Marble statues found hidden face down in Roman wine pit

[guy]

 

Archaeologists digging near Binyamina in Israel uncovered two remarkably well-preserved Roman marble statues dating to roughly 1,700 years ago. They were found in a collection pit used for a Roman–Byzantine winepress. Rather than being displayed as originally intended, they had been carefully laid face-down in the pit, suggesting they were intentionally buried after the winepress ceased operation.

The sculptures are marble protomes—heads and upper torsos—depicting figures from the Greco-Roman era. One statue bears a Greek inscription with the name “Lycurgus,” and researchers are trying to determine whether it represents Lycurgus of Sparta or Lycurgus of Athens, both well-known historical figures.

The statues were first noticed when an unusual object emerged from the soil; further digging revealed marble instead of the usual pottery fragments found at such sites. Their quality suggests a considerable investment in imported art, likely originally displayed in a public building or an elite household in Caesarea, where similar portrait sculptures have been discovered — although such finds are rare, with the last comparable discovery dating back to the 1990s.

The statues are now undergoing cleaning, conservation, and detailed study, including efforts to determine their original placement and the reason they were deliberately hidden for nearly seventeen centuries.

 

 

 

1,700-year-old Roman marble statues found buried in ancient winepress near Caesarea | Archaeology News Online Magazine

Edited Thursday at 04:00 AM by guy