Israel has unearthed amazing ancient sights - well able to rival any of the sights we've seen on our travels in Cambodia, Jordan, India, Greece, and Egypt. It should be the place to go for anyone interested in ancient history and archaeology.
At Bet Sh'an we saw a huge city, complete with amphitheatre and temples. For me this city was the most amazing of all - with its huge Greek columns lining the cardo, bathouses, lavatories, ancient altars, and bridges. A multitude of stairs lead up to the Tel shown in the background of the first picture.
Caesaria: we marvelled at the huge stadium which allowed King Herod and the citizens to view chariot races.
At Bet Alpha we admired an ancient synagogue with a mosaic floor decorated in grapes, and animals and the astrological charts - making concession to Jewish sensibilities with a section of mosaic decorated with a Menorah and a shofar. (We have a representation of this part of the mosaic in ceramic tile given to us by George Sandrouni, our Armenian friend). We laughed as an entertaining film explained that the synagogue could not afford the master, so took his apprentice to do the mosaic floor. The apprentice copied representations from the houses of wealthy people and of churches to complete the floor, not always being in the least true to the acceptable Jewish symbols.
We visited Zippori in the western lower Galilee, a whole city unearthed with beautifully preserved mosaics that festooned wealthy homes in Roman times - a city with another amphitheatre which has been reconstructed to allow for concerts during the summer. Remains of this magnificent city include a system of streets, public buildings, dwellings, a central market, bathhouses, a synagogue and churches, mainly dating from the Roman and Byzantine periods, and a fortess and a church from the crusader period.
One of my favorite places is the town of Akko in the north of the country: we walked down the magical alleys of the city, and listened to the stones tell the stories of history, the battles, the love stories, the excommunications, and assassinations. We enjoyed the clever dramatization in the ancient bathouse which helped us imagine those times. We ate wonderful St. Peter's fish as we looked out at the harbor and the ancient wall that surrounds the city. We ate (arguably) the best hummous in all of Israel in its ancient market.
Housed in Ginosar, at the kibbutz where we stayed for five days, is an ancient Galilee Boat dating from BCE. It is part of the Yigal Allon Centre - which in addition to stories about the ancient boat, tells the modern story of the life of Yigal Allon.
And, of course, the excavations of Jerusalem. More about that in a later posting.
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