Late this morning, we drove out of Jerusalem to the heart of Judea. Shortly after leaving Jerusalem, we came to a ‘border crossing’ of sorts. It turned out that we had driven into an area controlled by the Palestinian Authority. The sign (photo 1) said that it was illegal and dangerous for Israeli citizens to enter. I asked our guide how she could do it and she just shrugged and said, “American tourists.” We drove to Herodium National Park, which is run by the Israeli Civil Administration, despite being located within the Palestinian Authority area. Our guide said that Israel had retained control over certain national park and antiquities areas within that space. This is a major archeological site and the burial location of Herod.

Herodium (or Herodion) is named after Herod the Great who built this fortress between 23 and 15 BCE. It’s on the outskirts of the Judean Desert in the West Bank, three miles southeast of Bethlehem. Herod was the King of Judea which was on the far edge of the Roman Empire. It’s an incredible ancient building complex. The excavation and restoration work here has been going on for awhile but has a very long way to go. Still, it was very much worth the visit.

The first photo was one of many such signs that we saw after passing the border checkpoint.

The 2nd photo is a model in the visitor center. I show it to give an idea of what we experienced and what a crazy building project this was by Herod. A Jewish historian who lived at this time described it as “a hill raised to the height by the hand of man and rounded off in the shape of a breast…” The visitor center is at the far right which is where we started our tour.

The next photo is the small theatre which seated 400 people. It was apparently used to entertain palace guests. It had a private box behind it that was lavishly decorated for the king and his guests. You should also notice how high is the top of the mountain up behind the theatre. Herod had this mountain made by hand from what had been a simple hill.

There were over 200 steps from the theatre to the top of the mountain, and it was a hot day.

The palace fit within the top of the mountain. You can see a small glimpse in the next photo.

We continued our tour at the top and later came back down through secret tunnels.

Several places that we visited had the remnants of elaborate frescoes and mosaic floors. Even though long ago abandoned and buried, we could still see that they had once been fabulous.

The photo below was the tower at one corner of the palace. It was originally three times the height seen here.

The photo below was Herod’s grand reception hall. We felt we deserved our own reception there so we went ahead and had one.

Our views from the top of the palace were spectacular. It was also very educational, thanks to our guide, Noa. In the next photo, the lowest settlement is one of the controversial Jewish towns. The others behind it are Palestinian towns. We learned a lot about historical excavations, the politics of settlements, and more. It’s a very complicated situation.

We came back down most of the hill in the tunnel system. The tunnel system contained two main components: cisterns from Herod’s time and tunnels from the time of the revolts. Herod built at least three rain-fed cisterns on the mountain’s slopes and another near the top. Water was moved upwards by means of vessels and ropes. My favorite part of the tunnel system was that it was so cool inside, versus the bright and muggy day outside. Plus, we were moving downhill. In the last photo, you can see that, at times, it was steeply downhill.