A Burial Complex and Ossuaries of the Second Temple Period on Mount Scopus, Jerusalem

Chapter 10 A Burial Complex and Ossuaries of the Second Temple Period on Mount Scopus, Jerusalem

Amos Kloner* and Sherry Whetstone**

Over the past century, about 100 cave tombs of the Second Temple period have been discovered on Mount Scopus in Jerusalem (Kloner and Zissu 2007, 152– 96). Some date to the second/first centuries BCE and others to the first century BCE/first century CE. All the cave tombs were hewn in the rock and occupy relatively small spaces; they make up about one-tenth of all known cave tombs in the ancient burial grounds that encompassed Jerusalem. Burial caves were concentrated on Mount Scopus because of its proximity to the walled city and the ease with which the soft chalk there could be worked.1 The burial complex described here contains most of the features character- istic of Jewish burials in Jerusalem and Judea in the first century BCE and the first century CE. At first, the deceased were laid in kokhim (loculi) for primary burial. After a time, the bones were collected for secondary burial in several short kokhim and later in ossuaries. The ossuaries were stored on the floor in the tomb or on shelves in specially hewn recesses in the tomb’s walls. Some of the ossuaries were adorned with ornaments containing standard motifs and names were incised or written in Hebrew or Greek (Avigad 1956; Rahmani 1994a–b; Hachlili 2005; Kloner 1980a, 218–58; Kloner and Zissu 2003, 49–56; 2007, 103–20).

* The Martin (Szusz) Department of Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology, Bar-Ilan University, Israel, [email protected]. ** The Martin (Szusz) Department of Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology, Bar-Ilan University, Israel, [email protected]. 1 On the caves in the region of Mount Scopus, see Kloner 1980a (pp. 4–20 and bibliography therein). Since 1980, several additional burial caves were discovered and excavated on Mount Scopus (for a complete list, see Kloner 2001; and Kloner and Zissu 2003; 2007). The present work is a revised and updated English version of the Hebrew article (Kloner 1993), but see also Kloner 1994; and Kloner and Zissu 2003, 79, 81–82; 2007, 161–63, 550. We believe that this report is illustrative of many of the questions concerning Jewish burial customs and art in the first century BCE and the first century CE, and we are honored to dedicate it to Prof. Rachel Hachlili, a colleague, a friend, and a scholar who has contributed much to the study of these subjects.

The burial complex comprises two neighboring cave tombs that were joined together in antiquity. The eastern cave (Tomb I) consists of Chambers A–C; the western cave (Tomb II) consists of Chambers D–E (Figs. 10.1–10.2). Both face south toward the Temple Mount.2

Tomb I

Chamber A The southern part of this chamber was destroyed by construction work that revealed the existence of the burial cave complex (Fig. 10.3). Earth-movers demolished a forecourt in front of Chamber A, which was 2.71 m wide and 1.7 m high. Arcosolium 1 was cut in the upper half of the west wall.3 Two ordinary kokhim (Kokhim 2–3) were cut at floor level in the east wall, and Kokh 3 mea- sures 2 × 0.7 m at the center. An unnumbered loculus in the northern wall was deepened to connect Chambers A and B. A recessed frame (1 × 0.8 × 0.22 m) was cut around the opening and a blocking stone fitting it was found nearby (Figs. 10.4–10.5). The chamber was found empty of finds of any kind.

Chamber B Chamber B (2.5 × 2.3 × 1.8 m) has shelves (0.6–0.7 m wide) hewn in its walls. A shallow standing pit (1.5 × 0.8 × 0.22 m) was hewn in the center of the floor, although the ceiling was high enough for people to stand upright, an indica- tion that the provision of a standing pit in burial chambers was a standard traditional feature—even where it was not needed. It is also possible the pit

2 The cave complex was discovered in the course of earth-moving work for the foundations of the Humanities faculty building of The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Scopus campus. The excavation, on behalf of the Department of Antiquities and Museums (now the Israel Antiquities Authority), took place in May–June 1974, under Permit 472, directed by the present writer (Kloner). The late Prof. Ehud Netzer, who participated in the first three days of excavation, also took the measurements. Photos are by Zeev Radovan, Kloner, and Zila Sagiv. The anthropological examinations were carried out by Joe Zias. The plan was drawn by Fera Resnick and the pottery drawings by Boris Zeloni. A preliminary report of the excavation was published in Hadashot Arkheologiyot (1974), 51–52. 3 The term arcosolium (pl., arcosolia) denotes a niche or recess with an arched ceiling hewn into the rock wall of a tomb in the form of a shelf on which ossuaries were laid, and in some rare cases, the deceased. The term quadrosolium (pl., quadrosolia) denotes a type of recessed shelf with a ceiling parallel to the shelf surface and slightly rounded ends. Both arcosolia and quadrosolia differ from kokhim, which are hewn perpendicular to the wall.