Caesarea Maritima קיסריה
Shown within Israel
Location	Israel
Coordinates	32°30′09″N 34°53′30″E / 32.5025060°N 34.8917670°E / 32.5025060; 34.8917670
History
Builder	Herod the Great
Periods	Roman, Byzantine, Islamic, Crusader
Site notes
Condition	ruin
Ownership	Israel Nature and Parks Authority
Public access	yes
Website	Caesarea National Park

Caesarea Maritima (Greek: παράλιος Καισάρεια) is a national park on Israeli coastline, near the modern city of Caesarea. The ancient Caesarea Maritima (or Caesarea Palestinae^[1]) city and harbor was built by Herod the Great about 25–13 BCE. The city has been populated through the late Roman and Byzantine era. Its ruins lie on the Mediterranean coast of Israel, about halfway between the cities of Tel Aviv and Haifa, on the site of Pyrgos Stratonos ("Straton's Tower").^[2] The national park is a popular location for the summer period, having a developed promenade with restaurants and coffee shops. The access to the Caesarea Maritima national park is via the coastal road.

Caesarea Maritima was named in honor of Augustus Caesar.^[1] The city was described in detail by the 1st century Roman Jewish historian Josephus.^[3] The city became the seat of the Roman prefect soon after its foundation. Caesarea was the "administrative capital" beginning in 6 CE.^[4] This city is the location of the 1961 discovery of the Pilate Stone, the only archaeological item that mentions the Roman prefect Pontius Pilate, by whose order Jesus was crucified.^[5]

The emperor Vespasian raised its status to that of a colonia. After the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE, Caesarea was the provincial capital of the Judaea Province, before the change of name to Syria Palaestina in 134 CE, shortly before the Bar Kokhba revolt.^[6] In Byzantine times, Caesarea remained the capital, with brief interruption of Persian and Jewish conquest between 614 and 625. In the 630s, Arab Muslim armies had taken control of the region, keeping Caesarea as its administrative center. In the early 8th century, the Umayyad caliph Suleiman transferred the seat of government of the Jund Filastin from Caesarea to Ramla.

History[link]

Roman era[link]

Remains of the ancient Roman aqueduct

The theatre at Caesarea

Herod built his palace on a promontory jutting out into the sea, with a decorative pool surrounded by stoas. In 13 BC, Caesarea became the civilian and military capital of Iudaea Province and the official residence of the Roman procurators and governors, Pontius Pilatus, praefectus and Antonius Felix. Josephus describes the harbor as being as large as the one at Piraeus, the major harbor of Athens. Remains of the principal buildings erected by Herod and the medieval town are still visible today, including the city walls, the castle and a Crusader cathedral and church. Caesarea grew rapidly, becoming the largest city in Judea, with an estimated population of 125,000 over an urban area of 3.7 square kilometres (1.4 sq mi). In 66 CE, the desecration of the local synagogue led to the disastrous Jewish revolt.^[7]

This city is the location of the 1961 discovery of the Pilate Stone, the only archaeological item that mentions the Roman prefect Pontius Pilate, by whose order Jesus was crucified.^[5][8] It is likely that Pilate used it as a base, and only went to Jerusalem when needed.^[9]

In 69, Vespasian declared it a colony and renamed it Colonia Prima Flavia Augusta Caesarea. In 70 CE, after the Jewish revolt was suppressed, games were held here to celebrate the victory of Titus. Many Jewish captives were brought to Caesarea Maritima and 2500 were slaughtered in Gladiatorial games.^[10]

After the revolt of Simon bar Kokhba in 132, which ended with the destruction of Jerusalem and expulsion of Jews, Caesarea became the center of Early Christianity in Palestine.

Christian hub[link]

According to the Acts of the Apostles, Caesarea was first introduced to Christianity when Peter the apostle baptized Cornelius the Centurion, his household, and his soldiers.^[11] This was the first time any Apostle had preached to the Gentiles and before Paul's first missionary journey. The Apostle Paul sought refuge there,^[12] staying once at the house of Philip the Evangelist, and later being imprisoned at Caesarea (which was the capital of the Roman province) for two years before being sent to Rome.^[13]

The Apostolic Constitutions state that the first Bishop of Caesarea was Zacchaeus the Publican. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, Caesarea became the metropolitan See. In the 3rd century Origen wrote his Hexapla and other exegetic and theological works while living there. The early church historian Eusebius was one of its bishops (315 - 318) in the early 4th century. Nicene Creed may have originated in Caesarea.

The main church, a martyrion (martyr's shrine) was built in the 6th century and sited directly upon the podium that had supported the Roman temple, as was a widespread Christian practice. Throughout the Empire, prominently-sited pagan temples were rarely left unconsecrated to the new rites: in time the Martyrion's site was re-occupied, this time by a mosque. The Martyrion was an octagon, richly re-paved and surrounded by small radiating enclosures. Archaeologists have recovered some foliate capitals that included representations of the Cross.

An elaborate government structure contained a basilica with an apse, where magistrates would have sat, for the structure was used as a hall of justice, as fragments of inscriptions detailing the fees that court clerks might claim attest. A well-preserved 6th century mosaic gold and colored glass table patterned with crosses and rosettes was found in 2005.^[14][15]

Theological library[link]

Through Origen and especially the scholarly presbyter Pamphilus of Caesarea, an avid collector of books of Scripture, the theological school of Caesarea won a reputation for having the most extensive ecclesiastical library of the time, containing more than 30,000 manuscripts: Gregory Nazianzus, Basil the Great, Jerome and others came to study there. The Caesarean text-type is recognized by scholars as one of the earliest New Testament types. The collections of the library suffered during the persecutions under the Emperor Diocletian, but were repaired subsequently by bishops of Caesarea.^[16] It was noted in the 6th century, but Henry Barclay Swete^[17] was of the opinion that it probably did not long survive the capture of Caesarea by the Saracens in 638, though a modern historian would attribute more destruction to its previous capture by the Sassanid Persians (in 614).

Arab rule[link]

Fishing Boats

In 638 the city, capital of Byzantine Palestine and an important commercial and maritime center, was conquered by the Muslims, allegedly through the betrayal of a certain Yusef, who conducted a party of troops of Muawiyah through a "secret tunnel", perhaps the extensive Byzantine sewers, into the city.^[18] The Persian historian al-Baladhuri, who offers the earliest Muslim account, merely states that the city was "reduced".^[19] The 7th-century Coptic bishop John of Nikiû, mentions "the horrors committed in the city of Caesarea in Palestine".^[20]

Crusader era[link]

The walls remained, but within them the population dwindled and agriculture crept in among the ruins. When Baldwin I took the city in 1101/2, during the First Crusade, it was still very rich, nevertheless. A legend grew up that in this city was discovered the Holy Grail around which so much lore accrued in the next two centuries. The city was strongly refortified and rebuilt by the Crusaders. A lordship was created there, as was one of the four archbishoprics in the kingdom (see Archbishop of Caesarea). A list of thirty-six Latin bishops, from 1101 to 1496 has been reassembled by 19th century papal historians; the most famous of these is probably Heraclius. After that the Latin "Bishop of Caesarea" became an empty title. Saladin retook the city in 1187; it was recaptured by the Crusaders in 1191, and finally lost by them in 1265, this time to the Mamluks, who ensured that there would be no more battling over the site— where the harbor has silted in anyway— by razing the fortifications - in line with their practice in other formerly-Crusader coastal cities.

Sebastos harbor[link]

When it was built in the 1st century BC, Sebastos Harbor ranked as the largest artificial harbor built in the open sea, enclosing around 100,000 m².^[21][22] King Herod built the two moles, or breakwaters, of the harbor between 22 and 15 BC,^[23] and in 10/9 BC he dedicated the city and harbor to Caesar (Sebastos is Greek for Augustus).^[24] The pace of construction was impressive considering its size and complexity. The moles were made of lime and pozzolana, a type of volcanic ash, set into a concrete underwater. Herod imported over 24,000 m³ pozzolana from Pozzuoli, Italy, to construct the 500 meter long southern breakwater and 275 meter long northern breakwater.^[25] A shipment of this size would have required at least 44 shiploads of 400 tons each.^[23] Herod also had 12,000 m³ of kurkar quarried to make rubble and 12,000 m³ of slaked lime mixed with the pozzolana.

Architects had to devise a way to lay the wooden forms for the concrete moles underwater. One technique was to drive stakes into the ground to make a box and then fill the box with pozzolana concrete bit by bit.^[21] However, this method required many divers to hammer in the stakes underwater and it used large quantities of pozzolana. Another technique was a double planking method used in the northern breakwater. On land, carpenters would construct a box with beams and frames on the inside and a watertight, double-planked wall on the outside. This double wall was built with a 23 cm gap between the inner and outer layer.^[26] Although the box had no bottom, it was buoyant enough to float out to sea because of the watertight space between the inner and outer walls. Once it was floated into position, pozzolana was poured into the gap between the walls and the box would sink into place on the seafloor and be staked down in the corners. The flooded inside area was then filled by divers bit by bit with pozzolana-lime mortar and kurkar rubble until it rose above sea level.^[26]

On the southern breakwater, barge construction was used. The southern side of Sebastos was much more exposed than the northern side, requiring sturdier breakwaters. Instead of using the double planked method filled with rubble, the architects sank barges filled with layers of pozzolana concrete and lime sand mortar. The barges were similar to boxes without lids, and were constructed using mortise and tenon joints, the same technique used in ancient boats, to ensure they remained watertight. The barges were ballasted with 0.5 meters of pozzolana concrete and floated out to their position. Alternating layers of pozzolana based and lime based concretes were hand placed inside the barge to sink it and fill it up to the surface.^[26]

At its height, Sebastos was one of the most impressive harbors of its time. It had been constructed on a coast that had no natural harbors and served as an important commercial harbor in antiquity, rivaling Cleopatra’s harbor at Alexandria. Josephus wrote: “Although the location was generally unfavorable, [Herod] contended with the difficulties so well that the solidity of the construction could not be overcome by the sea, and its beauty seemed finished off without impediment.”^[27] However, there were underlying problems that led to its demise. Studies of the concrete cores of the moles have shown that the concrete was much weaker than similar pozzolana hydraulic concrete used in ancient Italian ports. For unknown reasons, the pozzolana mortar did not adhere as well to the kurkar rubble as it did to other rubble types used in Italian harbors.^[25] Small but numerous holes in some of the cores also indicate that the lime was of poor quality and stripped out of the mixture by strong waves before it could set.^[25] Also, large lumps of lime were found in all five of the cores studied at Caesarea, which shows that the mixture was not mixed thoroughly.^[25] However, stability would not have been seriously affected if the harbor had not been constructed over a geological fault line that runs along the coast. Seismic action gradually took its toll on the breakwaters, causing them to tilt down and settle into the seabed.^[27] Also, studies of seabed deposits at Caesarea have shown that a tsunami struck the area sometime between the 1st and 2nd centuries CE.^[28] Although it is unknown if this tsunami simply damaged or completely destroyed the harbor, it is known that by the 6th century the harbor was unusable and today the moles rest over 5 meters underwater.^[29]

Archaeology and reconstruction[link]

Minaret of Caesarea Maritima

Archaeological excavations in the 1950s and 1960s uncovered remains from many periods, in particular, a complex of Crusader fortifications and a Roman theatre. Other buildings include a temple dedicated to Caesar; a hippodrome rebuilt in the 2nd century as a more conventional theater; the Tiberieum, which has a limestone block with a dedicatory inscription.^[30] This is the only archaeological find with an inscription mentioning the name "Pontius Pilatus"; a double aqueduct that brought water from springs at the foot of Mount Carmel; a boundary wall; and a 200 ft (60 m) wide moat protecting the harbour to the south and west. The harbor was the largest on the eastern Mediterranean coast. Worked directed by Robert Bull of Drew University is still in the process of publication while more recent work in the harbor directed by Robert Hohlfelder *U of Colorado, John Oleson of the U of Victoria, and the late Avner Raban has been largely published. Caesarea has recently become the site of what bills itself as the world's first underwater museum, where 36 points of interest on four marked underwater trails through the ancient harbor can be explored by divers equipped with waterproof maps.

See also[link]

• List of megalithic sites

References[link]

Other sources[link]

Books[link]

• Avner Raban and Kenneth G. Holum, Caesarea Maritima: a retrospective after two millennia (Leiden, Brill, 1996).
• Clayton Miles Lehmann and Kenneth G. Holum, The Greek and Latin Inscriptions of Caesarea Maritima (Boston, American Schools of Oriental Research, 2000).
• J. Patrich, Caesarea in the Time of Eusebius, in: Sabrina Inowlocki & Claudio Zamagni (eds), Reconsidering Eusebius: Collected papers on literary, historical, and theological issues (Leiden, Brill, 2011) (Vigiliae Christianae, Supplements, 107).

Films[link]

• Herod's Lost Tomb (2008; National Geographic Society), in addition to examining Netzer's purported find of Herod's tomb, Caesarea Maritima and most of Herod's other large projects are reconstructed in CGI.

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Caesarea Maritima

• Jewish Encyclopedia: Cæsarea by the Sea
• Texts on Wikisource:
  •  S. Vailhé (1913). "Caesarea Palaestinae". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 
  • R. A. Stewart Macalister (1911). "Caesarea Palaestinae". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 
  • "Cæsarea Palestinæ". New International Encyclopedia. 1905. 
• PBS Frontline – Caesarea Maritima
• Archaeology:
  • Archaeology of Caesarea
  • Archaeology of Caesarea
  • Pilate inscription
• Photos:
  • Photo gallery of Caesarea Maritima
  • Photo gallery of Caesarea Maritima

Coordinates: 32°30′00″N 34°53′59″E / 32.5°N 34.89972°E / 32.5; 34.89972

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Caesarea
Caesarea Maritima
Hebrew	קֵיסָרְיָה
(Translit.)	Keisarya
Also spelled	Qesarya (officially)
District	Haifa
Coordinates	32°30′08.08″N 34°54′30.33″E / 32.5022444°N 34.908425°E / 32.5022444; 34.908425Coordinates: 32°30′08.08″N 34°54′30.33″E / 32.5022444°N 34.908425°E / 32.5022444; 34.908425
Population	4,400 (2006)
Jurisdiction	35,000 dunams (35 km2; 14 sq mi)
Caesarea

Caesarea (Hebrew: קֵיסָרְיָה‎‎; Arabic: قيسارية‎, Kaysaria; Greek: Καισάρεια) is a town in Israel located mid-way between Tel Aviv and Haifa (45 km), on the Israeli coastal plain near the city of Hadera. Modern Caesarea as of December 2007 has a population of 4,500 people.^[1] It is the only Israeli locality managed by a private organization, the Caesarea Development Corporation,^[2] and also one of the most populous localities not recognized as a local council. It lies under the jurisdiction of the Hof HaCarmel Regional Council.

The town was built by Herod the Great about 25-13 BCE as the port city Caesarea Maritima. It served as an administrative center of Judaea Province of the Roman Empire, and later the capital of the Byzantine Palaestina Prima province during the classic period. Following the Arab conquest in the 7th century, the city fell into obscurity until Crusader renovation, but was again abandoned after the Mamluk conquest. It was populated in 1884 by Muslim Bosnyak immigrants, making it a small fishing village. In 1940, kibbutz Sdot Yam was established on Jewish lands next to the Bosnyak village. During the Civil War in Mandatory Palestine, the town was abandoned by the Bosnyak residents, and in 1952 a Jewish town of Caesarea established near the ruins of the old city, which were made into the national park of Caesarea Maritima.

History[link]

Early history[link]

Caesarea is believed to have been built on the ruins of Stratonospyrgos (Straton's Tower), founded by Straton I of Sidon, and was likely an agricultural storehouse in its earliest configuration.^[3] In 90 BCE, Alexander Jannaeus captured Straton's Tower as part of his policy of developing the shipbuilding industry and enlarging the Hasmonean kingdom. Straton's Tower remained a Jewish city for two generations, until the area became dominated by the Roman in 63 BCE, when the Romans declared it an autonomous city. The pagan city underwent vast changes under Herod the Great, who renamed it Caesarea in honor of the Roman emperor, Caesar Augustus.

In 22 BCE, Herod began construction of a deep sea harbor and built storerooms, markets, wide roads, baths, temples to Rome and Augustus, and imposing public buildings.^[4] Every five years the city hosted major sports competitions, gladiator games, and theatrical productions in its theatre overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.

Caesarea also flourished during the Byzantine period. In the 3rd century, Jewish sages exempted the city from Jewish law, or Halakha, as by this time the majority of the inhabitants were non-Jewish.^[5] The city was chiefly a commercial centre relying on trade.

Middle Ages[link]

The area was only seriously farmed during the Rashidun Caliphate period, apparently until the Crusader conquest in the eleventh century.^[5] Over time, the farms were buried under the sands shifting along the shores of the Mediterranean.

According to Petersen, a Great Mosque was seen there in 439H (1047) by Nasir-i-Khusraw. This was converted into the church of St. Peter in Crusader times. A wall, which could belong to this building, has been identified in modern times.^[6][7]

A portion of the Crusader walls and moat, as they exist today

In 1251, Louis IX fortified the city. The French king ordered the construction of high walls (parts of which are still standing) and a deep moat. However, strong walls could not keep out the sultan Baybars, who ordered his troops to scale the walls in several places simultaneously, enabling them to penetrate the city. During the Mamluk area, the ruins of Caesarea Maritima by the Crusader fortress near Caesarea on the Mediterranean coast lay uninhabited.

Ottoman period[link]

First in 1664 a settlement is mentioned. It consisted of 100 "Moroccan" families, and 7-8 Jewish ones.^[8] In the late 17th century it again declined.^[9]

The Bosnian Mosque at Qisarya

Caesarea lay in ruins until the nineteenth century, when the village of Qisarya (Arabic: قيسارية‎, the Arabic name for Caesarea) was established in 1884 by Bushnaks (Bosnyaks) - Muslim immigrants from Bosnia, who built a small fishing village on the ruins of the Crusader fortress on the coast.^[10][11]

Petersen, visiting the place in 1992, writes that the nineteenth-century houses were built in blocks, generally one storey high (with the exception of the house of the governor.) Some houses on the western side of the village, near the sea, have survived. There were a number of mosques in the village in the nineteenth century, but only one ("The Bosnian mosque") has survived. This mosque, located at the southern end of the city, next to the harbour, is described as a simple stone building with a red-tiled roof and a cylindrical minaret. It was used (in 1992) as a restaurant and as a gift shop.^[7]

British Mandate[link]

Kibbutz Sdot Yam, 1940

The Jewish kibbutz of Sdot Yam was established 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) south to the Arab town in 1940. The Arab village declined in economic importance and many of Qisarya's Arab inhabitants left in the mid 1940s, when the British extended the Palestine Railways which bypassed the shallow-draft port. Qisarya had a population of 960 in 1945,^[12] with Qisarya's population composition 930 Muslims and 30 Christians in 1945.^[13] In 1944/45 a total of 18 dunums of Arab village land was used for citrus and bananas, 1,020 dunums were used for cereals, while 108 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards.^[14]