Masada

Masada is a natural fortress: a flat-topped block of rock in the Judaean Desert whose sides drop about 400 m on the east towards the Dead Sea and some 90 m on the west. The summit plateau is roughly 550 m long and 270 m wide. Between about 37 and 31 BC Herod the Great turned it into a fortified refuge, ringing it with a casemate wall about 1,300 m long, storerooms, bathhouses and huge rock-cut cisterns filled by flash floods, and building two palaces, including one that steps down the northern cliff on three terraces. It is one of the finest surviving examples of Herodian architecture and has been a World Heritage Site since 2001.

Masada's fame comes from the end of the First Jewish–Roman War. In 66 AD Jewish rebels of the Sicarii faction seized it, and after the fall of Jerusalem it became their last stronghold. In 73 or 74 AD the Roman governor Lucius Flavius Silva besieged it with the Tenth Legion, enclosing the mountain with a wall and building a massive earth ramp up the western side to bring a siege tower and battering ram to the walls. According to the historian Josephus, when the Romans broke in they found that the 960 defenders had killed themselves rather than be captured. Archaeology has not confirmed the account in full, and historians still debate it, but the story made Masada a central symbol of modern Israeli identity.

The excavations of 1963–65, led by the archaeologist Yigael Yadin, uncovered the palaces with their painted plaster, storerooms still holding food remains, ritual baths, a synagogue with fragments of scrolls of Deuteronomy and Ezekiel, and small inscribed potsherds, one bearing the name "ben Ya'ir", possibly the rebel commander. A date palm seed found here was later germinated. Many buildings have been partly restored, and a museum at the foot of the mountain, opened in 2007, displays the finds.

The Roman siege works are among the most complete anywhere: the ramp still stands on the western side and can be climbed on foot, and the siege wall and eight Roman camps are clearly visible from the summit. There are two ways up on foot, both steep: the Snake Path on the eastern side from the visitor centre, climbing about 300 m, and the shorter Roman Ramp path from the west. A cable car also runs from the visitor centre to the top. Hikers often start before sunrise to avoid heat that can exceed 43 °C in summer, when the trails may close during the day.

Getting there

Masada is in Masada National Park above the Dead Sea Highway; the eastern side and cable car are reached from that road, the western side from the road from Arad, the nearest town, about 20 km away. Queen Alia International Airport (AMM) in Jordan is closer by straight line, about 76 km, but lies across the border; Ben Gurion Airport (TLV) is about 89 km away as the crow flies and much further by road.