A Hungarian archaeological mission digging in the ruins of Machaerus, a fortress built by King Herod on the eastern shore of the Dead Sea, has discovered a large ritual bath which were likely constructed for the royal family’s use. The bath has 12 steps, and was fed from a reserve pool when its water ran low.
In order to qualify as a means to purification, a ritual bath must have at least 40 Se’ah, the equivalent of about 83 gallons of water.
The underground cistern, 54 ft deep, watered the baths and the fortress’ gardens.
The architecture of the bath is very similar to the baths and cisterns discovered in nearby Qumran (across the Dead Sea). It is situated 9 ft below the royal courtyard, and used to be covered by a vaulted stone roof, which was probably demolished by Lucilius Bassus’ 10th Roman legion. Bassus’ soldiers, on a campaign to repress the Great Jewish Revolt, in 71 attacked the Herodian fortress and the Jewish warriors who were hiding inside.
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Machaerus was in direct line of sight of Jerusalem. The Talmud reports that the smoke of the sacrificial offerings could be seen rising from the altar of the temple in Jerusalem all the way to Machaerus, and Rabbi Elazar ben Delgai said: (Yuma 39:): “Father owned goats in the Machaerus mountains that would sneeze from the smell of the burn incense.”
