Zinman Institute of Archaeology, Department of Archaeology, Department of Art History

In 1996 a salvage excavation was conducted along the northern fringes of ancient Lod. A building with mosaic floors and eight stone-lined graves were exposed in the eastern part of the excavation. A plastered step separated the tombs from the building. The building consisted of three rooms arranged in a cloverleaf configuration. Evidence of plastered installations was found along the walls of the rooms and they were presumably built to contain in water. The three rooms were paved with mosaics decorated with geometric patterns. The three mosaics adorning the structure are characteristic of the Early Roman period throughout Judaea, but deviate from the customary patterns. They are not laid out in a typical manner or, as is usual, within the outline of the room. On the basis of the ceramic and glass artifacts discovered in the graves and building, the mosaics date to the 2nd century CE. Two important questions arise concerning the date and function of the building decorated with mosaics. Both are determined by the archaeological context and are mutually dependent. The mosaics provide unique evidence of provincial art in Lod, presumably in the period between the revolts, which is still insufficiently known to us through archaeological finds in the city of Lod.
The graves and the mosaics building were constructed with the same orientation and in close proximity. In our opinion there was a connection between them. The plastered step shows that visitors to the mosaics building created a buffer, if only a symbolic one, between the mosaics and the graves. To date no proposal has been put forth identifying the function of a similar building in the context of cemeteries. In light of the findings here, we cautiously suggested that the mosaics building was a wing or part of a structure used by visitors to the cemetery. The building was likely associated with the cemetery and was used for washing. Either way, the tombs and the mosaics building reveal a small portion of Jewish life in Lod during its golden age in the period between the revolts or after the Bar Kokhba rebellion.