Page 155 - A Walk to Caesarea / Joseph Patrich

A Walk to Caesarea: A Historical-Archaeological Perspective 141

The length of the northern part of this mole was c. 80 m. Then it turned in an
obtuse angle toward the harbor fortress, leaving an open passage c. 50 m wide.
On the south the harbor was bordered by the harbor fortress. The sea wall of the
Crusader city closed in the eastern part of the harbor and ended with a square
tower. It was over 100 m long and 5–6 m wide – as a quay – with its external side
bearing the wall itself. For the most part the inner harbor had turned into a lagoon
already in the Byzantine era, and toward its end various structures began to be built
on its area and its quay. In the early Muslim period a residential neighborhood of
courtyard houses with cisterns existed here, and likewise in Crusader times.

The harbor fortress had an elevated keep and it was separated from the city by
a broad water-filled moat, 20 m wide, that was open to the sea (Fig. 156). On the
perimeter was a wall with rectangular towers (Fig. 64 above, p. 60). Prone pillars
were also placed criss-cross in its foundations (Fig. 157). This thick, rigid base layer
foiled the Mamluks’ attempt to penetrate beneath its foundations and collapse it.

The Jewish Synagogue

The site that Michael Avi-Yona excavated in 1956 and 1962, with the assistance of
Avraham Negev, is located in the northwest area of Herodian Caesarea, and looks
to the sea. It was reexamined by members of an expedition led by Robert Bull,
and a summary report was recently published by Marylinda Govaars and others.
Of the five (and according to Govaars, seven) layers distinguished there, two or
three of the later levels can be ascribed with certainty to the fourth–sixth centuries,
when the site served as a synagogue. This determination stems mainly from the
inscriptions and menoroth on the marble capitals, which indicate the identity of
the structure (Fig. 158a–b and Fig. 179, below, p. 158). The assumption is that the

ab

Donation of synagogue An offering of the Jewish
floor by Iouli(o)s, 4th–5th congregation, 6th–7th c.
c. CE. “Iouli(o)s, having CE. “May the Lord be our
made a vow, had …. feet helper. An offering/donation
(of mosaic pavement) of the congregation under
made” Maruthas”

Donation by Theodorus
son of Olympus, for the
salvation of his daughter
Matrona”

Fig. 158a–b (tr. J.J. Price, CIIP II, nos. 1139,
a. Remains in situ of a mosaic floor of the synagogue 1141, 1143)
b. Findings and inscription from a synagogue