King Herod's Dream: Caesarea on the Sea.


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Large, square octavo; brown cloth (hardcover); gilt letters; 244 pp + Index. Very Good+, in a Fine dust jacket. From dust jacket: Caesarea iis one of the richest archaeological sites in Israel. Located on the Mediterranean coast, this urban center was a port of great vitality that survived until the thirteenth century. REcently archaeologists both on land and underwater have discovered many of the secrets of Caesarea, enabling them to reconstruct what the city was like and the manner of life therein. This profusely illustrated volume offers the results of the archaeologists' findings, describing their methods and adventures as well. Like many ancient cities, and some modern cities, Caesarea owed its foundations as a great city to the imagination, ambition, and resources of a major benefactor of urbanism: This city was King Herod's Dream. He and his planners were responsible for its up-to-date urban plan and for the magnificent conception of the city's man-made harbor, Sebastos. Herod's engineers constructed the harbor's huge breakwaters out of concrete blocks poured underwater into wooden frameworks fabricated near the shore and towed into position. Until the end of antiquity, Caesarea was the headquarters of Roman administration in the region. Its harbor was the major transport center for goods and commodities from all over the Mediterranean world. In the Byzantine era Caesarea became Christian in religion, but otherwise the forms of classical urbanism lived on through the Arab conquest of the Middle East and the subsequent era of the Crusaders. When the Egyptian Mamluks destroyed Crusader Caesarea they put an end to thirteen centuries of urbanism on the site. The story of Caesarea's rise, fall, and subsequent rediscovery is the fascinating subject of King Herod's Dream.

Title: King Herod's Dream: Caesarea on the Sea.

Author Name: Holum, Kenneth G.; Hohlfelder, Robert L.; Bull, Robert J.; Raban, Avner.

Location Published: New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1988. First Edition, stated.

Categories: Ancient Civilization

Seller ID: vas763