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Masada (Hebrew: מְצָדָה məṣādā, 'fortress'; Arabic: جبل مسعدة) [1] is an ancient fortification in southern Israel, situated on top of an isolated rock plateau, akin to a mesa. It is located on the eastern edge of the Judaean Desert , overlooking the Dead Sea 20 km (12 miles) east of Arad .
The siege of Masada was one of the final events in the First Jewish–Roman War, occurring from 72 to 73 CE on and around a hilltop in present-day Israel.The siege is known to history via a single source, Flavius Josephus, [3] a Jewish rebel leader captured by the Romans, in whose service he became a historian.
One of Ben-Yehuda's subjects of research is the fall of the Masada fortress, the last refuge of a Jewish group, the Sicarii, to the Romans in 73 CE. During the Siege of Masada, the Sicarii committed mass suicide rather than surrender to slavery. He views the story of Masada, as presented in the early decades of the State of Israel, as a modern ...
Herod also developed an innovative combination of palace and fortress; examples include the Antonia Fortress in Jerusalem, the Herodium in the Judean Desert about 2 miles south of Bethlehem, [2] and Masada. Characteristically, they have (or had) one tower higher and stronger than the others.
In 1841, Edward Robinson's identified the site in Biblical Researches in Palestine as Herodium based on the description found in Josephus. [11] [12] Josephus described a palace fortress and a small town, named after Herod the Great, built between 23 and 15 BCE. A sarcophagus discovered in 2007 was claimed to belong to Herod as it was more ...
Together with a small group of followers, Menahem made his way to the fortress of Masada, took over a Roman garrison and slaughtered all 700 soldiers there. They also took over another fortress called Antonia and overpowered the troops of Agrippa II. He also trained them to conduct various guerrilla operations on Roman convoys and legions ...
However, Dani Zion emphasizes that Masada was a fortress, originally built as a fortification facility, where several hundred families of rebels were hiding and where there was no battle as such. Gamla, in contrast, was a city where fortification was carried out in connection with military operations and where heavy fighting took place before ...
During Babylonian occupation, a large residence was built on the platform that had once supported the Israelite palace. At the end of the captivity, some exiled Jews returned to Lachish and built a new city with fortifications. Under the Achaemenid Empire (Level I), a large altar known as the Solar Shrine on the east section of the mound was built.