MARESHA
An Overview
by Professor Amos Kloner
Identification
Tell Sandahannah, located ca. 1.5 km. south of Beth Govrin
and 39 km. east of Ashkelon, has been identified as the site of ancient
Maresha (Marisa) by Robinson, Petrie, Bliss and others, on the
bases of biblical references and the writings of Josephus and
Eusebius. This identification has since been confirmed by modern
excavations. Ancient Maresha occupied the high mound, a lower
city with ancillary cave
complexes, and a necropolis which encompassed the entire site of Tell
Sandahannah.
History
The earliest written record of Maresha was as a city in
ancient Judah. After the destruction of the First Temple the city of
Maresha became part of the Edomite kingdom. In the late Persian
period a Sidonian community settled in Maresha, and the city is
mentioned in the Zenon Papyri (259 BCE). During the Hasmonean
wars Maresha was a base for attacks against Judea and eventually
suffered retaliation from the Maccabees. After John Hyrcanus I captured
and destroyed Maresha in 113 BCE the region of Idumea remained
under Hasmonean control. In 40 BCE the Parthians devastated completely
the "strong city", after which it was never rebuilt.
The Mound
Tell Maresha was first excavated in 1900 CE by Bliss and
Macalister, who uncovered a planned and fortified Hellenistic city
encircled by a town wall with towers. Two Hellenistic and one
Israelite strata were identified by them on the mound. From 1989
through 1985 Amos Kloner
cleared the northwestern tower of the Hellenistic city on behalf of the
Israel Antiquities Authority, thereby revealing two Hellenistic phases
of construction in the fortifications. The earlier tower, dated to
ca. 300 BCE, was built into the debris of the Persian period. A
new tower, dated to ca. 200 BCE and built directly over the
earlier Hellenstic tower, was probably destroyed toward the end of that
century. Beneath these fortifications Kloner identified Persian and
Iron Age levels of occupation.
Finds from the Israelite (Iron Age) stratum discovered during the
excavations of 1900 CE include seventeen la-melekh seal
impressions. Among the rich finds from the Hellenstic period were 328
stamped Rhodian amphora handles and three inscriptions. Sixteen small
lead figurines and fifty-one limestone execration tablets attest to the
practice of magic in Hellenistic Maresha.
The Lower City
The lower, partially walled, city entirely surrounded the upper
mound in a belt of varying width. Ceramic evidence dates its original
construction to the Hellenistic period. The lower city consisted of
private houses, baths, workshops, and stores or shops laid out in
insulae with lanes and streets. The "Southern House", located
directly above Macalister's Cave 53, was excavated by Kloner in 1989.
It was erected in mid-third century BCE and was continually occupied
until the final destruction of the city. A staircase led to a second
floor of the "Southern House", and a narrow corridor descended to a
network of cisterns beneath the house. Found beneath a floor in the
"Southern House" a juglet contained twenty-five coins dated to
122-113/112 BCE. Similar dwelling units and caves were excavated by
Kloner in 1992-1993 in Area 61 in the eastern part of the Lower City.
Caves of the Lower City
Houses in the lower city were constructed above hundreds of caves
hewn in the soft chalk limestone of the hillsides. Macalister listed
sixty-three cave complexes located in his survey in 1900 CE. Recent
excavations have revealed ninety more. The principal uses of these
caves were for the manufacture of olive oil and for the breeding of
pigeons. Twenty oil presses from the Hellenistic period have been
discovered in cave chambers; two of these pressing units have been
excavated. Each was made up of a crushing installation, three crushing
beds, storage areas, a cistern and a cultic niche.
More than sixty columbaria have also been identified among the
caves, the finest of which is located in Cave 61. Cave 21, also
containing a columbarium, was excavated in 1972 and again in 1981;
evidence from Cave 21 suggests a time of use between the third and first
centuries BCE. Each columbarium comprises halls with many small niches
carved in the upper parts of its walls; there are probably about 50,000
such niches in all of the caves at Maresha. The niches, most
likely intended originally as dovecotes, yield no evidence for use as
repositories for the ash remains of cremated humans.
Some of the caves were also used as stables, animal stalls,
storerooms, cisterns, bathhouses, ritual halls and for other, yet
undetermined, purposes. For example, Cave 70, which was examined in
1980 by Kloner, consists of thirty-one rooms and contained various
cereal grains and olive pits. Cave 75, explored in 1988-1991, revealed
that it had been occupied in the Iron Age, as well as in the Persian and
Hellenistic periods.
The Necropolis
In the eastern necropolis are fifteen tombs of which seven were
first excavated in 1902 CE by Peters and Thiersch. Tomb I is the
largest and most lavishly decorated with a painted frieze of hunting
scenes and animals adorning its walls. Greek inscriptions and graffiti
establish the date of the tomb to 196-119 BCE. Tomb II, also painted,
contains inscriptions which date it to 188-135 BCE. The northern
necropolis contains twenty loculus tombs dated from the third-second
centuries BCE. One tomb in the southwestern necropolis was excavated in
1989 by Kloner; Greek inscriptions and pottery assemblages date it to
the third and second centuries BCE as well. These tombs show that the
inhabitants of Maresha in the Hellenistic period (Idumeans,
Sidonians, and Greeks) practiced secondary burial, added loculi for
primary burial, and built family tombs.
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