← Back to the front page

Fascinating Biblical and Biblical Era Archaeology

Khalid Elhassan May 4, 2025 17 min

Archaeology - Ashurbanipal in a chariot, inspecting booty and prisoners from Babylon — Ashurbanipal in a chariot, inspecting booty and prisoners from Babylon. Wikimedia

1. The Legend of the Masada

Archaeology - Aerial view of the Masada's ruins — Aerial view of the Masada’s ruins. Wikimedia

The Sicarii remnants holed up in the Masada contented themselves with plundering the surrounding countryside. In the meantime, the Zealots and other radicals managed to crush the popular backlash and retained control of Jerusalem until it was besieged, conquered, and razed by the Romans in 70 AD. The Romans then began mopping up operations, and eventually reached the final holdouts in Masada. Considering all they had done, the prospects of leniency were slim if the Romans got a hold of the Sicarii. Rather than face what was bound to be an unenviable fate if they were captured alive, the defenders opted for mass suicide.

_________________

Where Did We Find This Stuff? Some Sources and Further Reading

Ahmed, Sami Said – Southern Mesopotamia in the Time of Ashurbanipal (2018)

Ben-Yehuda, Nachman – Masada Myth: Collective Memory and Mythmaking in Israel (1996)

British Museum – Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About the Rosetta Stone

Discovering Ancient Egypt – Mystery of the Rosetta Stone

Encyclopedia Britannica – Cleopatra

Encyclopedia Britannica – Sicarii

Encyclopedia Britannica – Sir Austen Henry Layard

Freud’s Butcher – The Jews, the Pyramids, and the Importance of Questioning

Gonick, Larry – The Cartoon History of the Universe: Volumes 1 – 7, From the Big Bang to Alexander the Great (1990)

Guardian, The, January 11^th, 2010 – Great Pyramid Tombs Unearth Proof Workers Were Not Slaves

Harvard Magazine, July-August 2003 – Who Built the Pyramids?

History Collection – Every Day Life in Ancient Rome Was Funnier and More Scandalous Than Historians Let On

Jewish Chronicle, September 17^th, 2018 – I Told Menachem Begin: The Pyramids Were Not Built by the Israelites

Jewish News of Northern California, January 15^th, 2010 – Egypt Unveils More Proof That Jews Did Not Build Pyramids

Josephus – The Wars of the Jews

National Geographic, July 9^th, 2017 – We Could Resurrect the Woolly Mammoth: Here’s How

Pearlman, Yoshe – The Zealots of Masada: Story of a Dig (1967)

Smallwood, Edith Mary – The Jews Under Roman Rule: From Pompey to Diocletian (1976)

World Atlas – Did Woolly Mammoths Still Roam Parts of the Earth When the Great Pyramids Were Built?

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.