Editing Caesarea Maritima (section)

====Herodian Caesarea====
[[File:Caesarea Maritima aqueduct.jpg|thumb|The Roman aqueduct]][[File:אמפי קיסריה.jpg|thumb|The theatre]]
Caesarea was built in [[Judaea (Roman province)|Roman Judea]] under the Jewish client King [[Herod the Great]] during {{circa}} 22-10/9 BCE near the ruins of the small naval station of Straton's Tower.<ref name="Straton" /> The site, along with all of Judea, was awarded by Rome to Herod in 30 BCE.<ref name="UNESCO">"In the year 30 BCE the (Phoenician) village was awarded to Herod, who built a large port city at the site, and called it "Caesarea" in honor of his patron Octavian Augustus Caesar....The city transformed rapidly into a great commercial centre, and by the year 6 BCE became the headquarters of the Roman government in Palestine. Since Caesarea had no rivers or springs, drinking water for the prospering Roman and Byzantine city was brought via a unique high-level aqueduct, originating at the nearby Shuni springs, some 7.5&nbsp;km northeast of Caesarea. [...] Caesarea served as a base for the Roman legions who quelled the Great Revolt that erupted in 66 BCE [sic], and it was here that their commanding general Vespasian was declared Caesar. After the destruction of Jerusalem, Caesarea became the most important city in the country: Pagans, Samaritans, Jews and Christians lived here in the third and fourth centuries CE.''[https://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/1480/ UNESCO tentative list:Caesarea]''</ref> The pagan city underwent vast changes under Herod, who renamed it Caesarea in honour of the Roman emperor, [[Caesar Augustus]].<ref name="Straton" /><ref name="nie" /> Caesarea was known as the administrative, economic, and cultural capital of the Judean province from this time.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Masalha |first=Nur |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1046449706 |title=Palestine : a four thousand year history |date=2018 |isbn=978-1-78699-272-7 |location=London |pages=93 |oclc=1046449706}}</ref>[[File:Caesarea Maritima BW 2010-09-23 09-26-26 stitch.jpg|thumb|The Herodian hippodrome]]In 22 BCE, Herod began construction of a deep-sea harbour named Sebastos and built storerooms, markets, wide roads, baths, a temple to the [[Roma (personification)|goddess Roma]] and Emperor [[Augustus]], and imposing public buildings.<ref>Crossan, 1999, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=GaYKGrqXCwEC&pg=PA232 232]</ref> Herod built his palace on a promontory jutting out into the sea, with a decorative pool surrounded by [[stoa]]s.<ref name="nie" /><ref name="UNESCO" /> Every five years, the city hosted major sports competitions, gladiator games, and theatrical productions in its theatre overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Hohlfelder |first=Robert L. |title=Caesarea |journal=Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary |volume=1 |pages=800}}</ref>

===== Sebastos harbor =====
[[File:125423 caesarea national park PikiWiki Israel.jpg|thumb|The harbor]]
Herod built the two [[jetty|jetties]] of the harbour between 22 and 15 BCE,<ref name="Votruba2007">Votruba, G., 2007, Imported building materials of Sebastos Harbour, Israel, International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 36: 325-335.</ref> and in 10/9 BCE he dedicated the city and harbour to Emperor Augustus (''[[sebastos]]'' is Greek for ''[[Augustus (honorific)|augustus]]'').<ref>Raban, A., 1992. Sebastos: the royal harbour at Caesarea Maritima - a short-lived giant, International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 21: 111-124.</ref> The pace of construction was impressive considering the project's size and complexity.<ref name="Hohlfelder2007">Hohlfelder, R. 2007. "Constructing the Harbour of Caesarea Palaestina, Israel: New Evidence from ROMACONS Field Campaign of October 2005". International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 36:409-415.</ref> At its height, Sebastos was one of the most impressive harbours of its time. It had been constructed on a coast that had no natural harbours and served as an important commercial harbour in antiquity, rivaling [[Cleopatra|Cleopatra's]] harbour at [[Alexandria]]. [[Josephus]] writes: "Although the location was generally unfavorable, [Herod] contended with the difficulties so well that the solidity of the construction could not be overcome by the sea, and its beauty seemed finished off without impediment."<ref name="Holum1988">Holum, K. 1988. King Herod's Dream: Caesarea on the Sea. New York: Norton.</ref>

When it was built in the 1st century BCE, the harbour of Sebastos ranked as the largest artificial harbour built in the open sea, enclosing around 100,000 m<sup>2</sup>.<ref name="Menachery87">George Menachery, 1987 in Kodungallur, City of St. Thomas, Azhikode, 1987, Chapter II note 19 quotes the National Geographic article: Robert L. Hohlfelder, "Caesarea Maritima, Herod the Great's City on the Sea". ''[[The National Geographic]]'', 171/2, February 1987, pp. 260-79.<br />2000 years ago, Caesarea Maritima welcomed ships to its harbour called Sebastos. Featuring innovative design and hydraulic concrete, this building feat set a standard for harbours to come. A monumental work, city and harbour were constructed on an unstable storm-battered shore, at a site lacking a protective cape or bay. The project challenged Rome's most skilled engineers. Hydraulic concrete blocks, some weighing {{convert|50|ST}} anchored the north breakwater of the artificial harbour ... Caesarea Maritima, rival to Alexandria in the Eastern trade, a city worthy to be named for Herod's patron, Caesar Augustus, master of the Roman world, in view of its opulence and magnificence.</ref><ref name="Hohlfelder2007" /><ref>Votruba, G. 2007. "Imported Building Materials of Sebastos Harbour, Israel." International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 36:325-335.</ref>

The [[breakwater (structure)|breakwater]]s were made of [[Lime (material)|lime]] and [[pozzolana]], a type of volcanic ash, set into an underwater concrete. Herod imported over 24,000 m<sup>3</sup> of pozzolana from the name-giving town of [[Pozzuoli|Puteoli, today Pozzuoli]] in Italy, to construct the two breakwaters: the southern one 500 meter, and the northern one 275 meter long.<ref name="Hohlfelder2007" />

A shipment of this size would have required at least 44 shiploads of 400 tons each.<ref name="Votruba2007" /> Herod also had 12,000 m<sup>3</sup> of local [[kurkar]] stone quarried to make rubble and 12,000 m<sup>3</sup> of slaked lime mixed with the pozzolana.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Porath |first1=Yosef |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1fzhdc0 |title=Caesarea Maritima I: Herod's circus and related buildings Part 1: Architecture and stratigraphy |last2=Epstein |first2=Mindi |last3=Friedman |first3=Zaraza |last4=Michaeli |first4=Talila |date=2013 |publisher=Israel Antiquities Authority |isbn=978-965-406-379-1 |editor-last=Hurowitz |editor-first=Ann Roshwalb |volume=53|jstor=j.ctt1fzhdc0 }}</ref>

Architects had to devise a way to lay the wooden forms for the placement of concrete underwater. One technique was to drive stakes into the ground to make a box and then fill it with pozzolana concrete bit by bit.<ref name=Hohlfelder2007/> However, this method required many divers to hammer the planks to the stakes underwater and large quantities of pozzolana were necessary.

Another technique was a double planking method used in the northern breakwater. On land, carpenters would construct a box with beams and frames on the inside and a watertight, double-planked wall on the outside. This double wall was built with a {{convert|23|cm|0|abbr=on}} gap between the inner and outer layer.<ref name=Brandon1996>Brandon, C., 1996, Cements, Concrete, and Settling Barges at Sebastos: Comparisons with Other Roman Harbor Examples and the Descriptions of Vitruvius, Caesarea Maritima: A Retrospective after Two Millennia, 25-40.</ref>

Although the box had no bottom, it was buoyant enough to float out to sea because of the watertight space between the inner and outer walls. Once it was floated into position, pozzolana was poured into the gap between the walls and the box would sink into place on the seafloor and be staked down in the corners. The flooded inside area was then filled by divers bit by bit with pozzolana-lime mortar and kurkar rubble until it rose [[Above mean sea level|above sea level]].<ref name=Brandon1996/>

On the southern breakwater, [[barge]] construction was used. The southern side of Sebastos was much more exposed than the northern side, requiring sturdier breakwaters. Instead of using the double planked method filled with rubble, the architects sank barges filled with layers of pozzolana concrete and lime sand mortar. The barges were similar to boxes without lids, and were constructed using [[mortise and tenon]] joints, the same technique used in ancient boats, to ensure they remained watertight. The barges were ballasted with 0.5 meters of pozzolana concrete and floated out to their position. With alternating layers, pozzolana-based and lime-based concretes were hand-placed inside the barge to sink it and fill it up to the surface.<ref name=Brandon1996/>

However, there were underlying problems that led to its demise. Studies of the concrete cores of the moles have shown that the concrete was much weaker than similar pozzolana hydraulic concrete used in ancient Italian ports. For unknown reasons, the pozzolana mortar did not adhere as well to the [[kurkar]] rubble as it did to other rubble types used in Italian harbours.<ref name=Hohlfelder2007/> Small but numerous holes in some of the cores also indicate that the lime was of poor quality and stripped out of the mixture by strong waves before it could set.<ref name=Hohlfelder2007/>

Also, large lumps of lime were found in all five of the cores studied at Caesarea, which shows that the mixture was not mixed thoroughly.<ref name=Hohlfelder2007/> However, stability would not have been seriously affected if the harbour had not been constructed over a [[geological fault line]] that runs along the coast. Seismic action gradually took its toll on the breakwaters, causing them to tilt down and settle into the seabed.<ref name=Holum1988/> Studies of seabed deposits at Caesarea have shown that a [[tsunami]] struck the area sometime during the 1st or 2nd century.<ref>Reinhardt, E., Goodman, B., Boyce, J., Lopez, G., Hengstum, P., Rink, W., Mart, Y., Raban, A. 2006. "The Tsunami of 13 December A.D. 115 and the Destruction of Herod the Great's Harbor at Caesarea Maritima, Israel." Geology 34:1061-1064.</ref>

Although it is unknown if this tsunami simply damaged or completely destroyed the harbour, it is known that by the 6th century the harbour was unusable and today the jetties lie more than 5 meters underwater.<ref>Raban, A., 1992, Sebastos: the royal harbour at Caesarea Maritima - a short-lived giant, International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 21: 111-124.</ref>