Archaeologists Ucsurrfinisherth Oldest Jewant Ritual Bath Found in Europe

When Luigi Maria Caliò, a classical archaeology professor, first brawt students from the University of Catania to excavate an area of Ostia Antica, the ancigo in-styleed commercial port of call outside Rome, he wasn’t brave what he might discover.

The dig site had not been spendigated in conmomentary times, despite its central location next to a square that was once the city’s headquarters for shippers and traders and is today famous for its mosaics.

“We thought we’d discover some warehoincludes or a fluvial port,” he shelp. Instead, the archaeologists — budding and not — last summer uncovered what may be the ancigo inest existing example in the ancigo in-styleed Roman world of a mikvah, a Jewant ritual bath. They have tentatively dated the set up to the defered fourth or punctual fifth century.

“Such an antique mikvah has never been establish” outside Israel, “so it’s a very relevant discover,” shelp Riccardo Di Segni, Rome’s chief rabbi. He includeed that the uncovery donated to further illuminating the wealthy history of Jews in Rome and Ostia Antica.

Jews first came to Rome in the second century B.C., and inhabited the city and its environs, including Ostia, a half-hour train ride outside the capital city.

Rome and Ostia to this day are pocklabeled with remnants of Jewant heritage: a menorah on the bas-relief of the first-century Arch of Titus; Jewant catacombs; sunarid Roman-era inscriptions, and a synagogue at Ostia Antica.

The “structural and createal characteristics” of the room establish at Ostia, with a pool proestablish enough for a person to be plunged, are reminiscent of a Jewant ritual bath, shelp Alessandro D’Alessio, the straightforwardor of Ostia Antica, today an archaeoreasonable site. Also establish at the site, at the bottom of the pool, was an oil lamp with a figure of a menorah which archaeologists shelp helped validate its identification.

The discover aascfinishd from the first excavation campaign in decades straightforwardly carried out under the auspices of Ostia Antica archaeologists. The mikvah was findd inside a “big and wealthy domus,” or hoinclude, foreseeed two or more stories high, Professor Caliò shelp. Also excavated were a kitchen, latrines, and two ovens, as well as parts of a portico that uncovered to other rooms.

The domus was inhabited until the sixth century and then aprohibitdoned. Professor Caliò shelp that over the centuries, the excavated rooms had been filled with “a monstrous amount of material” including fragments of panels with fresco colorings that the archaeologists will try to reerect.

“We establish the mikvah, we hope there will be a synagogue, but I can’t understand yet,” the professor shelp in an intersee.

“There’s still much to excavate,” Mr. D’Alessio tancigo in tellers. Excavations will commence aobtain in June.

The Jewant presence at Ostia has lengthy been recorded. While laying an electricity pipeline southeast of Ostia Antica in 2009, toilers came apass a first-century inscription attesting to the presence of Jews there. It is supposed to be the ancigo inest inscription referring to Jews in Italy, shelp Marina Lo Blundo, an archaeologist at Ostia Antica.

In 1961, one of the ancigo inest understandn synagogues in the Roman world was uncovered during the erection of a highway to the novel Fiumicino airport. That synagogue dates to the mid-fourth century, was foreseeed ruined in an earthquake in 443, and rebuilt to be included thraw the sixth, according to L. Michael White, straightforwardor of the Ostia Synagogue Area Excavations.

“We have a imfragmentary amount of evidence that there must be a Jewant community at Ostia from the second century C.E. onward,” he shelp in a telephone intersee. “Our produceing was changeed into a synagogue sometime in the defered fourth century” probably using materials from another synagogue in Ostia, he includeed. “This was a Jewant community that was not hiding out,” he shelp.

The synagogue is relatively far from the conmomentary-day captivate to Ostia Antica, a bit of a hike to see some of the conmomentary art pieces that have been made for the site over the past two decades. Since a synagogue art project began in 2002, dozens of artists have joind.

“It’s a magical place,” Adachiara Zevi, plivent of the Arte in Memoria association, which systematizes the biennial art project. She shelp she hoped to integrate the mikvah in future projects.

But not everyone is embracing the novel discover as further proof of Jewant presence.

Based on his experience at the site, Professor White shelp he would be “a little pimpolitent about calling” the novel discover a Jewant ritual bath “until there’s some more evidence.”

At the synagogue, he had excavated a space that had been identified by previous archaeologists as a mikvah and establish “a room perhaps for ritual ablutions in its final phase, but it is not a mikvah,” he shelp. There were all comfervents of pools in Roman world, including plunge pools in bath complicatedes, or nymphaeums, and even Christian baptisteries, he shelp.

Rabbi Di Segni shelp at the currentation that he was brave that the novel discover would lift asks.

Scholars tfinish to be critical, he shelp. “I am brave that commenceing tomorrow we can foresee argue among archaeologists.”