View source for Masada

==History==
Almost all historical information about Masada comes from the first-century [[Jews in the Roman Empire|Jewish Roman]] historian [[Josephus]].<ref name=THL>{{cite book |pages=[https://archive.org/details/holylandoxfordar00murp/page/n402 378]–381 |title=The Holy Land |year=2008 |url=https://archive.org/details/holylandoxfordar00murp |url-access=limited |series=Oxford Archaeological Guides |first1=Jerome |last1=Murphy-O'Connor |first2=Barry |last2=Cunliffe |edition=5th |publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-923666-4 }}</ref> Masada is also mentioned in the [[Dead Sea Scrolls|Judean Desert Documents]].<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Eshel |first1=Hanan |author-link=Hanan Eshel |title=The Bar Kokhba Revolt  |last2=Zissu |first2=Boaz |author-link2=Boaz Zissu |publisher=Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi |year=2019 |isbn=978-965-217-429-1 |edition=1 |location=Jerusalem |publication-date=2019 |pages=154–157 |language=English}}</ref> 

===Hasmonean fortress===
Josephus writes that the site was first fortified by [[Hasmonean dynasty|Hasmonean]] ruler [[Alexander Jannaeus]] in the first century BC.<ref name=THL/> However, so far no Hasmonean-period building remains could be identified during archaeological excavations.<ref name=Negev>{{cite encyclopedia |editor-last= Negev |editor-first= Avraham |editor-link= Avraham Negev |editor-last2= Gibson |editor-first2= Shimon |editor-link2= Shimon Gibson |entry=Masada |encyclopedia=Archaeological Encyclopedia of the Holy Land |year= 2001 |location= New York and London |publisher= Continuum |pages= 320–325 |isbn=0-8264-1316-1 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=l3JtAAAAMAAJ |access-date=26 July 2021 |type=snippet view}}</ref>

Josephus further writes that Herod the Great captured it in the power struggle that followed the death of his father [[Antipater the Idumaean|Antipater]] in 43 BC.<ref name=THL/> It survived the siege of the last Hasmonean king [[Antigonus II Mattathias]], who ruled with [[Parthian Empire|Parthian]] support.<ref name=THL/>

===Herodian palace-fortress===
[[File:Termas en Masada.JPG|thumb|A ''[[caldarium]]'' (hot room) in northern [[Roman baths|Roman-style public bath]] (#35 on plan)]]
According to Josephus, between 37 and 31 BC, Herod the Great built a large fortress on the plateau as a refuge for himself in the event of a revolt and erected two palaces with an endless food supply.<ref>Cohen, Shaye. "Roman Domination: The Jewish Revolt and the Destruction of the Second Temple," in ''Ancient Israel'', ed. Hershel Shanks. (Biblical Archaeology Society, 1999), pp. 269–273.</ref>

=== First Jewish–Roman War ===
{{Main|Siege of Masada}}
In 66 CE, a group of Jewish rebels, the [[Sicarii]], overcame the Roman garrison of Masada with the aid of a [[Ruse de guerre|ruse]].<ref name=THL /> According to Josephus, the Sicarii were an extremist Jewish splinter group antagonistic to a larger grouping of Jews referred to as the [[Zealots]], who carried the main burden of the rebellion. Josephus said that the Sicarii raided nearby Jewish villages including [[Ein Gedi (archaeological site)|Ein Gedi]], where they massacred 700 women and children.<ref name=THL /><ref>[https://www.gutenberg.org/files/2850/2850-h/2850-h.htm#link42HCH0007 ''The Wars of the Jews, or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem'', by Flavius Josephus], translated by William Whiston, Project Gutenberg, Book IV, Chapter 7, Paragraph 2.</ref><ref>[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0147%3Abook%3D4%3Awhiston+chapter%3D7%3Awhiston+section%3D2 Flavius Josephus, De bello Judaico libri vii], B. Niese, Ed. J. BJ 4.7.2</ref><ref>[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/ancient-battle-divides-israel-as-masada-myth-unravels-1275878.html Ancient battle divides Israel as Masada 'myth' unravels; Was the siege really so heroic, asks Patrick Cockburn in Jerusalem], ''The Independent'', 30 March 1997</ref>

In 73 AD, the Roman governor of Judaea, [[Lucius Flavius Silva]], headed the [[Roman legion]] [[Legio X Fretensis|X ''Fretensis'']] and laid siege to Masada.<ref name=THL /> Another source gives the year of the siege of Masada as 73 or 74 CE.<ref>{{cite journal |author=H. M. Cotton |year=1989 |title=The date of the fall of Masada: the evidence of the Masada papyri |journal=Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik |volume=78 |pages=157–162}}</ref> The Roman legion surrounded Masada, building a [[circumvallation]] wall and then a siege ramp against the western face of the plateau.<ref name=THL /> According to Dan Gill,<ref>Gill, Dan. [https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v364/n6438/abs/364569a0.html "A natural spur at Masada"], ''Nature'' '''364''', pp. 569–570 (12 August 1993); {{doi|10.1038/364569a0}}</ref> geological investigations in the early 1990s confirmed earlier observations that the 114&nbsp;m (375&nbsp;ft) high assault ramp consisted mostly of a natural spur of bedrock.

The ramp was complete in the spring of 73, after probably two to three months of siege, allowing the Romans to breach the wall of the fortress with a [[battering ram]] on April 16.<ref>Duncan B. Campbell, "Capturing a desert fortress: Flavius Silva and the siege of Masada", [[Ancient Warfare (magazine)|''Ancient Warfare'']] Vol. IV, no. 2 (Spring 2010), pp. 28–35. The dating is explained on pp. 29 and 32.</ref><ref>{{cite web|author=UNESCO World Heritage Centre |url=https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1040 |title=Masada – UNESCO World Heritage Centre |publisher=Whc.unesco.org |date=2001-12-13 |access-date=2013-07-20}}</ref> The Romans employed the X Legion and a number of auxiliary units and Jewish prisoners of war, totaling some 15,000, of whom an estimated 8,000 to 9,000 were fighting men,<ref>{{cite book|last1=Sheppard|first1=Si|title=The Jewish revolt, AD 66–73|date=2013|publisher=Osprey Publishing Ltd.|location=Oxford|isbn=978-1-78096-183-5|page=83}}</ref> in crushing Jewish resistance at Masada.
[[File:Masada West View.jpg|alt=Western view from Masada of Roman military encampments and wall.|thumb|Western view from Masada of Roman military encampments and wall.]]

A giant [[siege tower]] with a battering ram was constructed and moved laboriously up the completed ramp. According to Josephus, when Roman troops entered the fortress, they discovered that its defenders had set all the buildings but the food storerooms ablaze and committed mass suicide or killed each other, 960 men, women, and children in total. Josephus wrote of two stirring speeches that the Sicari leader had made to convince his men to kill themselves.<ref name=THL /> Only two women and five children were found alive.<ref name=THL />

Josephus presumably based his narration upon the field commentaries of the Roman commanders that were accessible to him.<ref>{{cite EJ |last=Stiebel |first=Guy D. |title=Masada |volume=13 |pages=593–599|via=[[Gale (publisher)|Gale Virtual Reference Library]]|access-date=10 July 2013 |url=http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CCX2587513369&v=2.1&it=r&p=GVRL&sw=w}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YoXUXvBUUjgC&q=Massada+suicide |title=Masada Myth: Collective Memory and Mythmaking in Israel |last=Nachman |first=Ben-Yehuda |page=48 |isbn=978-0-299-14833-1 |date=1996 |publisher=University of Wisconsin Press}}</ref>

There are discrepancies between archaeological findings and Josephus' writings. Josephus mentions only one of the two palaces that have been excavated, refers only to one fire, though many buildings show fire damage, and claims that 960 people were killed, though the remains of at most 28 bodies have been found.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GkOIQ9JgR-cC&q=Massada+suicide&pg=PA215 |title=Making History: Josephus And Historical Method |publisher=Zuleika Rodgers |page=215 |isbn=978-90-04-15008-9 |year=2007}}</ref><ref name=Zias2000 /> Some of the other details that Josephus gives were correct – for instance, he describes the baths that were built there, the fact that the floors in some of the buildings 'were paved with stones of several colours', and that many pits were cut into the living rock to serve as cisterns. Yadin found some partially intact mosaic floors which meet that description.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://aeon.co/essays/decoding-the-ancient-tale-of-mass-suicide-in-the-judaean-desert|title=Decoding the ancient tale of mass suicide in the Judaean desert &#124; Aeon Essays}}</ref>

=== Byzantine monastery of Marda ===
Masada was last occupied during the [[Byzantine]] period, when a small church was established at the site.<ref>{{cite book |author1=Glenda W. Friend |author2=Steven Fine |name-list-style=amp |chapter= Masada |pages=428–430 |title= The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East |publisher= Oxford University Press |volume= 3 |year= 1997}}</ref> The church was part of a monastic settlement identified with the monastery of Marda known from [[Hagiography|hagiographical literature]].<ref>Yizhar Hirschfeld. ''The Monastery of Marda: Masada in the Byzantine Period'', Bulletin of the Anglo-Israel Archaeological Society; 2001/2002, Vol. 19/20, p. 119, Jan. 2001 (abstract) [https://web.archive.org/web/20160610021851/http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/12856569/monastery-marda-masada-byzantine-period]</ref> This identification is generally accepted by researchers.<ref name="588Keel1982">{{cite book |title=Orte und Landschaften der Bibel: ein Handbuch und Studien-Reiseführer zum Heiligen Land |volume=2 |author1=Othmar Keel |author2=Max Küchler |author3=Christoph Uehlinger |year=1982 |location=Göttingen |publisher=Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht |page=588 |isbn=978-3-545-23042-2 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=j3jsKqzuP5YC&q=%22Orte+und+Landschaften+der+Bibel%22++marda&pg=PA987 |access-date=23 May 2016 }}</ref> The [[Aramaic]] [[common noun]] ''marda'', "fortress", corresponds in meaning to the Greek name of another desert monastery of the time, [[Hyrcania (fortress)#Monastery of Kastellion|Kastellion]], and is used to describe that site in the [[hagiography|''vita'' (biography)]] of [[Sabbas the Sanctified|St Sabbas]], but it is used as a proper name only for the monastery at Masada, as can be seen from the ''vita'' of [[Euthymius the Great|St Euthymius]].<ref name="588Keel1982"/>