Lost workshop making pagan figurines in Roman Palestine rediscovered haaretz.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from haaretz.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
A Roman workshop that made pagan figurines in Israel was first found in 1934
However, the village where it sat was abandoned in 1948 and it was forgotten
Experts announced it had rediscovered the location and hundreds of figurines
There were oil lamps that were designed with both Hebrew and pagan designs
The trove of figurines includes naked women, animals and horse-riders
Israel
By Hamodia Staff
YERUSHALAYIM -
Finds from the Beit Nattif excavation. (Itai Aviv/Israel Antiquities Authority)
One of the largest ceramic oil-lamp workshops in Israel has been discovered in Beit Shemesh, a trove of hundreds of lamps, two bearing symbols of the menorah and stone lamp molds for their production which were made about 1600–1700 years ago, according to archeological estimates.
The discovery of the lamps, used for lighting in ancient times, surprised the archaeologists not only because of their quantity and quality, but also because it solved an archaeological mystery connected with them:
In 1934, archaeologist Dimitri Baramki, an inspector on behalf of the Department of Antiquities during the British Mandate, discovered a water cistern in the region of Beit Shemesh. On excavating the cistern, he was surprised to uncover an ancient ‘treasure’ a huge quantity of intact oil lamps bearing animal and plant motifs and geometric designs. The lamps a
Photo Credit: Yoli Schwartz, Israel Antiquities Authority.
Moran Balila and Itai Aviv of the Israel Antiquities Authority with a few discovered lamps at the excavation.
One of the largest ceramic oil-lamp workshops in Israel has been discovered in Israel Antiquities Authority excavations in Beit Shemesh. Hundreds of ceramic oil lamps, two bearing symbols of the menorah, and stone lamp molds for their production were found along with terracotta figurines which were made about 1600-1700 years ago.
The IAA dig site in Beit Shemesh. /Â Assaf Peretz, Israel Antiquities Authority
In the past few months, the IAA carried out excavations in Beit Shemesh which are mandatory in Israel before the start of any construction project. This one is a new neighborhood established by the Ministry of Construction and Housing. The large-scale archaeological excavations were aided by dozens of pre-military school students.