Ancient Jewish ritual bath discovered in Ostia Antica Archaeological Park

Extraordinary discovery in the Ostia Antica Archaeological Park: a Jewish ritual bath(mikveh) was brought to light during excavations carried out between June and August 2024. The excavation campaign, carried out as part of the OPS - Ostia Post Scriptum project, was financed by the Ministry of Culture, through the General Directorate of Museums, with an appropriation of 124,190.41 euros from chapter 7515 cdr19, earmarked for archaeological research for the year 2024.

The OPS - Ostia Post Scriptum project, launched in 2022, is the result of a collaboration between the Ostia Antica Archaeological Park (under the direction of Dr. Alessandro D’Alessio and Dr. Claudia Tempesta), the University of Catania (Prof. Luigi Caliò) and the Polytechnic University of Bari (Prof. Antonello Fino), with the aim of further investigating two strategic areas of the city of Ostia, the first Roman colony and an important urban center of antiquity, to better understand its evolution over time. For decades the Park, formerly the Ostia Archaeological Superintendency, had not conducted its own excavations, hence the choice of the name OPS.

The investigations focused mainly on the so-called Area A, located in the central area of the city, near the ancient course of the Tiber River. The area is bounded on the west by the Great Horrea, on the south by the sanctuary of the Four Temples, the Mithraeum of the Seven Spheres and the Domus of Apuleius, and on the east by the Piazzale delle Corporazioni. Despite its strategic location, the area had never been explored and was a perfect stratigraphic basin that was still intact.

During the excavations, within a large and sumptuous building discovered here and already extensively unearthed, a small semi-hypogeous space with an underlying well for rising or otherwise drawing groundwater, in which a mikveh, or Jewish purifying ritual bath, can in all probability be recognized, among the remains of its component rooms and some black-and-white tile floor mosaics. This semi-hypogean space, rectangular with a semicircular apse on the east side, shows several construction phases. In the last phase, it was accessible from the west through a marble threshold with a raised outer edge. Inside, a staircase of three steps, visibly worn, was flanked by two masonry parapets covered with hydraulic plaster. The floor, made of bipedal brick, was about a meter lower than the entrance threshold and had a 3-centimeter recess, possibly intended to accommodate a wooden transenna. A through hole in the northeast masonry suggests the presence of a water supply pipe.

At the eastern end of the floor is a well, circular and 1.08 meters in diameter, made of concrete and crowned by a brick ferrule, probably added later. At the base, the well narrowed to form a fold, perhaps intended to support a removable grating or wooden floor.

The walls of the shaft, built in opus listata with alternating tuff blocks and brick recursions, had no openings. In the back apse, a niche covered with blue plaster and shells was found, framed by two stucco columns resting on brick corbels. Important materials recovered from the layers of abandonment include fragments of plaster, oil lamps and marble fragments belonging to epigraphs and small statues. From the excavation of the shaft, conducted with the support of the Association of Underwater Archaeology Speleology Organization (A.S.S.O.), an oil lamp decorated with a menorah (seven-branched candelabra) and a lulav (palm branch), as well as an almost intact glass cup, dating between the fifth and sixth centuries CE, emerged.

The characteristics of the chamber-the steps occupying the entire width, the walls covered with hydraulic plaster, the well for groundwater, the conduit for communication with the adjacent room intended perhaps to house a pipe for adding water to groundwater, and the discovery of an oil lamp with Jewish symbols-lead to speculation that it could be interpreted as a Jewish ritual bath. Intended for the immersion of people (as well as objects) for purification purposes, these baths usually feature a rectangular, often covered basin dug into the ground, lined with hydraulic plaster and fed by a natural spring or rainwater, with a row of steps occupying its entire width.

Rabbinic sources, such as the Mishnah and Tosefta (3rd century CE), stipulate that the mikveh must contain at least 40 se’ah (about 500 liters) of rainwater or spring water and ensure that the body can be fully immersed.

The oldest documented examples of mikva’ot in Israel date from the Hasmonean age (late 1st century B.C.-early 1st century A.D.). Widespread in Judea, Galilee and Idumea during the Herodian era, particularly in residential settings, their presence declines in the 1st century and dies out almost entirely in the 2nd century, after the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE and the suppression of the Bar Kokhba revolt in 135 CE. Rare later records include mikva’ot found in the Galilean city of Sepphoris. No Roman or late antique mikva’ot are known to date in Diaspora sites, with the sole exception of the mikveh at Palazzo Bianca in Syracuse, probably made near the local synagogue between the sixth and seventh centuries CE.

To a slightly earlier chronology report the materials found in the layers of abandonment and obliteration of the compartment identified in Ostia: these include two oil lamps of the form Atlas VIII, decorated on the disk by a heptalicne menorah on a trifid support, one of them with lulav on the bottom, datable between the fourth and sixth centuries AD.

Statements

“The discovery of an ancient Jewish ritual bath, or mikveh, that came to light in the Ostia Antica Archaeological Park,” says Culture Minister Alessandro Giuli, “reinforces the historical awareness of this place as a true crossroads of coexistence and exchange of cultures, a cradle of tolerance between different peoples who found their union in Roman civilization. It represents a unique in the Mediterranean area of the Roman era outside the Land of Israel and attests to how deeply rooted the Jewish presence was in the heart of Romanity. It was precisely at Ostia that Rome welcomed and housed the original cults of other Mediterranean civilizations, at the moment when, having consolidated its power in Italy, it began to project itself into the Mare Nostrum. A miscellany of ethnicities and influences, along with the two monotheistic religions of the time, testifies to how ecumenical and universal Rome was. We are proud that this discovery is the result of the resumption of excavation activities promoted directly by the Ostia Antica Archaeological Park-thanks to a grant from the MiC, which will continue to invest resources on this discovery-which, on the one hand, has made it possible to return to promoting research activities and, on the other, to expand and make more accessible the areas that can be visited by the public.”

“This exceptional discovery,” says Alfonsina Russo, Head of the Department for the Enhancement of Cultural Heritage, “confirms on the one hand the importance and specificity of the ancient city of Ostia, Rome’s port and gateway to the Mediterranean and for that reason an ethnic, linguistic, religious and cultural melting pot in the broadest sense, and on the other hand, the unusual potential of Italy’s historical-archaeological heritage. In deference to the ”chain“ of research/knowledge-protection/conservation-valorization of this extraordinary heritage, the discovery of the Ostiense mikveh, the first such ancient one to come to light outside Israel’s borders, cannot but make us proud and at the same time determined that the monument be as soon as possible usable by the public of visitors who are increasingly frequenting and appreciating our cultural sites.”

“Thanks to the funding allocated by the Ministry of Culture in recent years,” comments Director General of Museums Massimo Osanna, “it has been possible to implement a plan of interventions on a national scale, promoted in particular by the Directorate General of Museums, aimed at planned maintenance, the promotion of archaeological research and the enhancement of institutes and places of culture. In this context, the Ostia Antica Archaeological Park has played a leading role, standing out for the innovativeness of its planned interventions and the excellence of its research projects, such as the one that led to the discovery of the mikveh. A find that testifies to the multicultural character of the ancient port city and opens new and fascinating scenarios for the expansion of our knowledge and the development of new narratives.”

“This is an absolutely extraordinary discovery,” explains Alessandro D’Alessio, Director of the Ostia Antica Archaeological Park, “in that no Roman-era mikva’ot were previously known outside of ancient Judea, Galilee and Idumea, and it can only but confirm the extent of the continued presence, role and importance of the Jewish community in Ostia throughout the imperial age (if not earlier): from the beginning of the 1st (the era to which the oldest known inscription in Italy mentioning Iudaei dates, found in the nearby Pianabella necropolis) to the 5th-6th centuries, when the Ostian synagogue - the oldest in the Western Mediterranean (in fact, it was built in the late 2nd-early 3rd centuries) and the only one preserved in Rome - ceased to exist following the final abandonment of the city.”

“The discovery of this site, which has the characteristics of a miqwè,” recalls Riccardo Di Segni, chief rabbi of the Jewish Community of Rome, “is of extreme interest in so many aspects, archaeological, historical, ritual. The history of the Jews of Rome is enriched today by yet another valuable monument that testifies to their millennial settlement and care in the observance of traditions: the uncovered environment is, among other things, functional and elegant. A structure such as the one discovered could not have been isolated from the building complex in which it is located, and it is likely that a good part, if not all, of this was a Jewish community center. I hope that the excavations can continue in anticipation of more surprises and that access will soon be possible to visitors, who will not lack for the importance of the find.”

"It is a source of great excitement the discovery of the probable miqwè at Ostia, in fact the oldest find of its kind in the Diaspora world, subsequent only to those in Judea, Galilee and Idumea," comments Victor Fadlun, President of the Jewish Community of Rome. “Emotion and pride, for the confirmation of the millennial roots of Jews in Rome, and of the umbilical cord that binds us to the Land of Israel. The miqwè is the sign of a living presence, which has been perpetuated over the centuries and leads to us today. A demonstration of an identity that many generations of Jews have managed to preserve, defend and enhance. I thank those who have made crucial scientific and financial contributions to this important achievement. And I hope it will bring luster and benefit to the entire area.”

Ancient Jewish ritual bath discovered in Ostia Antica Archaeological Park

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