Rediscovering the Ancient Golan—The Golan Archaeological Museum

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There are no gold mines or oil wells on the Golan. But, archaeologically speaking, the Golan settlers are mining gold and striking oil.

This remote, sparsely inhabited and sometimes desolate area might seem the last place in the world for a modern archaeological museum. But not to the 600 families who live in Qatzrin. What could be more logical than a museum to display the Golan’s archaeological treasures, to foster pride in the area, to attract tourists and, not least, to encourage scholarly research into the Golan’s fascinating and varied past.

So there it is, in all its glory, near the center of the settlement of Qatzrin, beside some recently constructed homes.

The oldest artifacts in the museum’s collection date to the Lower Paleolithic period (1,000,000–90,000 years ago). At a site near the Benot Ya’akov (Daughters of Jacob) Bridge, a cache of basalt tools—hand axes and choppers—was found that had been manufactured approximately 500,000 years ago.

These finds are especially exciting because they were made at the site, yet they were also part of a unique basalt tool industry that is related to a basalt tool manufacturing tradition found in Africa. The precise nature of the connection is not yet clear. But elephant tusks and fossilized ivory fragments were also found at the site, which suggests that elephants may have once roamed the area.

From a somewhat later date, some flint tools—including hand axes and hammers—on display at the museum were buried in molten basalt lava by a volcano that erupted, according to experts, 223,000 years ago. Until recently uncovered by archaeologist Dr. Naama Goren, the flint tools lay beneath the basalt, at a site called Birket Ram.

Extinct volcanoes can be seen all over the northeastern Golan. The plateau of which the Golan is a part is covered with volcanic basalt from lava flows laid down over the last four million years. Apparently there were two major cycles of volcanic eruptions. The lava from the earlier cycle eventually broke down to create the fertile soil of the southern Golan. The later cycle of volcanic activity left the extinct cones now visible in the northeastern part of the Golan.

Golan refers to the western part of this basalt plateau. It overlooks the Sea of Galilee and the Jordan River north of the Yarmuk River. Until 1967, Syrian gun emplacements rained terror on the Israeli settlements below. The area was captured by Israel in bloody fighting during the Six-Day War.

Shortly afterward, archaeologist Claire Epstein, who lives at Kibbutz Ginnosar on the shore of the Sea of 055Galilee, began exploring the Golan on foot. For the past 20 years, Dr. Epstein has been bringing to light an extraordinary civilization that flourished on the Golan in the fourth millennium B.C.—between 5,000 and 6,000 years ago—in the time frame known to archaeologists as the Chalcolithic period. Chalcolithic culture has been found all over Palestine, but it apparently had an unusual flowering on the Golan. And Claire Epstein, in surveys and excavations, is almost single-handedly responsible for bringing it to light.

Epstein has identified over 25 Chalcolithic sites in the central Golan. Chalcolithic villages were usually located near perennial streams and consisted of five or six parallel rows of long rectangular houses built end-to-end. The size of the houses varies somewhat, the average being about 20 feet wide and 50 feet long. The houses were built of unworked basalt boulders and probably originally stood to a height of about 6 feet. Many houses contained storerooms and some included stone-lined storage silos.

To give the visitor to the Golan Archaeological Museum a better understanding of these Chalcolithic houses, one such house, including its furnishings, has been reconstructed—all from original materials—inside the museum.

Also on display are numerous basalt and pottery vessels from the Chalcolithic period, as well as agricultural implements and flint tools used in daily life. The agricultural implements, as well as carbonized wheat grains and olive pits, and a variety of pottery 060vessels decorated with goat horns, all indicate that Chalcolithic economy in the Golan was based chiefly on agriculture and goat herding.

The most dramatic Chalcolithic artifacts are cultic—the famous pillar-form figurines, carved from basalt. On the top of each figurine, a shallow bowl has been carved out, presumably to hold an offering for some unknown ritual. Because these pillar-form figurines are so ubiquitous in Chalcolithic houses, it is assumed that the ritual was domestic in nature. Some of the figurines are carved with facial features and many have large protuberant noses, probably symbolizing life and fertility. Several of the pillar figures have horns, and sometimes goatees as well. By placing suitable offerings in the bowl on the top of the pillar figures, the Chalcolithic offerant no doubt believed he was ensuring the success and increase of his fields and flocks.

One of the strangest structures on the Golan remains a mystery—the monumental circles of Rujm el-Hiri. In the center of this site a solid, circular stone heap rises over 20 feet. Three concentric circles of stone walls, now mostly collapsed, ring the stone heap. The outermost wall encloses an area nearly 500 feet in diameter. These circles can best be seen from the air, so the Golan Archaeological Museum displays a dramatic aerial photograph of Rujm el-Hiri.

But the mystery remains. What function did this monumental construction serve? Some have suggested an elaborate burial. Perhaps the more probable explanation is that it was somehow used in astronomical calculations. Up to now, these circles have not been dated. Perhaps, if archaeological excavations are undertaken at the site, a date can be determined.

Another strange sight on the Golan is fields of dolmens. Throughout the Golan, hundreds of dolmens are visible on the horizon. They are made of huge unworked basalt slabs and resemble giant stone tables. In fact the word dolmen derives from two Old Breton words—dol, meaning table, and men, meaning stone.

Dolmens were built to serve as tombs. Because of the absence of any associated contemporary house remains, we infer that the dolmen builders were nomadic or seminomadic tribesmen.

The Golan dolmens vary in size, ranging from those built of three or four large boulders to the giants measuring over 20 feet wide and rising to heights of over 10 feet. Some dolmens are free-standing, but many others are partially—or completely—covered by stone heaps, or tumuli. Still others are surrounded by circles of stones.

Beneath each table-like structure is a rectangular underground chamber with a paved floor and a roof made with heavy slabs. Apparently, this chamber was used for a secondary burial: About a year after death, when the flesh of the deceased had decayed, the bones were reburied in the chamber beneath the dolmen, together with a few funerary gifts of pottery vessels and weapons, usually of copper. Many dolmen chambers were reused as ready-made tombs, both in ancient and modern times. The earliest artifacts found in them, however, enable us to date them to the period archaeologists call Middle Bronze I—about 2200–2000 B.C. (a little before the most commonly dated period for the patriarchal age).

In the garden of the Golan Archaeological Museum, a dolmen excavated by Claire Epstein is on display. This dolmen originally was located near the modern settlement of Ramat Magshimim, and it took a week, using modern mechanical equipment, to move it to the museum! After dismantling this dolmen stone-by-stone, moving it to the museum and then reconstructing it stone-by-stone, we gained a new appreciation of the enormous effort that the ancient settlers of the Golan must have expended in constructing hundreds of dolmens without the modern equipment that we had at our disposal.

The earliest written reference to the Golan is in the Bible, where it is mentioned several times. In Deuteronomy 4:41–43, we are told that Moses designated three cities east of the Jordan as cities of refuge for those who unintentionally killed someone to whom he had displayed no previous hostility. One of these three cities of refuge was “Golan, in Bashan, belonging to the Manassehites” (see also Joshua 20:8). At that time, “Golan” referred to a city, rather than a region, although in Joshua 21:27 its pastures are also referred to, confirming its fertile uplands suitable for grazing (see also 1 Chronicles 6:56).

During the Israelite monarchy, two petty states—Geshur and Ma’acah—were located within the borders of present-day Golan (see 2 Samuel 13:37, 38 and 1 Kings 20:26, 29–30).

Unfortunately, the Biblical city of Golan has not yet been found, and artifacts that have been found from the Biblical periods are comparatively sparse. From surveys in the Golan, we know that most of the sites from the Late Bronze and Iron Ages were concentrated in the more fertile southern region. Professor Moshe Kochavi of Tel Aviv University has begun a new regional project that will include the Iron Age in the Golan. His excavations will no doubt shed new light on these unexplored periods in the land of Geshur.

The most famous reference to the Golan appears in the account of the First Jewish Revolt against Rome (66–70 A.D.) by the first-century historian Flavius Josephus.

Josephus describes a heroic battle between the rebelling Jews and the Roman army at the Jewish settlement of Gamla in the southern Golan. Josephus relates in great detail the Romans’ seven-month siege of Gamla, ending, in 67 A.D., in its destruction.^a

The site of Gamla was identified by kibbutznik Schmaryahu Guttman during an archaeological survey shortly after the Six-Day War. Gamla is situated on the flank of a very steep mountain spur, naturally defended by deep ravines on three sides. In 1976, several years after discovering the site, Guttman and a team of archaeologists began excavating. The excavations are 061still in progress.^b

Gamla was founded in the Hellenistic period (mid-second century B.C.). According to Josephus, it was conquered by the Jewish Hasmonean king Alexander Janneus in 81 B.C. It remained a Jewish town until it was destroyed by the Romans nearly 150 years later.

Because of its unparalleled location, Gamla was able to withstand an extended Roman siege. Nineteen hundred years after it was destroyed by the Romans, volunteers and Israeli youth groups began excavating the remains and restoring the site.

Gamla was overcome by the Roman forces led by the Roman general Vespasian, who set out with three legions and laid siege to Gamla from the hill overlooking the town. There Vespasian constructed three platforms from which his campaign was conducted, catapulting ballista stones across the valley onto the Jewish inhabitants of the town. When the Romans finally succeeded in breaking into the city, the Jews stood firm and even counterattacked. The Romans fled to the roofs of the houses, but these quickly collapsed; many Roman soldiers lost their lives. Following this setback, the Romans continued their siege for another month. At dawn on the 22nd day of the month of Tishri, three Roman soldiers were sent to undermine the watchtower in the wall surrounding Gamla. They were successful, and the watchtower collapsed. The following day, 200 horsemen and infantry under the command of Titus stormed the town through this breach in the wall—which Guttman has now excavated. The ensuing slaughter deluged the town with blood, causing panic and despair among the Jewish inhabitants who, cornered on top of the mountain, flung themselves and their families into the deep ravine below. According to Josephus, 4,000 Jews fell by Roman swords and 5,000 plunged to their death. The sole survivors were two women. Thus Gamla was conquered and totally destroyed on the 23rd day of October, 67 A.D., never to be resettled.

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A model of Gamla is displayed in the museum. It shows not only the excavated synagogue (the earliest ever found) and an adjacent ritual bath, but also the remains of the defensive wall and watchtower. Ballista stones, arrowheads and spears from the excavation provide mute evidence of the bitter fighting.

Also on exhibit are other artifacts from the Gamla excavations: a plowshare, jewelry, cosmetic accessories, nails, pottery, oil lamps, pieces of stucco from the Gamla houses and many coins dating to the first and second years of the Jewish Revolt.

A new exhibit on Gamla now in the planning phase calls for a separate room to house the hundreds of artifacts recovered from the destroyed city during the past 12 years of excavation. As part of this enlarged Gamla exhibit, a short film will dramatize the story of Gamla and its tragic defeat by the Roman army.

Settlement on the Golan flourished during the Byzantine period, in the fifth and sixth centuries A.D. Over 170 sites have been identified. The rural villages were either Jewish or Christian (sometimes including pagans), but usually not mixed. Urban settlements, in contrast, had mixed populations. Synagogues, identified by inscriptions and symbols, indicated Jewish villages. Churches, identified by different inscriptions and crosses, indicated Christian villages. (Pagan remains could also be distinguished.)

Archaeologist Zvi Ma‘oz, during a survey of the Golan, identified over 25 Jewish villages in west central Golan. In the northern and eastern Golan, the discovery of Christian and pagan archaeological remains suggests that in the fifth and sixth centuries these areas were still engaged in a process of Christianization. In the more fertile southern Golan, however, Christianization was largely complete by the end of the sixth century, as reflected in the archaeological finds. At that time, it was populated by Jews, Christians and pagans, who inhabited villages and towns mainly in central and southern Golan.

During the fifth and sixth centuries, the Golan economy was based largely on olive oil; ancient oil presses have been found in abundance all over the Golan. Olive oil was used for cosmetic and medicinal purposes as well as for cooking and preserving food. It also provided oil for household lamps. Thanks to the excellent quality of its olive oil, the Golan enjoyed considerable economic prosperity, as evidenced by the richly decorated synagogues and public buildings dating to this period.

One artifact with a particularly interesting recent history is a stone column on which a seven-branched candelabrum, the menorah, is incised. Below the menorah, an Aramaic inscription reads Ana Yehuda Hazana—“I am Yehuda the cantor.”

This column was no doubt originally part of a Byzantine synagogue. The column was first discovered more than 100 years ago by Gustav Schumacher in the Arab village of Fiq, located in southern Golan. Schumacher was a German engineer hired to survey a railroad line between Damascus and Haifa. During the course of his work in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, he recorded and published numerous ancient sites and artifacts from the Golan, including the inscription from Fiq. After 1967, when the region was reopened to archaeological exploration, this column could not be found at Fiq. Several months later, during a survey at Quneitra, located about 35 miles north of Fiq, a plastered column was found standing at the entrance to a Syrian cemetery. Upon removing the plaster, the inscription and menorah were once again 063discovered. How the column got from Fiq to Quneitra remains unknown. In any event, it is now on display at the Golan Archaeological Museum.

Another remarkable architectural fragment from this period is an inscription that refers to “the school of Rabbi Eliezer ha-Qappar.” This rabbi is mentioned frequently in the Mishnah, a codification of Jewish law compiled about 200 A.D. that forms the core of the Talmud. From the inscription mentioning the school, it is not clear whether this famous rabbi actually taught in the Golan; more likely, a school was later named in his honor.

The numerous architectural fragments with Jewish 064symbols attest to the number of synagogues that once dotted the Golan. One particularly beautiful column capital is carved with a menorah, a shofar (ram’s horn) and the so-called four species—myrtle, citrus, palm and willow—associated with the Feast of Tabernacles.

Because it is so unusual, another architectural fragment from a Byzantine-period synagogue has been placed near the entrance to the museum—an especially impressive introduction to the collection. It is a carefully worked 7-foot-long basalt stone that is only 16 inches high and from 10 to 16 inches thick. Although it is basically rectangular, it ends in the form of a sculpted lion’s head and paws.

It is a skillfully worked basalt orthostat, depicting on either side, in relief, a man flanked by a lion and lioness with cub and an eagle. Found at the Syrian village of Ein Samsam, not far from the Byzantine Jewish settlement of Ein Nashut, the fragment may originally have been part of a Torah shrine base in the synagogue at Ein Nashut.

Another architectural fragment, a nine-branched menorah flanked by an incense shovel and shofar, stands near the entrance to the museum. It was found in an arch from the Jewish village of Yahudiyye. The menorah, shovel and shofar were among the ritual objects connected with the religious practices of the Temple in Jerusalem and are frequently found in ancient synagogue decorations.

The remains of several Christian villages and churches have been excavated or surveyed, and decorated architectural fragments from these sites are also exhibited in the museum. These include finds from Kursi on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee, which is identified with Gergasa, the site of the “miracle of the Gadarene swine” (Luke 8:22–39).

A third architectural fragment on display in the lobby of the museum depicts a hare eating grapes. It was recovered from the Byzantine Judeo-Christian village at Farj, one of the larger and more prosperous settlements in the eastern central Golan.

The archaeological attractions of the small modern settlement of Qatzrin are not limited to the Golan Archaeological Museum. They also include an open-air museum—the ancient Byzantine village of Qatzrin, located about a half-mile from the modern settlement.

Shortly after the Six-Day War, the elaborately decorated lintel of the entrance doorway to the ancient village’s synagogue was discovered poking above ground level.

The synagogue has now been excavated and partially restored. A number of bar mitzvahs (the reading of the Torah by a 13-year-old, which initiates the youth into the adult Jewish community) and weddings have already been held in the synagogue.

Since 1983, a portion of the ancient village has also been excavated, including a small public square adjacent to the synagogue, parts of three domestic buildings, a small industrial area and four alleys, all contemporary with the synagogue (late fourth to mid-eighth centuries A.D.). The ancient buildings were all constructed of local basalt stone. The living quarters of the houses are paved, sometimes with roughly cut, well-laid basalt blocks and sometimes with field stones and pebbles.

One of these partially restored domestic buildings, which we call House A, had a large living room (triclinium) and an adjacent, small storage area. An internal wall with windows and a doorway separated the living room from the smaller, storage area. This particular technique of building internal walls with windows that allowed the passage of light was very common in the basaltic regions of the Golan. A second story over the storage area probably served as a sleeping loft.

In another completely restored domestic building, which we reach by the original ancient path, two outdoor ovens (tabuns) have been preserved. This house consists of a living room, two storage areas, a sleeping loft, indoor and outdoor kitchens and a courtyard. Being planned for the inside of this house is a display that will present a reconstruction of the daily life and material culture of the seventh-century A.D. villagers who once lived here. Thus, Byzantine life in the Golan is being vividly recreated.^c

There are no gold mines or oil wells on the Golan. But, archaeologically speaking, the Golan settlers are mining gold and striking oil. This remote, sparsely inhabited and sometimes desolate area might seem the last place in the world for a modern archaeological museum. But not to the 600 families who live in Qatzrin. What could be more logical than a museum to display the Golan’s archaeological treasures, to foster pride in the area, to attract tourists and, not least, to encourage scholarly research into the Golan’s fascinating and varied past. So there it is, in all its glory, […]