ptolemies: A Contribution to the Study of the Zenon Papyri.” Mizraim 4–5 (1937): 9–90. Weinberg, G. Davidson. “Notes on Glass from Upper Galilee.” Journal of Glass Studies 15 (1973): 35–51. Weinberg, J. “Transmitter and Recipient in the Process of Acculturation: The Experience of the Judean Citizen-Temple-Community.” Transeuphratène 13 (1997): 91–105. Westermann, W. L., C. W. Keyes, and H. Liebesny, Zenon Papyri: Business Papers of the Third Century B.C. Dealing with Palestine and Egypt. Vol. 2. New York: Columbia University Press, 1940.

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Glossary AANS. Average Annual Number of Specimens agoranomos (pl. agoranomoi). Greek, “supervisor of the agora” amphora. A large, two-handled vessel, used for storing and transporting goods, often liquids anonymous follis (pl. folles). A Byzantine coin without the emperor’s image or name arcosolium (pl. arcosolia). An arched recess carved into rock to create a tomb. Some had a horizontal ledge for holding a corpse. area. See square ARS. African Red Slip Ware; see terra sigillata; red ware aryballos (pl. aryballoi). A small, globular flask ashlar. In contrast to an unworked stone and a “hammer-dressed” stone, an ashlar is a large, quarried, squared building stone. balk (British “baulk”). In an archaeological grid, “balk” refers to a one-meter-wide section of earth left unexcavated between squares/areas, for the purpose of maintaining scientific control and preserving a stratigraphic record; balks also serve as earthen catwalks between squares; sometimes the vertical sides of the square are also called balks (more properly, “sections”). See also section ballista (Latin; Greek ballistra). A machine that throws a projectile bema (also bima). A raised platform or podium; in Galilean synagogues, a bema sometimes held an arc containing Torah scrolls. bossing. An architectural term referring to trimming the visible face of an ashlar so that a recessed margin surrounds a raised central, rectangular face. A finely worked, flat bossing is typical of public buildings in the Early Roman period and is sometimes referred to as “Herodian.” One can see very large stones of this type in the Western Wall in Jerusalem. caldarium (pl. caldaria). From Latin calid (“warm,” or “hot”); the hot room or hot pool in a Roman public bath casemate wall. Two parallel walls joined at intervals by cross walls, forming enclosed rooms or casemates 443

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cardo maximus. Latin, “largest hinge” or “pivot”; the main north–south thoroughfare through a Roman city. The cardo often intersected the decumanus in the center of the city and formed the basis for the city grid. See also decumanus cavea. Latin, “enclosure”; the area of seats in a theater cippus. A stone for marking graves or sometimes boundaries cist tomb. Rectangular tomb dug into bedrock, or dug into the ground and lined with stone slabs cloaca. Sewer or drain corbel/corbeled arch/corbeling. A means of constructing an arched entrance or support for superstructure in which a lowest course of stones is laid with a gap in the middle, and each successive course reduces the gap above. Cypriot Red Slip Ware. See terra sigillata; red ware decumanus. From a Latin word referring to the tenth cohort, and by extension to the main entrance of a Roman camp; the term comes to denote the main east–west thoroughfare in a Roman city. The decumanus often intersected the cardo maximus in the center of the city and formed the basis for the city grid. See also cardo maximus engaged column. A column that protrudes from a wall ethnarch. Greek, “ruler of a people.” During the Hellenistic period, the late Roman Republic, and the early empire, the term referred to the local governor of a region (not necessarily a province) and its people, sometimes on behalf of foreign rulers. Simon son of Mattathias (142–135 bce) was an “ethnarch of the Judeans,” a title that he held along with high priest, as did his son John Hyrcanus I (135–104 bce). The Romans allowed John Hyrcanus II (63–40 bce) to rule as their ethnarch in the region. Herod’s son Archelaus was ethnarch of Samaria, Judea, and Idumea from 4 bce to 6 ce. etrog. A citrus fruit featured in the Jewish feast Sukkot (booths or tabernacles) ETS. Eastern terra sigillata (sometimes “eastern sigillata”), usually subdivided into types A, B, C, and D; see terra sigillata; red ware fistula (plural, fistulae). A pipe floruit. Latin, “he flourished”; a town’s period of flourishing. follis. A leather money bag; also a large bronze coin fresco. Painting on wet plaster. See secco. gabled roof. A double sloping roof with a peaked ridge GCW. Galilean Coarse Ware. A type of coarsely made ceramic vessel used by the pagan population of Galilee in the Persian and Hellenistic periods glacis. A slope at the base of a wall to defend against a siege

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445

halteres. From a Greek word meaning “to leap,” dumbbells lifted for exercise; also weights held in the hand to increase one’s distance in leaping competitions Hauran technique. Named for houses built of basalt in the Hauran region, the term refers to the use of dry-laid stones, corbeling, and window walls in two-story houses. hypocaust bath system. A hollow space under a floor through which heat was piped to warm the hot room in a Roman bath in situ. Latin, “in place”; refers to an ancient feature or object that has not been moved from its original location. insula (pl. insulae). Latin, “island”; a city block ITM. Israeli Transverse Mercator; see also Old/New Israeli Grid kantharos. A drinking cup with large handles kafar (‫ כפר‬also written “Kfar”). Hebrew for “village” khirbet (often abbreviated “Kh.”). Arabic for “ruin” kokh (pl. kokhim). See loculus Korazim windows (also “window wall”). A row of square openings piercing the lowest part of an interior wall of a house. The solid wall built above the windows partitions an interior space into two rooms. lacustrine. Of or relating to a lake lagynos. A flask, flagon latrina. A privy; also a bath; slang for brothel loculus (pl. loculi). Latin, “little place”; kokh in Hebrew. In a rock-cut tomb, loculi or kokhim are slots—usually radiating outward from a central chamber—for interring corpses in the practice of ossilegium. See also ossilegium locus (pl. loci). Latin, “place.” In archaeological method, this technical term usually designates any three-dimensional feature in a square/area, including soil layers, floors, pits, walls, and other features. In some methods, “locus” designates a room in a structure. LRC. Late Roman Ware lulav. A palm branch. During the Jewish feast Sukkot (booths or tabernacles), the lulav is a bundle formed from palm, willow, and myrtle branches. menorah. The seven-branched lamp stand in the Jerusalem temple; in the Roman period images of the menorah (not always with seven branches) come to symbolize the Jewish religion.

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mikveh (pl. mikvaoth). Hebrew, “collection”; a tub, usually carved into rock, used to immerse people and objects into naturally collected water for the purpose of rendering them ritually pure. See also otzar. mnaieion. A gold coin worth a mina of silver mortarium. A mortar used for pulverizing grain and other substances myoparo. A small warship or pirate ship nave. The central hall of a basilical building, such as a Roman basilica, a synagogue, or a church nummus (pl. nummi). Coin; also a low-value coin of late antiquity nymphaeum. A monument to the nymphs usually with a fountain Old/New Israeli Grid. The Old Israeli Grid (also ICS or Israeli Cassini Soldner), established under the British Mandate, measures locations in Israel as an alternative to using degrees of latitude and longitude. Coordinates consist of two numbers, the first of which is the easting (usually given in six digits) and the second of which is the northing (usually also in six digits, but sometimes seven). These coordinates indicate the distance in meters east and north of a point called the “false origin.” The New Israeli Grid (ITM or Israeli Transverse Mercator), established in 1994, corrects this system to allow all coordinates within Israel to be given as positive numbers. opus sectile. A marble inlaid floor orchestra. Greek term for the place on which the chorus danced; in Roman theaters, a semicircular area at the base of the cavea and directly in front of the stage ossilegium. Latin, “bone gathering,” also called secondary burial. In ossilegium, typically a corpse is placed in a rock-cut tomb for one year, after which the desiccated bones are placed in an ossuary or in an area in the tomb containing bones of several individuals. See also ossuary; rock-cut tomb ossuary. A small stone (sometimes clay) box for holding human bones after the flesh has decayed; used in the practice of ossilegium otzar. A small pool supplying naturally collected water to a mikveh palaestra. A wrestling school parodos (pl. parodoi). Greek, “passage.” In a Greek or Roman theater, the parodoi were usually two entrances, parallel to the stage, through which people (members of the chorus or people of high station) gained entrance to the orchestra. peristyle. From a Greek term denoting surrounding something with columns; a colonnade around a court or structure pileum. A conical felt hat pithos (pl. pithoi). Large ceramic vessel

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447

platea. In a city, a broad avenue; in a house, a courtyard Pompeian style frescoes. The mural painting typical of houses in Pompeii, Italy praefurnium. A Roman bath’s heating room progradation. The growth and extension of sedimentary deposits in a body of water. The term often applies to river deltas. propylaeum. A pillared or arched gate proscaenium. Latin from Greek proskēnion, “in front of the skēnē”; the front wall of the stage, from which one stepped down into the orchestra quadriporticus. A square atrium surrounded by roofed colonnades red ware. Various types of fine ceramic ware, some of them imported into Palestine, some made locally, not all of them red rock-cut tomb. A cave carved by humans, or a natural cave enlarged by humans, in the side of a hill, in contrast to a shaft cut vertically into the ground or bedrock sarcophagus (pl. sarcophagi). From a Greek word meaning “flesh eater”; a stone coffin. Some sarcophagi appear in rock-cut tombs, whereas others are left on the surface. scaena (also scaenae frons). A Latin word derived from Greek skēnē (“tent” or “booth”); in a Greek or Roman theater, the building behind the stage that served as the backdrop for performances secco. Painting on dry plaster. See also fresco secondary burial. See ossilegium section. The vertical, earthen side of an archaeological square/area (sometimes also called a “balk”) that shows the human-made and natural features, particularly as they relate to architecture. For example, a section can reveal a wall’s foundation trench or successive layers of eroded soil. Archaeologists usually draw sections to scale to preserve this record. shaft tomb. A deep rectangular burial chamber shofar. A musical instrument fashioned from a ram’s horn spatha. From Greek spathē, a long Roman sword, distinguished from the shorter gladius spatula (pl. spatulae). A small, flat, blunt-bladed instrument for applying makeup specillum (pl. specilla). A small surgical probe for examining the body spolia (also “spoils”). Reused building stones square (also “area”; sometimes “trench” or “probe”). Archaeologists usually dig square holes on a grid oriented on the compass in order to impose scientific control. Grids vary, but in archaeological excavations in the Galilee, it is standard to lay out a grid of 5 x 5 meter

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Glossary squares separated by balks one meter wide. Hence, most excavated squares measure 4 x 4 meters.

strigilis (pl. strigiles). A curved knife with a blunt edge used for scraping oil from the body after bathing stylobate. From a Greek word denoting “that on which columns tread”; a low wall, often only a few centimeters higher than a floor, and sometimes flush with the floor, upon which a row of columns sits suspensurae (pl. of suspensura). A series of vaults or arches for supporting superstructure tabun. A domed oven made of coarse ceramic material temenos. From a Greek word “to cut”; a section of land reserved for special or sacred use; a sacred precinct in front of a temple terra sigillata (sometimes simply “sigillata”). Latin, “signed earth”; a type of red ware, typically classified as “eastern” or “western” depending on the region of its origin in the area of the Mediterranean. See red ware tetradrachm. Greek silver coin worth four drachmas thermae (pl. of therma). A bath complex. The term denotes warm baths. tetrarch. Greek, “ruler of a fourth.” Antipas and Philip, sons of Herod the Great, ruled parts of their father’s former kingdom as tetrarchs. toparchy. A small region with a primary, governing town triclinium. Latin, “three couches”; the dining room of a Roman house tubuli. Small pipes or tubes unguentarium (pl. unguentaria). A small bottle, usually for holding perfume vomitorium (pl. vomitoria). Latin, “place of spewing” or “outlet”; a passageway through which visitors entered the cavea of a theater wadi. Arabic, “valley.” In the Levant, wadi usually refers to a narrow valley or riverbed (an arroyo) between hills; wadis are typically dry in summer; the Hebrew term is nah\al (‫)נחל‬.

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CONTRIBUTORS David Adan-Bayewitz Dr. Simon Krauthammer Professor of Archaeology, Department of Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology, Bar-Ilan University Yardenna Alexandre Field and Research Archaeologist, Israel Antiquities Authority, Northern Region Rami Arav Associate Professor, Department of Religion, Director, Bethsaida Excavations Project, University of Nebraska at Omaha Mordechai Aviam Senior Lecturer, Kinneret Academic College, Institute for Galilean Archaeology Andrea M. Berlin James R. Wiseman Chair in Classical Archaeology, Director of Graduate Studies, Department of Archaeology, Boston University Katia Cytryn-Silverman The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Director, Tiberias Excavations Stefano De Luca, ofm Director of the Magdala Project, Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem David A. Fiensy Professor of New Testament and Dean of the Graduate School, Kentucky Christian University Benjamin D. Gordon Perlow Lecturer in Classical Judaism and the Ancient Near East, University of Pittsburgh Matthew J. Grey Assistant Professor of Ancient Scripture, Brigham Young University Sharon C. Herbert J. G. Pedley Collegiate Professor of Classical Archaeology, University of Michigan

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Uzi Leibner Senior Lecturer in Classical Archaeology, Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Anna Lena Assistant Director of the Magdala Project F. Massimo Luca, ofm Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem Sharon Lea Mattila Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy and Religion, University of North Carolina at Pembroke C. Thomas McCollough Nelson D. and Mary McDowell Rodes Professor of Religion, Centre College Carol L. Meyers Mary Grace Wilson Professor Emerita, Department of Religious Studies, Duke University Eric M. Meyers Bernice and Morton Lerner Professor Emeritus of Jewish Studies and Archaeology, Duke University Carl E. Savage Associate Professor in the Practice of Professional Leadership and Biblical Studies, Theological School, Drew University Chad S. Spigel Associate Professor, Department of Religion, Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas  James F. Strange Distinguished University Professor, University of South Florida James Riley Strange Associate Professor, Department of Religion, Samford University Zeev Weiss Eleazar L. Sukenik Professor of Archaeology at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem

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Abbreviations AASOR ABD

Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research The Anchor Bible Dictionary. Edited by David Noel Freedman. 6 vols. New York: Doubleday, 1992. ADPV Abhandlungen des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins AGAJU Arbeiten zur Geschichte des antiken Judentums und des Urchristentums AJA American Journal of Archaeology AJP American Journal of Philology AJSR Association for Jewish Studies Review ANRW Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung. Edited by H. Temporini and W. Haase. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972–. AOAT Alter Orient und Altes Testament AYBRL Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library BA Biblical Archaeologist BAIAS Bulletin of the Anglo-Israel Archeological Society BASOR Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research BAR Biblical Archaeology Review BETL Bibliotheca ephemeridum theologicarum lovaniensium Bib Biblica BJS Brown Judaic Studies BTB Biblical Theology Bulletin CBQ Catholic Biblical Quarterly  CHANE Culture and History of the Ancient Near East ConBNT Coniectanea biblica: New Testament CQ  Classical Quarterly DJD Discoveries in the Judaean Desert DSD Dead Sea Discoveries EncJud Encyclopedia Judaica. 16 vols. Jerusalem, 1972. ErIsr Eretz Israel ESI Excavations and Surveys in Israel FRLANT Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments HA-ESI Hadashot Arkheologiyot – Excavations and Surveys in Israel 451

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452

Abbreviations

HUCA Hebrew Union College Annual IEJ Israel Exploration Journal INJ Israel Numismatic Journal Int Interpretation JAC Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum Jastrow Marcus Jastrow. A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature. 2 vols. New York: Pardes, 1950. JBL Journal of Biblical Literature JESHO Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient JJS Journal of Jewish Studies JJSSup Journal of Jewish Studies Supplements Josephus   Ant. Antiquities   C. Ap. Contra Apionem   J.W. Jewish War JPOS Journal of the Palestine Oriental Society JQR Jewish Quarterly Review JR Journal of Religion JRA Journal of Roman Archaeology JRASS Journal of Roman Archaeology Supplement Series JRS Journal of Roman Studies JSHJ Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus JSJ Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic, and Roman Period JSJSup Journal for the Study of Judaism: Supplement Series JSNT Journal for the Study of the New Testament JSNTSup Journal for the Study of the New Testament: Supplement Series JSOT Journal for the Study of the Old Testament JSOTSup Journal for the Study of the Old Testament: Supplement Series JSPSup Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha: Supplement Series JTS Journal of Theological Studies LCL Loeb Classical Library LSJ Liddell, H. G., R. Scott, and H. S. Jones. A Greek-English Lexicon. 9th ed. with revised supplement. Oxford: Clarenton, 1966. LXX Septuagint MT Masoretic Text NEA Near Eastern Archaeology NEAEHL The New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land. Edited by Ephraim Stern. 4 vols. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society and Carta, 1993 NIGTC New International Greek Testament Commentary

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NovT NovTSup NTS NTTS OBO OCD OEANE OTL PEQ PG PL

Abbreviations

453

Novum Testamentum Supplements to Novum Testamentum New Testament Studies New Testament Tools and Studies Orbis biblicus et orientalis The Oxford Classical Dictionary. Edited by Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East. Edited by Eric M. Meyers. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. Old Testament Library Palestine Exploration Quarterly Patrologia cursus completus: Series graeca. Edited by J.-P. Migne. 162 vols. Paris, 1857–86 Patrologia cursus completus: Series latina. Edited by J.-P. Migne. 217 vols. Paris, 1844–64.

Pliny   Nat. Naturalis historia QDAP Quarterly of the Department of Antiquities in Palestine RB Revue biblique RevQ Revue de Qumrân RQ Römische Quartalschrift für christliche Altertumskunde und Kirchengeschichte SBFLA Studii biblici Franciscani Liber Annuus SBLDS Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series SBLMS Society of Biblical Literature Monograph Series SBLSP Society of Biblical Literature Seminar Papers SBT Studies in Biblical Theology SemeiaSt Semeia Studies SJLA Studies in Judaism in Late Antiquity SNTSMS Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series ST Studia Theologica STDJ Studies on the Texts of the Desert of Judah StPB Studia Post-Biblica Strabo   Geogr. Geographica SUNT Studien zur Umwelt des Neuen Testaments TANZ Texte und Arbeiten zum neutestamentlichen Zeitalter TAPA Transactions of the American Philological Association TBei Theologische Beiträge

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454

Abbreviations

TIR

Tabula Imperii Romani Judaea-Palaestina: Maps and Gazetteer. Edited by Yoram Tsafrir, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994. TLZ Theologische Literaturzeitung TRE Theologische Realenzyklopädie. Edited by G. Krause and G. Müller. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1977. TSAJ Texte und Studien zum antiken Judentum/Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism TTKi Tidsskrift for Teologie og Kirke TynBul Tyndale Bulletin UF Ugarit-Forschungen VTSup Supplements to Vetus Testamentum WUNT Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament ZDPV Zeitschrift des deutschen Palästina-Vereins ZPE Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 

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Index of Ancient Sources Hebrew Bible Exodus 28:36 315

Ezekiel 10:6 315 43:1–9 315

Leviticus 15:13 307

Daniel 7:9 315 7:10 314

Joshua 12:22 424 15:37 287 19:10–16 158 19:12 167 19:28 158 19:34 364 19:35 211 20:7 424 21:32 424 1 Kings 6:29 315 17:9 167 32:35 315 1 Chronicles 6:75 364 24:1–19 89 Nehemiah 12:1–19 89 Isaiah 55:13 177

Apocrypha 1 Maccabees 5:9–20 175 5:14–24 148 5:15–23 9 11:63–74 10 11:63–67 424 14:35 282 15:28–36 435 New Testament Matthew 4:23 366 5:3 277 5:14 23 5:21–48 1 11:21 259 11:63–67 424 13:31–32 367, 371 13:54 173 14:34 282 15:39 286 27:56, 61 287 28:1 287

Mark 1:16–21 362, 366 4:30–32 367, 371 6:1 173 6:1, 9 287 6:45 259 6:53 282 8:10 286 8:22 259 12 430 12:42 27 15:40, 47 287 16:1, 9 287 Luke 4:16–30 177 6:20 277 8:1–3 366 8:2 287 9:10 259 10:13 259 13:18–19 371 24:10 287 John 1:44 259 2 159 2:1–11 133, 155 2:6–7 49 4:46–54 155 4:46–50 133 11:54 23

455

GalileeII_B.indd 455

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456

Index of Ancient Sources

John (continued) 12:21 259 19:25 287 20:1, 18 287 21:1–2 133 21:2 155

18.36 211 20.118 295 20.158–159 282, 296 20.159 327 23.334–344 25

Old Testament Pseudepigrapha 1 Enoch 14:18 315 14:18b 314 Dead Sea Scrolls 4QShirShabbf (4Q405) 22.9–10a 315 22.10b 314 Josephus Antiquities 8.36 295 10.213 295 12.4 150 12.330–334 175 12.348 295 13.256–258 16 13.318–319 16 13.337–338 41 13.337 88 13.338 41 14.119–120 281 14.207 295 14.280 26 14.413–414 17 14.413 27 14.420–430 27 14.490–491 27 15.294 295 17.271 53, 57, 77 17.289 27, 41 18.27 27, 41, 53, 77 18.28 259

GalileeII_B.indd 456

Jewish War 1.64–67 11 1.65 16 1.70 26, 41 1.86 88 1.180 281 1.303–306 281 1.307–314 355 2.30–31 43 2.56 53, 57 2.68 27, 41 2.168 259 2.188 295 2.232 295 2.252 296, 327 2.365–645 294 2.459 424 2.511 27 2.252 282 2.572–573 196 2.573 90, 172, 283, 352, 355, 365 2.574 54 2.575 391, 398 2.585–646 391 2.590–595 18 2.590–592 400 2.595 295 2.596 283 2.599 283, 327 2.606 328 2.608 327 2.609 328 2.618–619 297 2.632–641 283 2.635 331 2.645 54

3.6.3 153 3.30 29 3.31–34 29 3.39 295 3.43 89 3.48 295 3.55 293 3.128–131 153 3.158–160 109 3.166–171 119 3.213–221 119 3.324–339 119 3.362 295 3.443–542 291 3.445 293 3.446 296 3.447–460 293 3.447 295 3.460–61 196 3.460 293 3.462–542 283 3.462–465 328 3.462 293 3.463–466 293 3.466–469 294 3.467–469 294 3.470–503 283 3.470 294 3.485 294 3.486 289, 293 3.487–501 294 3.487–491 294 3.487 294 3.500 328 3.505 294 3.506 294 3.516–521 283, 294 3.522–531 294, 331 3.523 331 3.531 327 3.532 327 3.537 293 3.539–542 327

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Index of Ancient Sources

3.542 294, 327, 328 4.1–2 283 4.1 294 4.11 211, 294 4.12 293 4.54 295 4.70–83 283 4.83 294 4.100 295 4.104 424 4.112–120 391 4.451–459 296 4.451–458 295 4.451 295 4.452–454 295 4.455 295 4.456 296 4.458 296 4.459 295 4.484 282

159 328 163–164 283 188 90, 293, 365 189 391 206 130 207 90 230 172 232 27 233 90 276 293 312 327 318 327 373 54, 58 380 54 384 90 394 58 398–406 296 404 296 411 54, 58

Life 10 398 37–39 29 38–39 55 43 391 70–76 400 71–72 259 86 129, 130, 134, 152, 158 96 283, 297 104–111 55 127 283 131 328 132–154 283 142 327, 328 143 328 152 328 155–156 331 156–159 283 156 293, 328 157 292, 298 162 328

GalileeII_B.indd 457

Rabbinic Literature Mishnah ’Abot 4:20 236 ‘Arakin 9:6

26, 89, 392

Baba Batra 1:6 236 2:8 236 2:9 416 3:1 236 4:1–5 236 4:3 236 4:5 236 4:7 236 4:8–9 236 6:7 32 10:7 236 Baba Mes \i‘a 7:4 236

457 8:8 32 10:4 236 ‘Erubin 8.7 32 H|allah 1:9 236 Makkot 3:5 236 Menah\ot 8:3 414 11:4 316 Miqwa’ot 1, 4, 7 56 9:1–3 418 Nedarim 5:3 236 ’Ohalot 18:7b 134 18:9 134 Qiddušin 4:5 55 Šebi‘it 5:8 236 9:2 181 Terumot 3:4 236 T|ohorot 2:8 236 9:8 236 10:1–3 236 10:3 236

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458

Index of Ancient Sources

Tosefta Baba Batra 3:1 236 3:2 236 11:12 236

Horayot 3:1, 47a

Baba Mes \i‘a 6:3 90 8:27 236 H|ullin 2:24 90 3:2 49 Me‘illah 2:9 90 Niddah 8:6 90 Šabbat 13:9 89 Šebi‘it 7:15 392 Ta‘anit 1:3 89 1:13 89 Terumot 7:14 90 Talmud of Israel ‘Abodah Zarah 16b–17a 90 Berakot 3:9, 14a 280 51a 296 ‘Erubin 4:3, 21d 280 4:16 298 5, 22d 298 5:1, 22c 298

GalileeII_B.indd 458

280, 297

Kila’yim 9:3 32 Ma‘aśer Šeni 3:1, 50c 5:2, 56b

280 296, 297

Megillah 1:1, 70a 3:1, 73d

295 280, 297

Nazir 56a Nedarim 51a 70 Peah 7:4 90 Pesah\im 1:4, 27c 3:2, 30a 4:1, 30d

367 298 297, 343

Šabbat 6.8a 32 12:3.13c 71 16:7 89 Sanhedrin 2:1, 19d

280, 297

Šebi‘it 9:1, 38c 9:1, 38d

367, 371 297

Šeqalim 7.50c 49

Ta‘anit 1:6, 64c 80, 297, 343 4:5, 69a 280, 296, 343 4:6, 68d 89, 288, 297 4:69a 90 Terumot 8:6, 45d

90

Talmud of Babylonia Baba Batra 8a 71 Baba Mes \i‘a 74a 90 25a 280 Berakot 43a 71 57b 71 ‘Erubin 54b 62 85b–86a 71 87a 77 Ketubbot 111b 90 Megillah 6a 43 Menah\ot 85b

18, 392

Nedarim 51a 71 Niddah 27b 280 33a 280 66b 418

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Index of Ancient Sources

Parah 3:3 49

Genesis Rabbah 5:9 280 13:15 280 20:8 280 79:6 280, 297 93:7 280 98:20 280

Pesah\im 46a 280, 298 53a 392 Šabbat 16:121a 89 33b 72 120b 90 139a 280 Sanhedrin 38a 71 43a 173 43a–b 90

Lamentations Rabbah 2:2 90 2:2.4, 21c 280, 296, 297 2:2.4, 21d 280, 297 3:8 280 3:8.3 296, 297 Leviticus Rabbah 17:4 280, 343

459 Protevangelium of James 9 169 Classical, Ancient Christian, and Pilgrim Writings Abbot Daniel 291 Adomnan De locis sanctis 26.1 170 Ah\mad ibn Yah\yā ibn Jābir al-Bāladhurī 187

Ta‘anit 16a 416

Midrash Samuel 7:5 280, 297

Bordeaux Pilgrim Itinerarium Burdigalense 174

Yoma 81b 280

Pesiqta Rabbati 17:6 280

Burchard of Mount Sion 291

Other Rabbinic Works Canticles Rabbah 1:12.1, 12a 280, 297 3:10 280

Pesiqta de Rab Kahana 7:10 280 11:16 280, 297

Deuteronomy Rabbah 89 Ecclesiastes Rabbah 2:8 174 10:8.1, 27a 280 Esther Rabbah 2:3 71 Ecclesiastes Rabbah 1:8, 4a 280 2:8 392 10:8.1, 27a 297 11:2 392, 393

GalileeII_B.indd 459

Piyyut\im 174

Cassius Dio Historia Romana 69.12.3

280

Cassius Longinus Ad Familiares 12.11 281

Semah\ot 4 416

Commemoratorium de cassis Dei 161

Sifrei Deut. 316 18

Egeria Itinerarium 173

Ruth Rabbah 2:10, 4d

Piyyut\im 174 New Testament Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha Gospel of Thomas 20 371

Epiphanius Panarion (Adversus haereses) 29.9.2 173 30.11.9–10 173 (see also 161, 291)

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460

Index of Ancient Sources

Eusebius Historia ecclesiastica 1.7.14 173

Peregrinatio S. Paulae 13.4 159

Panarion 30 35

Johannes Phocas 161 Nās \ir-i Khusraw 187

Onomasticon 88 367 114 129 116 129 138 173 (Klostermann edition) 22,5; 28,23;   70,9; 98,24 34

Origen Commentarii in evangelium Joannis 173

Frontius De aquaeductu 1.5 76, 77

Piacenza Pilgrim (Anonymus Placentinus) Itinerarium 161 36, 132, 160 (see also 174)

Jerome (Hieronymos) Chronicon Eusebii a Graeco Latine redditum et continuatum 89 367 238 34 Commentariorum in Epistulam ad Philemonem liber 393 De situ et nominibus locorum Hebraicorum 173 De viris illustribus 5 393 Epistulae 35, 46 108

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159 159, 174

Palladius Lausiac History 46 35

Pliny the Elder Naturalis historia 5.71–72 292 5.71 283 Ptolemy Geographica 5.16.4 23 Sanctae Helenae et Constantini Vita 291

Stephanus of Byzantium Ethnika 603.15 283 Strabo Geographica 16.2.45

282, 283

Suetonius Titus 4.3 283 Tabula Peutingeriana (Peutinger Map) 174 Tacitus Historiae 5.6.2–7 282 Theodoric 291 Theodosius De situ terrae sanctae 139 160 (see also 291) Vitruvius De architectura 8.6.1 76 Willibald

160, 291

Yaqût al-H|amawi 3.410 295

Sextus Julius Africanus Epistula Aristidem V 173

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Index of Subjects AANS (Average Annual Number of Specimens), 238–39, 241, 245, 248, 443 Acco (Akko), 22, 25, 39, 96, 127, 134, 140, 146, 148, 156, 181, 227, 346, 390, 429, 433, 435 agoranomos (plural agoranomoi), 310, 327, 443 Agrarian, 2, 282 Agrippa I, xiii, xv, 29, 30, 186 Agrippa II, xiii, 30, 55, 186, 244–45, 268, 310, 328 Alexander Jannaeus, xii, 25, 34, 41, 150, 175, 303, 369 amphora, 13, 19, 91, 111, 175, 200, 201, 244, 261–62, 264, 270–71, 273, 286, 309, 310–11, 313, 330, 430, 433, 435, 443 anonymous follis (pl. folles), 207, 208, 443 Antigonus, xii, 17, 26, 27, 313 Antipas, xi, xii, 3, 27–29, 41–43, 50, 53–54, 57, 62, 67, 77, 186, 195, 211–12, 258, 370, 400–401, 448 apse, 131, 155, 163–65, 199–201, 203, 299 Arbel, 27, 281, 283, 289–90, 293–94, 297–98,

343–44, 348–49, 353, 355, 358 aqueduct, G-8, 29, 32, 40, 68–69, 76–87, 97, 127, 182, 185, 290, 299–300, 303–6, 309–11 archaeological surveys, 3, 163, 298, 362, 397 arcosolium (plu. Arcosolia), 93, 143, 416, 443 Aristobulus I, xi, xii, 12, 16, 18, 26, 41, 89, 303 ARS (African Red Slip Ware), 225, 240, 443 aryballos (pl. aryballoi), 197, 322–24, 443 ashlar, 45, 66, 112, 166, 183–84, 204, 227, 231, 306, 324, 367, 443 balk (British “baulk”), 443, 447–48 ballista (Lat.; Gr. ballistra), 116–19, 137, 443 Bar Kokhba, xi, xv, 73, 90, 102–3, 245, 274, 281, 345, 353, 359 basalt, 97, 150, 195, 197, 201, 203, 206, 225, 227, 231, 234, 260, 263, 266–67, 274, 277, 306, 318, 320, 326, 329, 346, 348, 358, 364, 445

basilica (basilical building) G-8, 28, 33, 35, 39, 45, 79, 105, 163, 174, 189, 196, 198, 202, 213, 214–15, 218, 226, 330, 357, 380, 383, 405–6, 408, 422, 446 baths, G-9, 16–17, 26, 30–32, 34, 45, 47–49, 55, 59, 68–70, 72–73, 122, 138, 140, 150, 176, 189, 195, 197, 200, 202–5, 212–14, 227, 291, 302–3, 305–7, 309, 311, 319–20, 323–24, 327, 371–72, 399, 416–18, 424, 443, 445, 447–48 bema, 141–42, 199, 201, 215, 358, 383, 406, 409, 412, 418–20, 422, 443 Bet ha-Midrash, 59, 142, 187, 190, 195, 312 Bethsaida, G-3, 211, 258–79, 295–96, 366 boss, 45, 103, 324–25, 384, 443 Byzantine, ix, 36, 48–50, 68, 85, 98, 127, 131–32, 137–38, 141, 144, 147, 154–55, 156, 162, 165–66, 169–70, 172, 175, 177–78, 181–82, 184–85, 189–92,

461

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462 Byzantine (continued) 195–200, 202–3, 205–6, 212, 214, 216–18, 226–29, 237, 240, 241, 245, 247–48, 250–53, 290–91, 299–300, 305, 309–11, 317, 326, 245, 356, 359–60, 362–63, 365, 368–73, 375, 380, 387, 397, 400, 405, 409–12, 416, 418, 421, 443 caldarium (pl. caldaria), 68–69, 227, 299, 302, 319–20, 322, 443 Cana, 49, 127, 129–30, 132–34, 137, 151–56, 158–61, 163, 166, 177, 259, 287, 364 Capernaum, G-5, G-6, 5, 22, 35, 122, 129, 133, 158–59, 173, 177, 211, 215, 217–60, 272, 281, 283, 292, 296, 308, 310, 366 cardo, G-7, 28, 31, 34–36, 39–40, 61–62, 68–69, 192–93, 195, 202, 204–5, 212, 304, 444 casemate, 116–19, 326, 443 cavea, 35, 67, 193, 444 chalk vessels. See stone vessels church(es), 33–35, 129, 155–56, 158–65, 169–70, 172, 174–77, 187, 189–91, 198–201, 217, 253, 290, 394, 418, 446 cippus, 329, 444 cities, 2, 3, 5, 16, 20, 22–27, 29–32, 34–36, 39–45, 53–55, 57–59, 61–65,

GalileeII_B.indd 462

Index of Subjects 67–69, 71–72, 76–77, 79–81, 84–86, 89–91, 96, 106, 115, 122, 124–25, 127, 134, 137, 140, 148, 151, 153–54, 158, 160, 177, 186–88, 191–92, 195–98, 200–204, 211–13, 217, 246–47, 258–60, 262– 69, 276–77, 281–84, 286–91, 293–99, 303, 305, 313, 324–25, 327–28, 330, 388–92, 394–95, 397, 401, 416, 424–25, 429, 432–33, 444–45, 447 cist tomb, 373, 444 cistern, 44–45, 49, 55, 58, 66–69, 76–79, 96–97, 112–13, 120–21, 137– 38, 152, 163, 169–70, 198, 203, 207, 306, 355, 370, 372, 374–75, 385, 389, 398, 416, 418 cloaca, 325, 444 coins, numismatics, 11–12, 15–19, 23, 27, 30, 31, 34, 36, 41–42, 49, 58, 62, 64–65, 85, 98, 103, 111, 118, 124, 127, 134, 137, 140, 143, 148, 152, 154, 175, 177, 183, 201, 204, 207–8, 214, 217, 221–23, 225–26, 237, 241, 243–52, 260–62, 267–72, 278, 303, 310, 312–13, 316, 329, 345– 46, 350–52, 355–59, 365, 367–70, 374, 384, 386–88, 399–401, 407, 409, 420–22, 433, 435, 437, 443–44, 446, 448 columbarium, 138–39

commerce, 39, 413. See also trade cooking pot, 13, 86, 100, 143, 183–84, 239, 369, 373, 400 corbel/corbeled arch/corbeling, 306–7, 322, 346, 352, 444 courtyard, 33–34, 45, 55, 63–64, 68, 71, 77, 113, 120, 137–38, 143, 150, 155, 163, 190, 195, 203, 205, 207, 213, 222–23, 225, 230, 231–34, 236–37, 245, 253, 262–65, 272, 306–7, 346–48, 352, 374–75, 384–85, 392, 410, 427, 429, 431, 447 CRS (Cypriot Red Slip Ware), 225, 240, 250, 444 decumanus, G-7, G-8, 28, 31, 40, 61–62, 64–65, 305, 444 Early Roman, ix, 15, 18–19, 29, 30, 34, 42–43, 45, 47–49, 55–56, 58, 81, 91, 98, 103, 112, 116, 118, 124, 127, 134, 137– 41, 143–44, 147–48, 150–53, 166, 169, 172, 175–76, 182, 184–85, 189, 191, 195–97, 226, 244–45, 253, 266, 269, 289, 306–8, 315, 320, 326–28, 345–50, 352– 53, 355–56, 358–59, 362–63, 365–66, 368, 370–74, 376, 380, 382, 384, 398–401, 405–6, 410–11, 443

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earthquakes, 31, 34, 42, 85, 98, 154, 164, 187–88, 199, 201, 203–4, 208–9, 218, 231, 248, 290–91, 306, 326, 358, 380, 397–99, 407, 412, 420–21, 438 Eastern Terra Sigillata (ETS). See Terra Sigillata economics, 2, 5, 16–17, 45–46, 49, 59, 69, 71, 89, 115, 144, 154, 244, 247, 249, 250–51, 260–61, 269, 308, 311, 330, 345, 387, 400–401, 428 engaged column, 64, 444 ethnarch, xiii, 77, 444 ethnicity, 4, 196 etrog, 201, 444 ETS. See terra sigillata (sometimes “eastern sigillata”) Excavation Square, 99–101, 117, 146, 184–85, 443, 445, 447–48 fish(-ing), 17, 187, 200, 202, 226, 262–63, 266, 268, 280, 282–83, 286, 288–89, 299, 306–7, 309, 310–11, 369, 405 fistula (pl. fistulas), 324, 444 follis, 127, 207, 208, 252, 443, 444 fresco, G-1, 10, 45, 57, 114–15, 120, 124, 199, 231, 277, 312–13, 322, 444, 447 frieze, 67, 267, 329–30 gabled roof, 118, 444 Gadara, 86, 246, 276, 298, 328, 331 Galilean Coarse Ware (GCW), 10, 111, 330, 398, 399, 401, 444

GalileeII_B.indd 463

Index of Subjects Gamaliel, 134, 227 Gamla, xi, 13, 18, 57, 115, 119, 122–23, 125, 137, 141, 177, 262, 266, 283, 292–94, 313, 316, 331, 346, 348, 350–51 Gischala. See Gush Halav glacis, 116, 398, 444 glass, 105, 132, 175, 220, 234, 245, 253, 272–73, 311, 324, 329–30, 345, 351, 373–74, 386, 411, 427, 435–36 Great Revolt (Jewish Revolt), xi, 34, 53, 58, 68, 119, 127, 134, 137, 141, 152, 164, 244, 268, 283, 293, 316, 328, 343, 351, 353, 355, 364, 374–76, 405 Gush H|alav (Gischala), 5, 141, 389–403, 424 Halakhah, 56, 90 halteres, 322, 324, 445 Hamath Tiberias, G-9, 211–16 Hasmonean, xii, 3, 10–13, 15–20, 27–28, 41, 44, 89, 98, 111–12, 116, 119, 124, 134, 137, 147–48, 150, 244, 246, 261, 264, 269–70, 281–82, 289, 303, 315, 326, 238–39, 246, 259, 264–65, 269, 276, 284, 400, 424, 434–36 Hellenistic, ix, xii, 10–19, 25–26, 41, 47, 49, 55, 76–77, 89, 91, 98, 105, 111–13, 116, 124, 127, 134, 137, 141, 144, 147–48, 150, 154–55, 164, 166, 172, 175–76, 182, 212–18, 225–26,

463 241–42, 244–45, 253, 260–65, 268–72, 274–78, 283, 289–90, 299, 303, 305–6, 312, 217, 219, 325, 327, 330, 346, 362–63, 365–66, 368, 370, 373, 376, 380, 384, 387, 396–401, 425, 427, 436, 444 Herod the Great, xi, xii, 27, 41, 53, 57, 77, 186, 266, 366, 401, 448 Herodian, xiii, 17, 27, 35, 45, 50, 102, 115, 123, 129, 140, 176, 214, 258, 261, 264, 268–70, 275, 312, 314, 320, 329, 351, 369, 384, 400, 443 Hippos, 276, 292, 328, 331 household/house, 5, 22, 28, 33–35, 40, 43–45, 47–48, 55–57, 65, 69–72, 79, 81–82, 89, 99, 105, 111–15, 117–25, 137–38, 146, 148, 150–54, 159–61, 167, 169, 174, 176, 187, 189–90, 195, 207–8, 215, 225–31, 233–37, 240, 245, 248, 250–51, 253, 262–66, 268, 272, 277, 291, 302–3, 305–8, 311, 346, 351–52, 380, 385–87, 392, 399, 405, 410–11, 419, 422, 427–29, 435–37, 445, 447–48 hypocaust bath system, 68, 202, 227, 445 Hyrcanus II, xii, 444 industry, 17–19, 88, 106, 140, 234, 283, 309

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464 inscription(s), 10, 14, 16, 23, 31–34, 36, 40, 85, 89, 105, 121, 143, 155, 162–63, 166, 175, 177, 182, 185, 192, 196, 199–201, 204, 208, 212, 215, 246, 286, 288, 290, 322, 330, 369, 386, 393–95, 406–8, 412, 431, 433, 438 in situ, 19, 45, 95–96, 131, 152, 154, 185, 197, 199, 205, 234, 267, 319–20, 325, 385–86, 445 insula (pl. insulae), 63, 204, 225, 356, 445 Islamic, G-2, ix, 50, 98, 176, 178, 186–88, 191–93, 195–97, 199, 201–6, 267, 273, 299, 326 ITM (Israeli Transverse Mercator), 88, 445, 446 Itureans, 10, 16, 19 Jerusalem, xi, xv, 10–11, 18, 27, 32, 34–35, 45, 47, 49, 56, 58, 90, 115, 121, 123–25, 143, 150, 161, 177, 182, 186–88, 201, 212–15, 217, 244–46, 266, 268, 274–78, 288, 296, 298, 312–13, 316– 17, 356, 373, 382–83, 391–93, 405, 415, 419, 434, 437, 443, 445 Jesus of Nazareth, xi, xvii, 1, 3–4, 23, 35, 42, 90, 92–93, 115, 129, 132–33, 155, 158, 163, 167, 172–73, 177, 211, 216–17, 258–60, 277–78, 286–87, 364, 366, 371, 376

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Index of Subjects Jewish Revolt. See Great Revolt John, Gospel of, 23, 49, 129, 132–33, 154–55, 158–61, 166, 259, 287 John of Gischala, 391, 400–401 John Hyrcanus I, xi, xii, 11, 16, 25–26, 148, 261, 282, 444 Josephus, xvii, 3–4, 9, 11–13, 16–20, 22, 25–27, 29, 36, 41–42, 53–55, 57–58, 77, 88–91, 109–10, 112, 117, 119, 120–21, 125, 129–30, 134, 137, 150, 152–53, 158, 172, 175, 196, 211, 213, 259, 281–83, 289, 292–93, 295–98, 327–28, 331, 353, 355, 365, 375, 389, 391, 398, 400, 424 Jotapata. See Yodefat Kafr Kanna, G-4, 118, 129, 146, 154, 155–56, 158–66 kantharos, 316, 322, 324, 445 Kedesh, G-1, 10–12, 17, 424–41 Kefar Hananya, 114, 150, 153, 181–85, 244 Khirbet Qana, 127–45, 156, 158, 161 kiln, 98–101, 103, 114, 118–19, 140, 150, 153, 182–84, 273 kokh (pl. kokhim), 154, 245, 399, 445 Korazim windows (also “window wall”), 346–47, 445 krater, 100, 150, 161, 351 lacustrine, 326–27, 445

lagynos, 432, 445 lamps, 18–19, 30, 46, 83–84, 88, 90–91, 93, 98–103, 105–6, 111, 114–15, 121, 123–24, 129, 150, 175–76, 208, 214, 230, 237, 239, 273–75, 313–14, 317, 329, 345, 351–52, 369–70, 374, 384, 407, 409, 411–12 Late Roman, ix, 42, 48, 67, 98–99, 147, 154, 177, 182, 184, 215–16, 225, 240, 245, 249, 283, 286, 288, 290, 299, 303, 305– 6, 311, 318, 324, 326, 343, 345, 348–50, 352, 356, 362–63, 366–73, 375, 380, 382, 384–85, 387–88, 405–8, 410–12, 416, 421, 444–45 latrina, 302, 305, 307, 320, 324, 445 limestone, 24, 28, 62, 83, 97, 104–5, 116, 146, 175– 76, 198, 219–20, 225, 245, 266, 273–74, 289, 306, 312, 319, 357–59, 364, 370–71, 373–74, 389, 427, 429–30 locus (pl. loci), 98, 103, 223, 225, 230–31, 237, 284, 368, 384, 410, 421, 445 loculus (pl. loculi), 143, 382, 445 loom weights, 97, 113–14, 150, 264 LRC (Late Roman Ware), 225, 240, 250, 445 Luke, Gospel of, 177, 259, 277, 287, 366 lulav, 182, 201, 215, 445

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Magdala, xi, 16–17, 19, 57, 90, 122, 177, 226, 248, 258, 280–342, 349–50, 355, 366, 412 mansion, 71, 114–15, 122 Mark, Gospel of, 173, 259, 282, 286–87, 366, 430 market(s), 5, 36, 55, 62, 73, 101, 205, 212, 244, 249, 264, 308, 310, 370, 388, 400, 411 Matthew, Gospel of, 1, 23, 173, 259, 277, 282, 286–97, 366, 371 Meiron, 5, 91, 182, 250, 379–89, 404, 411, 415–16, 422 menorah, 91, 93, 124, 182, 208–9, 215, 313–14, 418–19, 420, 445 merchants, 324, 400 metal objects, 345, 411 Middle Roman, G-2, ix, 42, 45, 48, 137, 141, 147, 152–53, 155, 246, 305, 328, 343, 345–46, 355–56, 363, 365, 368, 369, 372–73, 376, 380, 387, 401, 405, 410–12 midrash, 174, 280, 297, 392 mikveh, mikva’ot, G-7, 11–12, 19, 30, 55–56, 68, 91, 113, 120–22, 138, 140, 143, 150, 152–53, 195, 201, 306–7, 309, 371–73, 399, 446–47 Mishnah, xi, 4, 32, 43, 59, 134, 172, 181, 392 Mishnaic Period, xi, 96, 364, 367–68, 438 mnaieion, 433–34, 446 money, 27, 31, 85, 89, 125, 444. See also coins

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Index of Subjects mortarium, 330, 446 mosaics, 28, 33–35, 40, 45, 55, 58, 62, 68, 70–72, 105, 121, 134, 155, 162–63, 165, 195–96, 198–202, 205–6, 212–15, 226, 277, 290, 299, 306, 312–13, 322, 324, 329–30, 357–63, 367, 369–70, 387, 409, 412, 420, 422, 431 mosque(s), G-2, 161, 163, 188–89, 191–93, 195, 197, 199, 202–9 movement(s), socio-religious, 4, 364, 430 myoparo, 331, 446 nave, 141, 162–63, 177, 199, 214–15, 357, 446 Nazareth, G-4, 1, 3, 5, 35, 39, 42–43, 53, 77–78, 81, 96–97, 101, 103, 122, 127, 129–30, 146, 155, 158–61, 163, 167–80, 277 numismatics. See coins nummus (pl. nummi), 252, 446 nymphaeum, 320, 446 Old/New Israeli Grid, 445–46 olive press(es), 25, 166, 169, 198, 219, 223, 228–31, 234–37, 251, 370–72 Onomasticon (Eusebius’), 34, 129, 173 opus sectile, 195, 446 orchestra, 67, 195, 446–47 ossilegium, 176, 374, 382, 445–47 ossuary, 176, 373, 382, 417, 446 otzar, 56, 446

465 palaestra, 214, 325, 446 parodos (pl. parodoi), 67–68, 446 peasant(s)/peasantry, 2, 122, 234 peristyle, 63, 71, 195, 203, 306, 324, 446 PHAB (Persian-Hellenistic Administrative Building at Kedesh), 425–36 pilaster, 67, 138, 198, 394, 407 pileum, 329–30, 446 pithos (pl. pithoi), 12, 15–16, 111, 172, 330, 446 Piacenza Pilgrim, 132, 174 platea, 326, 447 polis, 23, 27, 55, 58, 212, 258, 266, 276 Pompeian: flour mill, 234; frescos, 115, 312, 447; red ware, 46 Pompey, xi, 41 population, 2, 10, 16, 18–20, 24–25, 27, 34, 41, 45, 49, 53, 58–59, 65, 69, 72–73, 81, 89, 93, 95, 98, 106, 137, 148, 172, 174–77, 188, 201, 241– 42, 244–48, 250–53, 264–66, 272, 277, 327, 329–30, 353, 364, 382, 398, 401, 411, 422, 444 praefurnium, 320, 447 prayer hall (proseuche), 198–99, 201, 222–23, 225, 395 priest(s)/priestly, xii, 20, 47, 89, 103, 150–51, 162, 174–75, 277, 282, 288, 313, 411, 416, 438, 444 progradation, 326, 447 propylaeum, 63, 447 proscaenium, 67, 447

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466 purity, ritual, 47–48, 90, 106, 113, 134, 150–51, 234, 236, 274, 351, 371, 373, 376, 416 quadriporticus, 300, 305, 319–20, 324–27, 330, 447 Qumran, 382, 411 rabbis/rabbinic, xi, xvii, 3–4, 23, 26, 32–34, 36, 43, 55, 59, 71–73, 88–90, 93, 134, 154, 181–82, 185, 187, 195, 211–14, 216, 227, 235, 250, 280, 288–89, 297, 310, 320, 343, 364, 367, 371, 376, 387, 389, 392–93, 401, 405, 417 red ware, 46, 154, 177, 443–44, 447–48 road, 5, 22, 32, 39, 42, 47, 55, 61, 65, 76, 90, 96, 106, 127–28, 136–37, 156, 159, 170–71, 193, 212, 236, 241, 246, 259, 262, 269, 286, 293–94, 297, 300, 303–6, 308, 311, 324, 326, 328, 364, 366–67, 369, 416, 422, 428 rock cut tomb, 93, 373, 443, 445–47 roof(s), 56, 58, 72, 77–78, 83–84, 105, 113, 118, 137, 183–84, 189, 205, 208, 231–32, 234, 236, 306, 319–20, 346, 384–87, 407, 434, 444, 447 rural, 2, 5, 16, 20, 55, 96, 110, 154, 234, 268, 277, 327, 345, 350, 359, 438

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Index of Subjects Sabbath, 25, 78, 88–89, 177, 328 sages, 5, 59, 78, 88, 90–91, 106, 134, 235–36, 392 sarcophagus (pl. sarcophagi), 91–93, 95, 97, 131, 213, 245, 394, 399, 424, 437–38, 447 scaena/scaenae frons, 67–68, 195, 447 Scythopolis, 11–12, 16, 18, 23, 36, 96, 187, 246, 295–96, 435 Sea of Galilee/Lake of Galilee, G-10, 16–17, 23, 27, 39, 53, 96–97, 168, 186–87, 190, 192, 202, 209, 211–13, 217, 225–27, 246, 258–59, 280–83, 286, 289, 292–96, 303–6, 308–10, 325–26, 343, 348, 353, 362, 364, 366, 412, 435–36, 445 secco, 349–50, 359, 444, 447 secondary burial, 382–83, 417, 446–47 Second Temple Period, 53, 55–56, 58, 109, 113, 115, 121, 150, 258, 303, 312, 345–46, 348–50, 356, 359, 365, 371, 380, 411, 424–25, 427 Sepphoris, G-7, G-8, G-9, xi, 2–5, 17, 20, 22–93, 96, 98–101, 105, 122, 125, 127, 130, 137, 140, 150–51, 153–55, 160, 171, 173–74, 187, 212, 244, 246, 248, 258, 260, 281, 286, 296, 392 Shikhin, 5, 25, 45, 88–108, 150, 153, 244, 276, 296, 329, 351, 369–70

shofar, 89, 182, 215, 447 Simon (Maccabee), xii, 9–10, 19, 148, 382, 444 small finds, 58, 115, 355, 367, 371, 373, 422 soil, 17, 24–25, 30, 43, 49, 97–98, 112, 117, 119–21, 169, 177, 182, 389, 398, 401, 445, 447 spatha (from Greek spathē), 352, 448 spatula (pl. spatulae), 324, 447 specillum (pl. specilla), 324, 330, 447 spolia/spoils, 35, 104, 250, 409, 447 stone/chalk vessels, G-11, 34, 48–49, 91, 122–23, 131, 150, 153, 161, 175–76, 244, 273–75, 307, 329, 345, 351, 371, 411 storeroom(s), 55, 71, 294, 299, 308 strigilis (pl. strigiles), 322, 324, 448 stylobate, 121, 141, 199, 201, 206, 312, 324, 420, 427, 429, 448 suspensurae (sing. suspensura), 320, 448 SWP (Survey of Western Palestine), 77–79, 82, 344, 415, 425 synagogue(s), 4–5, 16, 32–33, 57, 59, 89, 91, 101, 103–6, 121, 141–43, 153, 155–56, 162–63, 165, 174, 176–77, 181– 82, 196, 201, 211–15, 218–23, 225, 237, 244, 249, 250–51, 253, 267, 274, 288, 290, 294, 297, 300, 302–3, 305, 307–9,

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Index of Subjects 312–17, 320, 327–28, 344–45, 347–50, 352, 356–60, 362–63, 366– 70, 374–75, 379–80, 382–84, 387, 389–90, 393–95, 397, 400–401, 404–24, 443, 446

tabun, 113–14, 150, 346–47, 448 Talmud, 18, 32, 61–62, 78, 89, 93, 173–74, 187, 203, 213, 259, 287–88, 367, 371, 392, 418 Tannaitic, 56, 181 tax(es)/taxation, 5, 90, 154, 310, 380 Tel Anafa, 430, 436 temenos, 13, 63–64, 263, 448 temple: Jewish, xi, 4, 47, 58, 73, 124, 150, 215, 244–45, 266, 268, 297, 313–14, 316–17, 373, 387, 407, 411, 445; pagan G-1, 10, 13, 16, 31–32, 34–35, 42, 59, 63–65, 186–87, 263, 265–68, 274, 277, 424–26, 437–38, 448; Samaritan, 16 terra sigillata, 46, 240, 369, 387, 443, 444, 448 tetradrachm, 223, 247, 257, 399, 448 tetrarch, xi, xiii, 27, 211, 258, 277, 448

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textiles, 264, 430 theater, G-8, 2–3, 27–29, 31, 35, 39, 40, 42, 54, 59, 65–68, 93, 191, 193, 195, 204, 277, 444, 446, 447–48 thermae (sing. therma), 214, 194, 307, 312, 320, 324, 327, 329, 448 Tiberias, G-2, xi, 2–3, 5, 23, 27–28, 34–36, 39, 53, 55, 61, 96, 122, 125, 146, 153, 160, 171, 173, 186–213, 217, 245–46, 252, 258, 276, 281–83, 288–98, 327, 343, 350, 364, 366–68, 370, 373 tombs, 32, 91, 93, 95, 120, 122, 137, 143, 155, 163–64, 166, 168, 172, 175–76, 192, 196, 201, 205, 208–9, 269, 298, 316, 364, 366, 368, 373, 380–83, 393–94, 399, 411, 415–17, 443–47 toparchy, 282–83, 296, 327–28, 448 Torah, 174, 212, 214–15, 312, 317, 383, 406–12, 419–20, 443 Tosefta, 89–90, 213, 236, 392 trade, 5, 39, 45–46, 97, 106, 182, 244, 246, 250–51, 253, 286, 367, 400, 422. See also commerce triclinium, 34, 71, 306, 448

467 tubuli, 202, 320, 448 Tyre, 9–10, 13, 20, 158, 244– 46, 346, 388, 391–92, 400–401, 405, 424–25, 428–29, 432–33, 435 unguentarium (pl. unguentaria), 323–24, 448 urban/urbanization, 5, 20, 42, 45, 50, 53, 58, 63, 67–69, 72–73, 95, 98, 144, 197, 214, 276–77, 287, 290, 299–300, 303, 306–7, 311, 322, 324, 327, 330, 414 Usha, xi, 3, 72 vomitorium (pl. vomitoria), 67, 448 warehouse, 302–3 wine press, 25, 90, 169, 235–36, 370 Yodefat (Jotapata), G-8, xi, 15, 17, 42, 57, 109–27, 129–30, 137–38, 140, 151, 244, 313, 351 Zenon (and Zenon papyri), 17–18, 286, 424, 429–30

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This second of two volumes on Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic periods focuses on the site excavations of towns and villages and what these excavations may tell us about the history of settlement in that important time. Articles includes site plans, diagrams, maps, and photographs of artifacts and structures.

fiensy and Strange

An expansive view of Galilee from 100 BCE to 200 CE—

Praise for Galilee in the Late Second Temple and Mishnaic Periods, Volume 2

David A. Fiensy is professor of New Testament and dean of the Graduate School of Religion at Kentucky Christian University in Grayson, Kentucky. His publications include Jesus the Galilean (2007), The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (co-editor, 2013), and Christian Origins and the Ancient Economy (2014), and Galilee Volume 1 (co-editor, Fortress Press, 2014).

The Archaeologic al

Record from Cities,

Religion / Biblical Studies

Towns, and Vill ages

James Riley Strange is associate professor of religion at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama, and director of the Shikhin Excavation Project in Israel’s Lower Galilee. He has written The Emergence of the Christian Basilica in the Fourth Century (2000), The Moral World of James (2010), and Galilee Volume 1 (co-editor, Fortress Press, 2014).

2

David A. Fiensy is professor of New Testament and dean of the Graduate School of Religion at Kentucky Christian University in Grayson, Kentucky. His publications include Jesus the Galilean (2007), The Galilean Economy in the Time of Jesus (co-editor, 2013), Christian Origins and the Ancient Economy (2014), and Galilee Volume 1 (co-editor, Fortress Press, 2014).

Ga lilee

“This excellent volume on the archaeological sites in Galilee provides the underpinnings for the topically arranged Galilee Volume 1. A ‘who’s who’ of key archaeologists and other leading scholars take the reader through all the main Galilean sites for which welldocumented archaeological evidence is currently available. This book will be a basic resource for study of the context of Galilean Judaism and of the historical Jesus and his early followers.” Peter Oakes, The University of Manchester

in the L ate Second Temple a nd Mishna ic Per iods

“From ‘rural hinterland’ to a thriving, culturally diverse, and vibrant region! No other area of the Roman world, perhaps, has undergone such a deep transformation in scholarly assessment than Galilee. And rightly so: Despite all its special problems, Galilee in many ways is a model for understanding the relationship between indigenous and foreign cultures and internal social tensions and diversities in the Hellenistic and Roman East. With their unprecedented wealth of detail—literary as well as material—and thanks to ample maps, plans, and references, Galilee Volume 2 now provides the ideal supplement to Galilee Volume 1. Sites like Magdala, Capernaum, Tiberias, and many others are described and often reassessed according to the latest archaeological evidence. These two books truly mark a new era of Galilean studies! Nobody interested in the history and culture of ancient Judaism, early Christianity, archaeology, or ancient history can afford to miss these two books.” Jürgen K. Zangenberg, Leiden University