Find of the Month: The Doric Survivor – TMSP Staff

Doric Capital

An intriguing category of finds from our project is building fragments and special stones. For example, our “Find of the Month” for November 2016 was a small piece of a Crusader period column. We have found many small fragments of stone that originated in elaborate buildings and columns. We can identify architraves, bases, capitals and column drums. Some of these may even have originated from the Temple structure itself.

From the Hellenistic period, corresponding to the early Second Temple period, we have recovered a limestone column capital of the Doric order. The capital was fully preserved, and based on its diameter, we assume that it stood upon a column more than 18 feet high. We plan to put this capital on top of a restored pillar and present it grandly at our sifting site when we eventually resume the sifting.

Doric capital found by the Sifting Project

The Doric capital has concave bands. Among other attributes, this dates it to the second century BCE. It is one of many such capitals that adorned the eastern, earliest portico of the Temple Mount. This makes it pre-Herodian.

This rare relic enables us to begin to reconstruct this eastern portico, on the outside of which is a vertical seam separating two different types of masonry. To the south of the seam is Herodian masonry, and to the north is earlier masonry perhaps from the days of the Hasmonian dynasty and the early Second Temple later expanded by Herod.

This capital is unique. It is one of only a few pieces we have of a complete architectural member – and not just a small find. Because of the bulldozing and the way that the earth was removed from the Temple Mount, most of the artifacts recovered by the Sifting Project are small and broken.

Our Doric capital was most likely overlooked and forgotten by the Awaqf who kept the large, nicely cut pieces of architecture from the debris removed from the Temple Mount. There is photographic evidence from the illicit bulldozing of another Doric capital that has since been lost. We looked in the “garden of columns” on the Temple Mount but did not see it there. We may never learn where this and the other large pieces are kept, or where they were discarded, making this find even more important as it is the only one to which we have access.

We hope that you have learned something about the construction of the Second Temple. We are now in the three weeks of Jewish mourning that culminates in the fast day on the 9th of Av to commemorate the destruction of the Temple and many other terrible events in Jewish history. It is a common practice to learn about the Temple construction and laws during this time. We will continue to do our part by providing videos and information from our research about these topics.

Do your part by helping us complete our research on First and Second Temple Period architectural fragments and other artifacts.

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