A 2,000-year-old Jewish ritual bath unearthed in southern Israel has been extracted from the ground whole, offering evidence that a hitherto unknown Second Temple community existed at the site, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced on Thursday.
The 25-ton bath, or mikveh, was discovered in July in the southern Israeli city of Kiryat Gat, located about 25 miles north of Beersheva, ahead of the construction of a new neighborhood, the state-run archaeological body said.
A crane was used to extract it intact, and the mikveh will later be returned to the city for public display.
“The Jewish settlement we discovered here is the first and the only known one in this area,” said Elena Kogan-Zahavi, who led the excavations at the site. “In the Judean Lowlands, many Jewish settlements from the Roman period are known, but in the seam between the Judean Lowlands and the northern Negev no Jewish settlement was known until now.”
The excavation also uncovered stone measuring vessels which were widely used by Jews during the Second Temple period.
Their findings indicate the settlement was apparently abandoned during the Bar Kokhba Revolt against the Romans in the second century C.E. About 500 years later, during the Byzantine period, the area was revived, but with an entirely different population composition.
Transporting the immense ancient cargo to the IAA storehouse became an engineering operation in itself, with the road closed to traffic, and escort vehicles driving in front of and behind the truck.
“Once you lift up a structure like this, there’s no going back,” said Eyal Kaho, senior conservator at the IAA, who led the operation.
“The ritual bath uncovered in Kiryat Gat adds an important dimension to our understanding of Jewish settlement in the Land of Israel during the Second Temple period,” said Israeli Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu.
“Its future incorporation into the neighborhood’s public space will enable residents and visitors to encounter tangible evidence of Jewish life from 2,000 years ago as part of their daily lives,” he added.
