Turns Out We Put a Parking Lot on Top of a Lost Ancient Greek Fort
It seems that we find the coolest things when we dig up old parking lots.
And we don’t mean that half-dollar you found once in a pothole
In 1996, the National Underwater and Marine Agency discovered the location of a warship built for Texas’ navy during the Mexican-American War, conveniently beneath a parking lot in Galveston. Then back in 2010, Canadian archaeologists dug up the first Canadian Parliament (burned to the ground by an angry mob in 1849, a year after its establishment) from under a parking lot. And then, in 2013 under a parking lot in Leicester, England, archaeologists found the skeleton of King Richard III of England, the scoliosis-suffering subject of Shakespeare’s Richard III, who was killed in the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485.
Updated motto: “Screw you and your Mini Cooper”
Now, it seems that we modern folks have accidentally paved over an entire Ancient Greek fort: the 2,000-year-old lost stronghold of Acra.
Archaeologists have uncovered the ancient fortress of #Acra in Jerusalem. #BTN #archaeology https://t.co/zz0RZe7vxj pic.twitter.com/EViFDdTeox
— Britannica (@Britannica) November 4, 2015
The fort was built on a cliff overlooking the City of David hill by Greek mercenaries to cement the Seleucid Empire’s control over the city around two millennia ago, but was recaptured by the Jews in 141 BCE and razed some time after that.
Experts have been attempting to locate Acra for over a century. Using the Book of Maccabees and the work of historian Josephus Flavius, which both locate the fort within the City of David, archaeologists eventually dug up the parking lot to find lead sling shots, wine jars, bronze arrowheads, and ballista stones stamped with a trident, which is a symbol of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, the ruler of the Seleucid Empire at the time Acra was retaken.
This adams-apple-tastic guy
Image: Classic Numismatic Group, Inc. via Wikipedia
Finds like this really make you wonder what historical wonder is resting outside, just being used as a resting spot for a jacked-up Toyota 4Runner and a bumper-sticker-decked Prius.
“Yeah, sure, just spell out stuff on top of us” -Ancient Indians, probably
©GM
News Sources: Mental Floss, CNN
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