Tiberias (Berko Archaeological Park) (Israel)

Overview

Berko Archaeological Park contains the ancient remnants of the city of Tiberias from the time the city was established by Herod Antipas in the first century AD, until the Fatimid Dynasty in the eleventh century AD. The park contains gardens and archaeological finds, including an ancient Roman gate, a theater which had seating capacity of 5,000 - 7,000 people and a drainage system that is 1,000 years old. The park provides a fascinating glimpse into Tiberias of the first century.

Laid out in typical Roman grid patterns, Tiberias boasted avenues lined with shops, impressive statues, a luxurious bathhouse, and a grandiose palace. Josephus says that Antipas offered free land, housing, and tax exemptions to new residents to settle the area, so many Greeks and Romans became inhabitants. Unfortunately for the Jews of Israel, who would have delighted to take advantage of these perks, the king had unwittingly located Tiberias directly over an ancient Jewish cemetery, and fear of contamination kept most of them away, although some were forced to move there. Some 130 years later, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yohai emerged from a Galilee cave in which he had been hiding ever since the Romans sentenced him to death for studying the Torah and purified the city. He identified the graves by the blossoms growing nearby: lupine and sea squill, flowering plants that flourish in soft, turned-over soil. Finally, the rabbi dug up the bodies and relocated them elsewhere with appropriate ceremony.

The timing was fortuitous, for the ill-fated Bar Kochba Revolt had ended a few years earlier and Jews banished from Jerusalem were flocking north. Now that Tiberias was purged, it became a favorite destination, and by the 3rd century, Tiberias was the center of Jewish life in the Holy Land and remained predominantly Jewish for hundreds of years. The great earthquake of 1033 AD destroyed ancient Tiberias. The area was eventually captured in 1099 by Tancred and rebuilt slightly north of the original site where it has continued since that time.