The digitization of Jerusalem Architectural Archives was a practical heritage documentation project establishing a platform for studying architecture and design in modern Jerusalem. The project ventured to locate, digitize, and catalog official and personal documents concerning the city’s modern development. The resulting database consists of elaborate Excel tablesincorporating seven archival and working collections produced under various regimes: Ottoman, British, and Israeli. Striving to divulge the material to as many readers as possible and facilitate multiple readings of the city’s history, we questioned the terms and categories traditionally used for tagging and cataloging documents in the historiography of Jerusalem. Technically, the main challenges we faced were inconsistent and incomplete cataloging of the original archives, obtaining document publishing rights, and creating a sustainable platform. More substantial challenges pertained to the cataloger’s interpretative role in objectively representing the information emerging from the various documents and the archive’s role as a mediator in research and practice.

In the course of a seven-year-long project (2014–2021), all published architectural, archaeological, geographical, textual, and epigraphical data pertaining to early Christian churches (n=715) and monasteries (n=306) were collated in a comprehensive digital database. The objectives of the project and the structure of the database are described in detail, including an appendix outlining the templates of each section of the digital corpus (Appendix A). A designated section of the corpus is devoted to preconceived queries, which permit the generation of specific reports pertaining to geographical distribution, architectural components and members, index of terms mentioned in the inscriptions, and more. A Google search function covering the entire database is also available. At present, the database is undergoing the final stages of proofreading. When completed, it will be fully open to the public via the internet.

The “spatial turn” in the humanities has led to increased exploration of spatial perspectives. This shift inspired the ALMA Digital Atlas of the Ancient Jewish World project, which aims to develop a comprehensive digital-analytical atlas. It is intended to serve as a tool for geographical and comparative research on ancient Jewish geography, spanning the Hellenistic and Byzantine periods. The atlas builds on two elemental entity types: place, which pertains to regions or settlements, and source, which addresses pertinent historical texts, archaeological finds, or both, allowing for the robust comparison of geographical information from various sources. This project seeks not only to address existing historical and geographical questions but also to raise new ones, offering fresh insights into geographical perception in antiquity.

This paper describes the vision, framework, challenges, and implementation of the Jerusalem History Knowledge Center (JHKC) initiated by the late Ronnie Ellenblum. The center’s establishment was configured as a joint project of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI), the National Library of Israel (NLI), and the Israel Antiquities Authorities (IAA). Its primary mission and challenge were to establish a long-term digital infrastructure constituting an open-access platform about the history of Jerusalem, which draws on diverse sources, such as archaeological records, historical documents, pilgrims’ accounts, old and new photographs and videos, architectural reconstructions, etc. The first stages included the classification of databases about two sites in Jerusalem: the Citadel—Tower of David and the Damascus Gate. As part of this work, we implemented a unified search in interdisciplinary databases regarding a specific geographical area or a single monument. The center’s products will eventually operate at two levels: at the research level, facilitating work in the fields of history, archeology, art, geography, social sciences, etc., and at the popular level, serving the general public.

LISROP (Land of Israel Study and Research Online Platform) is an online, bilingual, English-Hebrew, integrative platform (under construction) aiming to allow scholars and interested non-academics to review a vast amount of archaeological and historical data from the land of Israel, explore it and dissect in various ways, and then analyze it using sophisticated GIS tools, some of which were specifically developed for the platform. The platform can be used for various types of studies and can be expanded thematically and spatially beyond its current limits by incorporating additional databases and applications and providing information on nature, culture, and heritage, furthering study and research into these areas. The paper briefly presents the project’s background, history, development, and current aims. It then describes the platform and its components, including the geographical foundations on which the data is studied, the archaeological and historical data it incorporates, and the various GIS components it includes. The paper then outlines the platform’s potential, capacity to advance research on several levels, and expected relevance for non-academics. Toward the end, the paper briefly describes some of the major challenges we encountered in our work and potential avenues for expanding the platform.

With the advent of information technology, numerous initiatives have been launched by cultural heritage, academic and commercial institutions aiming at digitization, organization, visualization and analysis of historical information of a given place. These projects usually utilize GIS (Geographic Information Systems) to represent and analyze a restricted range of spatial data, such as archaeological findings or landmarks from a single information source. To take the emerging field of spatial history to the next level—the spatial digital humanities—the traditional spatial data should be enriched with cultural and social data from heterogeneous resources, such as historical books, administrative documents, images, and multimedia objects, and allow for deeper analysis of the historical places’ cultural and social context. To this end, ontologies and modern semantic web technologies should be combined with GIS technology to enable easy data standardization and integration, uniform data modeling, open-access and cross-project data sharing and analysis. In this paper, we review this combined approach and its utilization attempts in recent spatial digital humanities projects for cities from all over the globe while discussing the field’s main common challenges and their possible solutions.

Substantial archaeological exposure of the ancient city of Yehud was achieved through as many as forty-four trial and salvage excavations conducted since 1993. The accumulated data has now reached a critical mass where a broad synthesis is made possible, concerning a site for which investigation has been slow due to the challenges of excavating within a densely populated and rapidly developing modern city. Excavations in the city, located in Israel’s central coastal plain, revealed a patchy history of human settlement, ranging in date between the Late Chalcolithic and Ottoman periods, with lengthy periods of sparse residential use, when the site was variably utilized for funerary, industrial, agricultural, or other types of yet unidentified activities. This comprehensive synthesis unravels the archaeology and history of this little-known site, located at the heart of a region that has undergone major social transformations and historical upheavals during the period in question. The information on Yehud is contextualized with up-to-date knowledge of the archaeology of the central coastal plain, especially concerning Yehud’s hinterland within the Ayalon valley.

This article engages three deities, one Greek and two Oriental, that their cults were worshipped in caves during the Hellenistic and Roman periods. The first deity is a Hellenistic terracotta figurine of Aphrodite, recovered from the prehistoric cave Me‘arat ha-Nahal (Wadi el-Maghara) at the foot of Mount Carmel. It probably represents Aphrodite Pandemos (Ἀϕροδίτη Πάνδημος) or Aphrodite en Kepois (Ἀϕροδίτη ἐν Κήποις). It may be assumed that the cave, and its proximity to the city of Dor, was modified to serve as a cultic site or shrine. The second deity is represented by a sunken relief engraved on a rough rock surface adjacent to a cluster of 18 caves, known as “The Temple Cave” complex, along Keziv Stream (Nahal Keziv) in western Galilee. The largest and main cave in this complex seems to have had a cultic function in the Roman period, that is, it constituted a cultic site for a particular divinity. The sunken relief depicts a walking male military figure, dubbed “The Man in the Wall.” Based on a comparative study and the figure’s iconographic characteristics, we may identify it with Sol Invictus Mithras, a Late Roman-period deity, manifesting cultic pagan activity in a remote and isolated area, in the very heart of nature. The third deity is Ba‘al Carmel (identified with Zeus/Jupiter) who was presumably worshipped in Elijah’s Cave on the western slope of Mt. Carmel. Ba‘al Carmel’s visual representation, the depiction of a libation vessel and the presumed figure of a priest or, alternatively, an altar within an aedicula suggest it was used in the Roman period. Notably, one of the Greek inscriptions, dated to the Roman period, explicitly addresses the cave’s sacred nature and the prohibition against its profanation.

El-Janab Cave (‘Usarin Cave) is a large karst system located about 11 km south of Shechem (Nablus) in Central Samaria. It comprises a series of large chambers connected by narrow passages that developed as a hypogenic cave in Upper-Cenomanian dolomite. During 2017–2018, we mapped and surveyed the cave, retrieving archaeological finds from various periods, including the Late Chalcolithic, early Bronze Age, Middle Bronze Age, Iron Age I, Iron Age II, Persian, early Hellenistic, Early Roman, Ayyubid and Mamluk periods. It seems that the cave’s geographical and morphological features—its location in an open but settled landscape and its complex structure of passages leading to spacious chambers—attracted distinct human activities in several periods. In some phases, it was used as a refuge in turbulent times. In this paper, we present the archeological assemblages from the cave and discuss their interpretation and association with the history of the area.

The site of Tell el-Hawy is located above the confluence of the Rukkad and Yarmuk Rivers, near Israel’s present-day borders with Syria and Jordan. A survey revealed ancient remains on the hilltop and slopes dating mainly from the Iron Age, Late Hellenistic, and Roman periods. Twenty caves were found, including a large burial cave with loculi. The finds from the survey, as well as the caves, are described. The location of the site and its function are also discussed.

The Nesher-Ramla Quarry (el-Khirbe), located in the northwestern part of the Judean Foothills (Shefela), has been the site of one of the most extensive and long-lasting salvage excavations in Israel, conducted over almost two decades. During this time, dozens of hiding complexes were uncovered. The author has recently published a detailed review of these findings in a separate monograph. The present article summarizes the typology of the Nesher-Ramla hiding complexes and discusses their dating and function. Although similar to hundreds of other hiding complexes in Judea and the Galilee, the subterranean complexes at Nesher-Ramla Quarry and elsewhere clearly predate the Bar Kokhba Revolt. Nesher-Ramla Quarry’s outstanding contribution derives from the scale of its excavations and recovered finds, indicating that these underground complexes may have had a history and a function somewhat different than previously believed.

Beth She‘arim was a Jewish town in the Galilee during the Roman period. Besides ritual baths, stone vessels, and synagogues, all present at Beth She‘arim, a key property of Roman-period Jewish settlements is underground complexes. The precise time and duration of these hiding complexes in the Galilee are controversial since there is only little reliable evidence upon which to establish a date. Recent excavations at Beth She‘arim have discovered three new hiding complexes that join another previously discovered complex. Two of the three complexes were excavated and documented, and the results shed light on the historical circumstances in which these complexes were hewn. It seems that the Beth She‘arim hiding complexes should be dated to the 2nd century CE and thus are probably related to the Bar Kokhba Revolt. Therefore, the Beth She‘arim hiding complexes constitute an important contribution to the study of the Galilee during the Bar Kokhba Revolt.

The ancient Jewish site of Ḥorbat Ḥuqoq has recently become famous for its synagogue and magnificent 5th-century CE mosaic floor. While unearthing the synagogue, a rock-hewn hiding complex was discovered beneath the floor and partially excavated. This complex (Hiding Complex 1) provided an emergency escape route via winding passages to a cistern, the side of which could be scaled with a ladder. Another hiding complex—Hiding Complex 2—was discovered as early as the 1980s at the base of the synagogue hill’s northern slope. It was surveyed and documented several times. In 2002, four chambers and several passages were excavated, and in 2021, the entrance was excavated, demonstrating it had been accessed via a ritual bath. This article presents the excavation results of the Ḥuqoq Hiding Complex 2. Among other things, they include a rich 2nd-century CE pottery assemblage retrieved from the inner passages of the complex, including fragments of cooking pots, jars, oil lamps, and a gemstone ring. A hoard of 22 coins, the first to be discovered in a Galilean hiding complex, was found deep inside one of the tunnels. Presently, only one was dated to the 2nd century CE. In this paper, we place Ḥuqoq in the context of some 14 other hiding complexes that were officially excavared and attributed by pottery and some other finds to the 2nd century CE. The paper explores a new dimension of the question about the Galilee’s participation in the Bar Kokhba Revolt. At the very least, it is now certain that the local population prepared for the revolt.