1,800-Year-Old Roman Military Based Unearthed in an Ancient City in Northern Israel

Archaeologists unearthed the remains of an old Roman military base. The site reportedly housed 5,000 Roman soldiers.

Roman Military Base Unearthed in Israel

Archaeologists have discovered the remains of a 1,800-year-old Roman military base that once held thousands of soldiers. The base is situated at the base of Tel Megiddo, an artificial mound made of the ruins of an ancient city in northern Israel. The village was inhabited for thousands of years and was a major hub in the ancient world.

According to Yotam Tepper, an archaeologist who oversaw excavations at the site on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), the military base was 1,800 feet long and 1,150 feet broad, with two main roads intersecting in the middle. The IAA press statement states that the location is the only known Roman military outpost of this magnitude in Israel.

The outpost was originally part of the Imperial Roman Army's Legio VI Ferrata ("Sixth Ironclad Legion"), assigned to defend the province of Judaea in the first century. From approximately A.D. 117/120-300, the camp was the permanent military station for over 5,000 Roman soldiers.

Archaeologists have recently discovered vast architectural remnants of the camp's main thoroughfare, the Via Pretoria, together with paved stone sections and a semi-circular podium that were formerly a component of a massive public edifice. These ruins represent the northern portion of the camp. The base's headquarters was built at the intersection of two main roads.

"It was from this base point that all the distances along the Roman Imperial roads to the main cities in the north of the country were measured and marked with milestones," the archaeologist added.

Because these archeological discoveries are uncommon, the research project's results offer a unique contribution, per Tepper. He added that although Israel is familiar with Roman military camps, these are either minor, auxiliary division-related camps or camps used for brief sieges. Nothing reportedly comes close to the legionary base as a whole.

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2,000-Year-Old Roman Swords Found

Glenn Manning, a resident in the Cotswold District, took part in a metal detector rally when he came across two rare, 2,000-year-old Roman swords. He discovered the cavalry swords with wooden scabbards, fittings, and a copper alloy bowl.

The council hailed the uncommon find as an "amazing discovery," which supposedly dates back to A.D. 160, during the height of the Roman Empire. The swords' "considerable length" is a crucial cue that they are cavalry weapons, as the ancient Romans would have carried them by horseback.

During this time, it was not illegal to own a firearm or travel with one on one's person. This is because there was a lot of violence and robbery in the Roman provinces at that period.

Simon James, a professor of archaeology at Leicester University, studied swords. According to him, the closest example was a pair of similar swords found in Canterbury, where their owners were found face down in a pit outside the city walls.

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