Masada: The last bastion jewish Second Temple

“Some time ago we decided to not serve ever to the romans, nor to any other, but only God, who is the only Lord of the true man.”

1. What is Masada and why it matters?

Masada it is a fortress on top of an isolated mesa in the desert of Judea, in front of the Dead Sea, 400 m on the environment.

In the jewish narrative, Masada symbolizes:

• The the latest episode in the armed the First Guerra Judeo-Romana (66-73 d.C.).
• The close symbolic of the Second Temple period (even though the Temple was destroyed in 70 ce.C., the fall of Masada in 73/74 mark the end of military).
• A modern myth of “last resistance” and choice of death rather than slavery, built on the story of Flavius Josephus and reworked by zionism.

Almost all that we know of Masada in the first century comes from a single author: Flavius Josephus, “The Jewish War”. Modern archaeology (especially the excavations of Yigael Yadín in the 60's) has served to confirm parts of the story and refine other.

2. Background: strength asmonea to Herod's palace

2.1 Origins in time asmonea

Josephus attributed the first fortification of Masada to the king asmoneo Alexander Jannaeus (s. I a.C.), although archaeologically have not found clear structures of this phase; the record material that dominates is the herodian.

That is to say:

• There was probably occupation and fortification asmonea.
• But what we see today and what defines Masada in the war judeo-roman is fundamentally herodian.

2.2 Masada as a refuge for Herod the Great

In the context of the power struggle after the death of Antipater, father of Herod) and the conflict with the last king asmoneo Antigonus II, Herod used Masada as shelter strategic.

Between approximately 37-31 to.C., Herod transformed Masada:

• In a fortress-palace of luxury and a refuge in the case of jewish rebellion or foreign invasion.
• With a capacity of to withstand long sieges thanks to:
  • Huge stores of food.
  • A sophisticated system of cisterns and channels taking water from wadis distant.

2.3 Architecture herodiana key

The excavations of Yadín revealed almost the entire complex of the period of Herod:

• Palace North (“villa pendant” three levels) embedded in the hillside north: terraces, frescoes, columns, mosaics.
• Palace West with a “throne room” and dependencies administrative.
• Stores huge (tens of rooms elongated).
• Roman baths with a hypocaust.
• Perimeter wall type casemate (double wall with rooms inside).
• System-wide tanks carved in the rock, fed by channels that they were collecting the floods of winter.

In summary: Masada is a hybrid between roman military camp and royal residence of luxurydesigned to withstand a total purse.

“Our wives to die without being raped and our children without knowing the slavery, and freedom is our last napkin.”

3. Context: the First War Judeo-Roman and the hitmen

3.1 The war (66-73 d.C.) and the destruction of the Temple

• 66 d.C.: Explode the revolt against Rome in Judea.
• 70 d.C.: The romans, led by Titus, destroyed the Second Temple in Jerusalem.
• 70-73 d.C.: Campaign of “cleansing” of the last pockets of resistance, between them Stork, Machaerus, and Masada.

Masada is thus converted into the last bastion of armed resistance.

3.2 Who were at Masada? Shooters and your profile

According to Josephus, Masada was seized by the hitmen, an extremist group emerged from the environment zelota, characterized by:

• Tactics terror individual (murders with daggers hidden among the crowd, hence the “sicarii”).
• Absolute rejection of the roman domination.
• Violence towards other jews they considered a collaborationist.

Under the command of Eleazar ben Ya go, the sicarii took Masada around 66-67 d.C., probably after removing the small roman garrison that was left. From there:

• Launch raiding and looting against nearby towns and villages including Ein Guedí, where massacred its inhabitants according to Josephus.

This adds to the “heroización” modern: to Josephus, the sicarii are fans of violentnot national heroes.

4. Chronology of the occupation of the jewish and of the siege

4.1 Occupation jewish (c. 66/67–72/73 d.C.)

• The rebels come into a fortress already equipped with stores, palaces and cisterns.
• To adapt the structures herodianas to use more communal and defensive:
  • Reused warehouses and rooms of the wall as homes.
  • This is enabled by a synagogue (one of the oldest identified).

4.2 Dates of the siege

Traditionally stood the siege of Masada in 72-73 d.C.; some studies it push 73-74 d.C. in function correlations internal in Josephus and archaeological data.

What is essential: it is the last episode of the War First Jewish-Roman.

“We have not won a victory; we have only defended the dignity of a free man.”

5. The siege of Masada according to Josephus

5.1 Forces at play

Josephus describes:

• Jewish defenders:
  • About 967 people (including women and children).
  • Led by Eleazar ben Ya go.
• Romans:
  • Legio X Fretensis (~4.800 legionaries).
  • Auxiliary and slaves between 4,000–to 10,000.
  • Control: Lucio Flavio Silva, governor of Judea.

Total roman: maybe a few To 8,000–9,000 personnel of combat, more personal logistics.

5.2 The system of roman siege

The romans applied a manual classic siege:

1. Camps and beltline
   • Rise 8 camps around the plateau and a wall ring about 3 km to enclose the besieged and control the environment.
   • All of this is visible today and is one of the systems of siege best-conserved of the roman world.
2. The ramp siege
   • Identify the flank westernthe most accessible, and built a huge ramp of earth and stone supported on a spur natural.
   • It is estimated that moved hundreds of thousands of tons material.
   • On the ramp, push a tower siege with the mounts and artillery.
3. Artillery and fire
   • Josephus describes the use of ballistae and the fire of a wall of wood interior raised by the defenders.
   • When the fire turns against the romans by the wind, it changes back to its favor, allowing the gap.

5.3 The final night and the “voluntary death”

In the account of Josephus, when roman opens a gap and retreat to assault the next day, Eleazar, calling on the men to an assembly and holds an ideological discourse:

• Freedom is incompatible with slavery romana.
• It is preferable to die as free men than to live as slaves.

The course plan:

1. The men kill their own families (women and children).
2. Then kill each other; you choose ten men by lot to kill the rest.
3. Of those ten, one is elected by new sweepstakes to kill the other nine, and then commit suicide.
4. Left with life two women and five children hiding and later recount the story to the romans.

According to Josephus, the romans come and find only dead bodies and silence.

6. What does the archaeology? Confirmations and questions

6.1 Confirmations general

The excavations of Yadín (1963-1965), and subsequent studies showed that many descriptions of Josephus are surprisingly accurate:

• The ramp roman it is there, and coincides with his story.
• We still keep the wall ring and eight roman camps.
• Identify:
  • The palace northpalace west, warehouses, baths.
  • The synagogue and the homes of the rebels.
• They are evidence of fire in the inner wall, compatible with the episode of the fire.

In terms of macrohistoria –siege and fall and destruction–Josephus is quite reliable.

6.2 human Remains and the issue of “collective suicide”

Here begins the debate:

• Only found remains very fragmentary a few individuals (not nearly thousand), both at the top as in a cave at the foot of the cliff.
• Some remains were reenterrados with State honors in 1969, assuming that they were of the jewish defenders. However:
  • Remains of bones associated with some of the material suggest that it could be romans (it was customary to sacrifice pigs in contexts and military funeral).

Several scholars (e.g. Jodi Magness, Joe Zias) point out that there is archaeological evidence direct of a mass suicide or a systematic killing as described by Josephus.

Conclusion academic usual:

• It is plausible that it would have mass death and perhaps acts of homicide-suicidebut the details dramatic (speeches, system of sweepstakes, the exact figures) reflect the rhetoric literary Josephus more than a forensic report.

“To die as free men is better than to live in chains.”

7. Daily life at Masada during the siege

The findings give an image quite rich of the community to rebel:

7.1 social Organization and religious

• Modest houses within the walls, and antique stores.
• A synagogue with benches attached to the walls, which is oriented towards Jerusalem.
• In the synagogue were found:
  • A ostracón with the inscription ma asher kohen (“tithe for the priest”).
  • Fragments of rolls bible (Deuteronomy, Ezekiel the vision of the “dry bones”, in Genesis, Leviticus, Psalms, Sirach, and the Songs of the Sacrifice of Shabbat).

This points to:

• A community with religious life activeeven in siege.
• Interest in texts eschatological hope and resurrection (very significant in the context of a terminal resistor).

7.2 domestic Economy: food and water

• The system of tanks, fed by canals from wadis, explains how they were able to resist years in an environment so arid.
• The warehouses contained the remains of:
  • Cereals, legumes, oil, wine, nuts, etc
  • Ceramics of different backgrounds, reflecting networks previous exchange.

It is likely that:

• Herod left huge reserves, and the rebels were confined in great measure to use them, reabasteciéndolas in part with looting.

8. Masada in relationship to other foci of the war

Chronologically, Masada is the epilogue of a process:

1. 66-70 d.C.: Revolt in Judea, the war in Galilee and Judea, central, site and destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple.
2. 70-72 d.C.: Fall of other bastions:
   • Stork (south of Jerusalem).
   • Machaerus (in modern Jordan).
3. 72-73/74 d.C.: Campaign Silva against Masadathe last square.

Politically:

• The fall of Masada does not change the overall outcome of the war (as decided after Jerusalem), but:
  • Eliminates the last symbol armed of organized resistance.
  • Facilitates the consolidation of the roman province of Judea as a territory pacified, although with deep traces of destruction of economic and demographic.

9. Masada in the memory of the jews and in the modern myth

9.1 out Of oblivion on national symbol

After Antiquity, Masada enters a phase of sporadic use (side dishes roman, possibly byzantine monastery) and then abandonment. In the Modern Age is visited by european travellers, but without great symbolic impact.

With the emergence of the zionism and the State of Israel, Masada is redefined:

• Of the strength of the assassins ambiguous (according to Josephus) happens to be the emblem:
  • “Masada shall not fall again”.
  • “Better to die than to fall into the hands of the enemy”.
• Becomes:
  • Instead of ceremonies military (oaths of army units).
  • “Stage space” of the national memory.

9.2 “Myth of Masada” and critical historiographical

The so-called “myth of Masada” it consists of a re-reading this patriotic episode:

• It emphasizes the heroism and determination.
• It ignores or minimizes the fact that:
  • They were gunmen, described by Josephus as violent even in the face of other jews.
  • The story of collective suicide is debatable from the point of view of the material evidence.

Historians and archaeologists contemporary point:

• The need to differentiate between:
  • Facts archaeologically confirmed (siege, ramp, destruction, occupation).
  • Constructions literary of Josephus and readings ideological contemporary (zionist, nationalist, etc).

10. Key points that you “know” about Masada in the context of the Second Temple

For you to leave as a checklist for article or script:

1. Localization and nature: Strength in table rock isolated, with natural defenses extreme, in front of the Dead Sea.
2. Political origin: Fortified first (according to Josephus) by asmoneos, transformed radically by Herod the Great in a palace-fortress of luxury and shelter.
3. Key infrastructure:
   • Two big palaces.
   • Enormous warehouses.
   • Hot springs and roman architecture of prestige.
   • Hydraulic system special cisterns and channels.
4. Context of war: Last stronghold of the jews in the War First Jewish-Roman, after the destruction of the Temple (70 ce.C.).
5. Main actors:
   • Defenders: hitmenled by Eleazar ben Ya go.
   • Attackers: Legio X Fretensis and auxiliary, commanded by Lucius Flavius Silva.
6. Tactical roman:
   • Camps siege and wall ring perfectly preserved.
   • Ramp western monumental to carry tower and battering ram.
7. Inner life:
   • Religious community active with a synagogue and rolls of the bible.
   • Use of resources herodians: food and water in relative abundance.
8. End of the siege:
   • Narrated by a single author (Josephus).
   • Idea of suicide/homicide collective staircase draws.
   • Archaeologically, the episode bulk is not shown; yes what are the siege and destruction.
9. End of the period of the Second Temple (in the broad sense):
   • Destruction of the Temple in 70 d.C. → theological point central.
   • Fall of Masada in 73/74 d.C. → close military and symbolic of the era of the Temple as the focus of political-legal Judea.
10. Reception modern:
    • Symbol zionist resistance and heroism (“Masada shall not fall again”).
    • Object of historiographical debates, archaeological and ideological on how to build the collective memory.