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Archaeological Finds That Rewrote Our Understanding of History

Khalid Elhassan January 9, 2024 30 min

Archaeological - Ashurbanipal — Ashurbanipal. British Museum

The Dance Floor Where Salome Performed for Herod

Two columns that held up the roof above the courtyard and floor on which Salome danced. Gyozo Voros

Herod Antipas was a son of Herod the Great – the king who, per the New Testament, ordered the execution of all male babies near Bethlehem when Jesus was born. Herod Antipas inherited part of his father’s kingdom, which he ruled as a client king of the Roman Empire. He set up shop atop a hilltop desert frontier fortress, Machaerus. It was there, in 29 AD, that Salome’s dance and John the Baptist’s execution reportedly took place. Nearly two thousand years later, a Hungarian excavation team announced a dramatic archaeological: they had found the pavilion and courtyard where Salome danced for Herod.

Niche that reportedly contained the throne upon which Herod Antipas sat as he watched Salome dance. Patterns of Evidence

The Bible and ancient accounts do not name the location of Salome’s dance. However, Machaerus was the only royal citadel and palace that Herod Antipas inherited from his father. It thus would have been the logical place for his birthday bash. The Hungarian archaeological dig’s director, Gyozo Voros, announced the discovery beside a courtyard at Machaerus of a semi-circular niche that would have housed a throne. There is archaeological evidence that stairs led to an elevated platform by that niche. It is likely that Herod would have sat there as he watched Salome dance for him.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.