July 7, 2009. Jerusalem

In Jerusalem quarries of King Herod are discovered

In Jerusalem archeologists discovered quarries of the time of reign of Herod I the Great, The Jerusalem Post newspaper reports on Monday, July 6, with a reference to the Israeli Department of Ancient Relics. According to the scientists, from this quarry occupying a square of 100 sq m material for reconstruction of the Second Jerusalem Temple carried out by King Herod could have been taken. “The size of the blocks that were mined at the quarry allows supposing that they could be used for the building of the walls of the Temple,” Ofer Sion who leads the excavation crew says. The maximum size of the blocks mined at the quarry is three meters long, two meters high, and two meters wide. The part of the wall that survives to this day around the Temple Mount was built during the time of Herod I the Great and is laid with stones around one meter high, and 1.5—3 meters long. This part of the wall is more famous as the Wailing Wall – a religious sanctity of Judea.

“The discovery of the quarry where material was taken for the greatest in its scale construction in the history of Jerusalem is more than an ordinary find,” said Aren Maeir – an archeologist from the Bar Ilan University who did not participate in the excavations. “It is another fragment allowing us to gradually recreate the scene of the construction.”

In the course of excavations conducted on the site of the quarry metal plates that were used for sawing off the blocks were also found as well as coins and pieces of ceramics that date back to the time of the reign of Herod the Great.

Before that in Jerusalem and its vicinities dozens of quarries were found where material for constructions erected under the reign of Herod I the Great were mined. But only in three of them including the last discovery blocks that matched by size those used in the construction of the Temple could be mined.

During the last years the Israeli archeologists made a number of important discoveries related to the reign of Herod I the Great. For instance, an archeological expedition under the headship of professor of the Jewish University in Jerusalem Ehud Netzer that conducted excavations on Herodion – an artificial hill, twelve kilometers away from Jerusalem, – in May of 2007 found the site of a supposed burial of king Herod I the Great, and in November of 2008 found a theater built at the time of his reign.