{"id":11268,"date":"2024-07-29T11:16:29","date_gmt":"2024-07-29T15:16:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/?p=11268"},"modified":"2024-07-29T11:16:29","modified_gmt":"2024-07-29T15:16:29","slug":"3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html","title":{"rendered":"3,000-Year-Old Moat Discovered in City of David, Confirming Biblical Account"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Israel Antiquities Association \/ Facebook<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Archaeologists have announced the discovery of a 3,000-year-old moat surrounding the City of David that is mentioned in the Book of Kings. In 1 Kings 11:27 it mentions the splitting of the city into two areas. \u201cAnd this was the cause that he lifted up his hand against the king: Solomon built Millo, and repaired the breaches of the city of David his father.\u201d Ophel and Millo were terms to describe the different halves of Jerusalem. \u201cIt is not known when the moat was first dug, but it is clear that it was used during the centuries when Jerusalem was the capital of the Kingdom of Judah \u2013 almost 3,000 years ago, starting from the days of King Josiah,” said<\/a> directors Prof. Yuval Gadot of the Department of Archeology and Ancient Near Eastern Cultures at Tel Aviv University and Dr. Yiftah Shalev from the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). The moat measures 9 meters deep and 30 meters wide and was discovered outside the Dung Gate near the Old City of Jerusalem.<\/p>\n

The moat divides the city into two parts, separating the upper city which included the Temple and the palace from the lower city\u2019s residential area. \u201cIf the moat was cut during this period, then it was intended to protect the city from the north\u2014the only weak point of the City of David slope. Either way, we are confident that it was used at the time of the First Temple and the Kingdom of Judah (ninth century BCE), so it created a clear buffer between the residential city in the south, and the upper city in the north,\u201d said Shalev. Researchers have worked to prove the moat\u2019s existence for 150 years. The structure was originally discovered in the 1960s by archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon but she thought it was a natural formation rather than a moat. The section she found is a part of the moat that veers westward.<\/p>\n

The moat is an impressive feat, restructuring the topology of the surrounding land to suit the city\u2019s needs. IAA director, Eli Escusido, discussed the magnitude of the find<\/a>. \u201cOnce again, discoveries are being revealed that shed new and vivid light on the biblical literature. When you stand at the bottom of this giant excavation, surrounded by enormous hewn walls, it is impossible not to be filled with wonder and appreciation for those ancient people who, about 3,800 years ago, literally, moved mountains and hills.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Archaeologists have announced the discovery of a 3,000-year-old moat surrounding the City of David that is mentioned in the Book of Kings. In 1 Kings 11:27 it mentions the splitting of the city into two areas. \u201cAnd this was the cause that he lifted up his hand against the king: Solomon built Millo, and repaired…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":664,"featured_media":11274,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n3,000-Year-Old Moat Discovered in City of David, Confirming Biblical Account<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Archaeologists have announced the discovery of a 3,000-year-old moat surrounding the City of David that is mentioned in the Book of Kings.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"3,000-Year-Old Moat Discovered in City of David, Confirming Biblical Account\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Archaeologists have announced the discovery of a 3,000-year-old moat surrounding the City of David that is mentioned in the Book of Kings.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Christ News Today\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-07-29T15:16:29+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2024\/07\/3000yo-moat-city-of-david_credit-Israel-Antiquities-Association-Facebook.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Cecilia Buchanan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"3,000-Year-Old Moat Discovered in City of David, Confirming Biblical Account","description":"Archaeologists have announced the discovery of a 3,000-year-old moat surrounding the City of David that is mentioned in the Book of Kings.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"3,000-Year-Old Moat Discovered in City of David, Confirming Biblical Account","og_description":"Archaeologists have announced the discovery of a 3,000-year-old moat surrounding the City of David that is mentioned in the Book of Kings.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html","og_site_name":"Christ News Today","article_published_time":"2024-07-29T15:16:29+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":900,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2024\/07\/3000yo-moat-city-of-david_credit-Israel-Antiquities-Association-Facebook.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Cecilia Buchanan","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html","name":"3,000-Year-Old Moat Discovered in City of David, Confirming Biblical Account","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2024\/07\/3000yo-moat-city-of-david_credit-Israel-Antiquities-Association-Facebook.jpg","datePublished":"2024-07-29T15:16:29+00:00","dateModified":"2024-07-29T15:16:29+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#\/schema\/person\/77cb6eeb5c74ee0eb8c77ea1ebc43c6a"},"description":"Archaeologists have announced the discovery of a 3,000-year-old moat surrounding the City of David that is mentioned in the Book of Kings.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2024\/07\/3000yo-moat-city-of-david_credit-Israel-Antiquities-Association-Facebook.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/409\/2024\/07\/3000yo-moat-city-of-david_credit-Israel-Antiquities-Association-Facebook.jpg","width":1200,"height":900,"caption":"Israel Antiquities Association \/ Facebook"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/2024\/07\/3000-year-old-moat-discovered-in-city-of-david-confirming-biblical-account.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"3,000-Year-Old Moat Discovered in City of David, Confirming Biblical Account"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/","name":"Christ News Today","description":"Christian News From Around the Globe","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/#\/schema\/person\/77cb6eeb5c74ee0eb8c77ea1ebc43c6a","name":"Leigh Pizzutilla","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/author\/lpizzutilla"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/664"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11268"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11280,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11268\/revisions\/11280"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/christnewstoday\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}