Beit Guvrin-Maresha National Park

Sidonian burial caves

The Sidonian burial caves were the family tomb of Apollophanes, the leader of the Sidonian community in Beit Guvrin. The Sidonian caves are the only ones that are painted inside. The caves were burial caves for the Greek, Sidonian and Edumite inhabitants of Beit Guvrin. The first and largest cave has paintings of animals, real and mythic, above the niches where the corpses were laid. A cock crows to scare away demons; the three-headed dog Cerberus guards the entrance to the underworld; a bright red phoenix symbolizes the life after death.[9] The Tomb of the Musicians is decorated with a painting showing a man playing the flute and a woman playing the harp.

"The Polish Cave" with columbarium (dovecote)

There are about 800 bell-shaped caves located in the area. Many of the caves are linked via an underground network of passageways that connect groups of 40–50 caves.

Bell Caves at the Beit Govrin National Park

The largest bell caves are in the east part of the park. They have been dug since prehistoric times, the excavations reaching their zenith in the Hellenistic period and during the Byzantine and Early Arab Period, when blocks of chalkstone extracted from the caves were used for construction work (buildings, etc.).[10] The bell caves consist of limestone in their upper-layer (to a depth of about one to two meters), beneath which is rock consisting solely of a beige-colored, soft chalkstone,[11] utilized by its early inhabits for carving caverns and dwellings. There are numerous bell caves within the park grounds and events are held in one of them. They are large (over 60 feet (18 m) high), airy and easily accessible.

The National Park is known for some of the best preserved columbaria from the Hellenistic and Roman periods. One of the largest is located on the west side of Tell Maresha (Khurbet es Sandahannah), described by Conder and Kitchener in their Survey of Western Palestine, and formerly known by its local inhabitants as Es Sûk.[12] It has been carved underground from the soft chalkstone endemic to the area, and built with tiers of niches capable of housing hundreds of brooding pigeons.

There are a number of cave-like dwellings carved from the chalkstone bedrock, some of which display a vast extension of networks and passageways, with staircases descending down into the depth, made with step-like balustrades, and replete with cisterns for storing water and millstones for grinding olives. These caverns and dwellings, though not situated on the eminence of the Tell itself, were considered part and parcel with the city of Maresha itself, as they were later enclosed by a wall that encompassed both the city and its expanded suburbs.[13] The largest and most impressive of these caverns and dwelling places is that built near the Tell on its southeast side, and which the locals knew by the name Mŭghâret Sandahannah (The Cave of Saint Anne).[14] Today, in Modern Hebrew, the same cave dwelling is called Mavokh (Maze).

The ruins of the Church of St Anne,[15] called Sandahanna in Arabic.

Saint Anne's church was first built in the Byzantine period and then rebuilt by the Crusaders in the 12th century. The ruin is known in Arabic as Khirbet (lit. "ruin") Sandahanna, the nearby tell (mound) of Maresha being called Tell Sandahanna.[16] The freestanding remains of the apse are well preserved (see photo).

The remains of a Roman amphitheater were uncovered in the mid-1990s. The amphitheater was built in the 2nd century, on the northwestern outskirts of Beit Guvrin. This amphitheater, in which gladiatorial contests took place, could seat about 3,500 spectators. It had a walled arena of packed earth, with subterranean galleries. The arena was surrounded by a series of connected barrel vaults, which formed a long, circular corridor and supported the stone seats above it; staircases led from the outside and from the circular corridor to the tribunes. It was built for the Roman troops stationed in the region after the suppression of the Bar Kochba rebellion. The amphitheater is an elliptical structure built of large rectangular limestone ashlars. It was in use until destroyed in the Galilee earthquake of 363.

Byzantine mosaics depicting birds and animals were discovered on the hilltop in 1924.[17]

Several hundred astragali – animal knucklebone dice – used 2,300 years ago during the Hellenistic period for divination and gaming have been found at the site since 2000.[18]

Among other major archaeological finds at this site is the Heliodorus Stele. This stele recounts events in Judaea prior to the Maccabean revolt and offers important historical evidence for events which modern day Jews commemorate during the holiday of Hanukkah.[19]