Maresha

Tel Maresha (תל מראשה) is the tell (archaeological mound) of the biblical Iron Age city of Maresha, and of the subsequent, post-586 BCE Idumean city known by its Hellenised name Marisa, Arabised as Marissa (ماريسا). The tell is situated in Israel's Shephelah region, i.e. in the foothills of the Judaean Mountains, about southeast of Beit Gubrin. Maresha was first excavated in 1898–1900 by the British archaeologists Bliss and Macalister on behalf of the Palestine Exploration Fund and again after 1989 by Israeli archaeologist Amos Kloner on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority. Excavations revealed that Maresha was inhabited (not necessarily continuously) during the Iron Age, the Persian period, and the Hellenistic period. Most of the artifacts of the British excavation are to be found today in the Istanbul Archaeology Museums. This site is now protected as part of Beit Guvrin-Maresha National Park and its burial caves are recognized by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. The location of Maresha in relation to Eleutheropolis (Beit Gubrin) has been noted by Eusebius in his Onomasticon, who wrote: Maresa (Joshua 15:44). Tribe of Judah. It is now a deserted site about 2 milestones from Eleutheropolis. C.R. Conder and H.H. Kitchener of the Palestine Exploration Fund surmised that Maresha should be identified with Khurbet Mar'ash, a ruin mile south of Beit Jibrin, based on a phonetic similarity of their names. It was not until J. P. Peters and Hermann Thiersch explored the ruins of Khurbet Sandahannah (grid position 140111 PAL) in 1902 that they discovered a Greek funerary inscription in an adjacent burial cave (known as the Sidonian burial Cave) which explicitly identified the site as Maresha. Today, Khurbet Sandahannah is an archaeological tell comprising 24 dunams (5.9 acres), with its "lower city" incorporating into it an additional 400 dunams (98 acres). Bayt Jibrin#History Maresha was one of the cities of Judah during the time of the First Temple and is mentioned as part of the inheritance of the biblical tribe of Judah in the Book of Joshua.