I'm standing on the crossroads between Cana and Nazareth.
Now, right here, they're constructing a new railroad
that's gonna lead the Israel Rail to the city of Nazareth.
But, while they were digging here,
they stumbled upon ancient remains.
How ancient? 2,000 years old.
This is only possible in Israel,
so stay tuned to find out what's in there.
♪ (music) ♪
(birds chirping)
Have you found anything here?
I'm seeing something round there.
- (Sergio) Are those-- - (Dr. Yonatan Adler) Yeah, yeah.
(Sergio) 'Cause they don't look natural, do they?
- (Dr. Adler) No, no, no. - (Sergio) Are those in situ right now?
- (Dr. Adler) Yeah, yeah. - (Sergio) Oh, this is so cool.
That is so cool.
- This is a mug.
I see that. I see the handle.
(Rhoda) Let us pause here for just a sec.
Before we dig mugs out of the ground and show you a discovery
that could potentially change what we know about them,
let's take a few steps back to explain why are we back here again.
It all started about three years ago when we came to this place
where they were going to construct a gas station
and accidentally stumbled upon an ancient quarry.
(Dr. Adler) He was able to determine that this was a quarry and a workshop
for the production of stone vessels.
(Rhoda) The quarry is believed to have served as a 1st century stone vessel factory
where they produced items like cups and bowls
that were used by the Jewish community.
So, this is the mug itself.
- (Sergio) And this is the real thing?
(Rhoda) While it was a fascinating discovery,
they left the site without finding any coins or pottery
which would have provided a more accurate dating.
If you haven't seen that episode yet,
we highly recommend you to pause here, go watch it,
then continue this video.
(Dr. Adler) So, David Amit had excavated here back in 2001,
he did a small probe,
and he found that there was a small room
higher up than where we were excavating,
which indicated that there was maybe a second floor.
It wasn't clear exactly what was going on.
Now, it's become clear that there's actually two floors.
(Rhoda) Back in 2018, they thought they'd excavated everything.
But this year, thanks to the new railway that is being laid,
they were able to discover that the ancient quarry
actually had multiple floors,
and its size is much larger than previously thought.
(Dr. Adler) So, most of what we were excavating
in the last bunch of seasons
was the lower floor, the lower level.
And, I hadn't realized it at the time
because the whole upper level was destroyed by modern work.
And here we're getting the upper level,
and the lower level is what we're also finding as well,
so we have actually these two levels.
It's actually a really, really large cave,
so it's a pretty big system of at least two caves.
(Sergio) Wow. Have you found anything here?
I'm seeing something round there.
- Are those-- - (Dr. Adler) Yeah, yeah.
(Sergio) 'Cause they don't look natural, do they?
- (Dr. Adler) No, no, no. - (Sergio) Are those in situ right now?
- (Dr. Adler) Yeah, yeah. - (Sergio) That's insane.
Oh, this is so cool.
And this is beautiful. No way!
- (Dr. Adler) So, these are cores. - (Sergio) Oh!
Each of these is a core.
- It's the inside of the stone vessels.
- This is a pour of a bowl.
I've never seen this in situ. I've seen it once you guys excavate--
(Dr. Adler) This also. This also. That one.
(Sergio) That is so cool!
That is so cool.
- This is a mug.
I see that. I see the handle.
(Dr. Adler) Yeah. And this is also a core.
- (Sergio) What is that?
This is the outside.
(Sergio) Oh, they left it, like it's not finished.
- It broke--
It broke as it was being made.
(Sergio) So, all of this, I guess, are discards?
- Yeah. Everything here is discarded.
Everything here is discarded.
(Sergio) Oh. This fills in the details from the last dig
because we didn't see them in situ.
We saw them once you guys got them out.
(Rhoda) Usually, Sergio and I come visit the sites after they've been dug
and the artifacts had already been extracted.
But, this time, we actually get to see what 2,000-year-old objects look like
when they are still buried in the ground.
Archaeologists actually have a term for it: in situ.
(Dr. Adler) So, the way it works is, as we're digging,
we don't remove the finds as we're digging.
We try to keep them in situ
and only remove the dirt around them,
so, this way, we can see exactly how they're sitting.
(Sergio) Wow. That's wonderful.
- (Dr. Adler) A mug here. A handle. - (Sergio) That's beautiful.
- (Dr. Adler) And the beginning of the-- - (Sergio) The core?
(Dr. Adler) of the core that was going to be removed.
(Sergio) That is beautiful.
(Rhoda) It's important to emphasize:
These are 2,000 years old!
Where else in the world can you be building a railroad
and stumble upon 1st century artifacts?
Absolutely remarkable.
So, they don't usually use tractors in an excavation dig,
but there's most likely two reasons why it's here today.
Number one: They only have two weeks to extract all of this
before the rail needs to be built.
And, number two:
They have a collapsed cave
and a lot of dirt on top of the ancient ruins
that they need to take out very fast.
And, for that purpose, the tractor is very, very useful.
Hey, I remember last time, you guys weren't able to find
coins or things like this.
- (Sergio) What about this time? - (Dr. Adler) We're looking.
I just asked her.
She has a metal detector,
so we're looking and still haven't found.
And we're still looking for pottery also,
so hopefully, I'm hoping something will come in.
- (Sergio) Oh, that is exciting.
(Rhoda) And, then... literally, a few minutes
after he says that they have not found any pottery...
this happens.
- (Limor) Is that it? - Yeah.
(Limor, in Hebrew) It's ceramics!
(Limor, in Hebrew) How wonderful!
So, they've been waiting for a very long time to find pottery,
and it looks like they have finally found pottery
in this site and can date it more precisely.
This is phenomenal. This is a cool moment to be here.
(Dr. Adler, in Hebrew) This is legitimate!
(Limor, in Hebrew) Great!
(man) (non-English speech)
(Sergio) And I saw you possibly found pottery?
Yes, we found pottery.
(Sergio) That was a great moment.
That was a little juglet.
(Sergio) Wow! Wow!
(Dr. Adler) The importance of the pottery is that
the pottery we can date,
so that's important for being able to date the caves.
- (Sergio) Wow.
The question is:
When within the Roman era are we talking about?
(Sergio) That's exciting.
This is a very significant find
because, until now, they've been finding here stone vessels.
All these years, they've been finding mugs, bowls, the cores,
but they're difficult to date.
Why? Because they're a category on their own.
They've only been found in this land for Jewish purity ritual purposes.
And, so, it's hard to say:
Is this AD 20 or is this AD 150?
But... with pottery sherds it's different
because you can date them.
Pottery sherds, we have so much of it around the world,
with so much data collected about the styles of pottery,
the colors, the glazing,
that they can pinpoint the exact years of its manufacturing.
So... now that they found it here, the pottery sherds,
they'll be able to date at what year this factory was in operation.
And that's huge.
♪ (music) ♪
(Rhoda) Unfortunately, we won't have the results
for the dating of the pottery today as it takes a long time to test them,
so make sure to check out the Israeli Institute of Archaeology
and the Ariel University links in the description below
to stay up to date with the latest findings
and more in-depth information.
It's kind of crazy to think that just in a few days
this whole area is gonna be a railroad
and there are gonna be train stations around,
and this is all gonna be gone.
This has been such a privilege to capture the video and share it with you guys.
We sure hope you enjoyed this video.
So, until next time.
♪ (music) ♪
And if you guys were wondering where Rhoda is...
It's hot.