JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

with a rectangular tower. This settlement is attributed to the
time of Herod’s successors (4–68 C.E.); it was destroyed and
burned apparently during the Jewish War in 68 C.E. Coins
from the “Year Two” of the war were found in the area of the
conflagration.
During the Roman-Byzantine period (Stratum I) the inhabitants
of the tell lived in temporary structures and cultivated
the slopes of the hill (third–fifth centuries C.E.). It appears
that at least from the time of the Herodian period the
main settlement at En-Gedi moved down to the plain, east
and northeast of Tell Goren between Naḥal David and Naḥal
Arugot.
A Roman bath was found in the center of this plain about
660 ft. (200 m.) west of the shore of the Dead Sea. It is dated
by finds, especially six bronze coins, to the period between the
fall of the Second Temple and the Bar Kokhba War.
A sacred enclosure from the Chalcolithic period was
found on a terrace above the spring. It consists of a group of
stone structures of a very high architectural standard. The
main building was apparently a temple which served as the
central sanctuary for the inhabitants of the region.
Excavations (1970) brought to light the remains of a Jewish
settlement dating from the Byzantine period. The synagogue
had a beautiful mosaic floor depicting peacocks eating
grapes, and the words “Peace on Israel,” as well as a unique
inscription consisting of 18 lines which, inter alia, calls down
a curse on “anyone causing a controversy between a man and
his fellows or who (says) slanders his friends before the gentiles
or steals the property of his friends, or anyone revealing
the secret of the town to the gentiles. …” (According to Lieberman,
it was designed against those revealing the secrets of
the balsam industry.) A seven branched menorah of bronze
and more than 5,000 coins (found in the synagogue’s cash box
by the ark) were also uncovered.
[Benjamin Mazar]
Since the writing of the entry above by Benjamin Mazar,
new archaeological work and historical studies concerning En-
Gedi have been made. En-Gedi is an oasis on the fringe of the
Judean Desert, situated in the middle of the western shore of
the Dead Sea, in the rift valley, the lowest place on earth. The
climate of the rift valley is arid and climatic changes have in
the past influenced the flow of the springs as well as the levels
of the Dead Sea. The source of the springs is in the aquifer
of the Judaean Group of the Cenoman-Touron Formation. In
the past, there were ten springs, but only four are active today:
‘Arugot, David, En-Gedi, and Shulamit.
En-Gedi is mentioned for the first time in the Bible as
Hazazon Tamar (Gen. 14:7), which was identified as En-Gedi
(II Chron. 20: 2). In I Samuel 23:29; 24:2–3, David took refuge
in the wilderness of En-Gedi. En-Gedi is mentioned once in
each of the Talmudic writings (Tj, Shevi’it 9:2, 38d; Tb, Shabbat
26a). The inhabitants of En-Gedi made their living from
agriculture. They cultivated a very poor marl and stony soil
with irrigation channels from the waters of the springs. They
en-gedi
also collected salt and asphalt (bitumen) from the shores of
the Dead Sea, as well as chunks of sulfur from the marl plains
for the production of medicines. The main cultivations in
this oasis were palm trees and barley; balsam, a cash crop,
was also grown in the region. Writers from the Roman period
praised the excellent dates that grew in En-Gedi and Judaea
(Pliny, Hist. Nat. 13:6, 26; Josephus, Ant., 9: 7). The palm
tree, a symbol of Judaea, was used as a motif on Jewish coins
and Flavian victory coins. Transportation between En-Gedi
and other parts of the country was dictated by geographical
and political conditions. During ancient times En-Gedi had
a strong connection with Jerusalem. During the First Temple
period, En-Gedi was first established as a military outpost on
the western shores of the Dead Sea over against Moab and
Edom. Later maritime transportation was undertaken on the
Dead Sea, as has been proven by the discovery of wooden and
stone anchors, as well as of anchorages near En-Gedi and at
other locations around the Dead Sea. Although sailing vessels
have not yet been found underwater, drawings and graffiti of
sailing ships are known from Masada and on the mosaic map
of Madaba. The connection between En-Gedi and Nabataea,
and later with Arabia, is attested by ancient historians, on the
one hand, as well as in the Judean Desert Documents, on the
other. Nabatean coins have also been found in archaeological
excavations.
During the 1980s–90s a systematic archaeological survey
was conducted in the area, and a number of intact burials of
the Second Temple period were revealed and excavated. These
were family tombs and the bodies were wrapped with linen
shrouds and interred in wooden coffins, usually without funerary
objects (Hadas, 1994). In the late 1990s a large area of the
Byzantine village adjacent to the synagogue was excavated and
many dwellings were revealed, all of which supports Eusebius’
description of En-Gedi as “a large village of Jews” (Hirschfeld,
in press). During this project the irrigated agricultural systems
were also investigated and excavated (Hadas, 2002). In recent
years (2003–5), a new suburb of En-Gedi dating from the Second
Temple period has been revealed to the northwest of the
synagogue (Hadas, forthcoming). Caves in the cliffs behind
En-Gedi have also been surveyed, revealing Bar-Kochba coins
and papyri in some of them, and much earlier Persian period
ornaments in another. Additional excavations conducted in
the area of the synagogue area (Hadas, in press) have shown
that the Byzantine village was destroyed and burnt in the sixth
century C.E. This was the end of the Jewish settlement, which
had existed here almost continuously for about one thousand
years. A gap in the occupation of En-Gedi existed until the
13th–14th centuries C.E., when a Mamluke village was founded
at the spot and existed there for about a century. Remains of
this period were found above the synagogue site and in the
general vicinity. A water mill was also built at this time (Hadas,
2001–2) and it still exists near the En-Gedi spring. En-
Gedi remained in ruins until the establishment of the State
of Israel in 1948.
[Gideon Hadas (2nd ed.)]
ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 6 407