Roman Swimming Pool Found

Excavating the ancient Roman bathhouse. Photo: Shlomi Amami, courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Israeli archaeologists have discovered a swimming pool in which a legion of Roman soldiers bathed after sacking Jerusalem and expelling the Jews from their city.

Featuring a number of plastered bathtubs and a pipe on its side used to fill it with water, the pool was part of a larger complex which included bathhouses and more swimming pools.

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Hundreds of terra cotta roof tiles, found on a white industrial mosaic floor, indicate that the pool was a covered structure.

The tiles bore the mark “LEG X FR,” for Tenth Legion “Fretensis,” and surprisingly, the paw prints of a dog that probably belonged to one of the soldiers.

“The print could have happened accidentally or have been intended as a joke,” excavation director Ofer Sion said in a statement.

A dog’s paw print impressed on a roof tile. Photo: Shlomi Amami, courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Based in Jerusalem for about 200 years, the Tenth Legion “Fretensis” consisted of about 6,000 soldiers. It was responsible for the brutal destruction of Jerusalem’ Second Temple in 70 A.D. and the repression of the Jewish revolt in 132-135 A.D.

“It seems that the bathhouse was used by these soldiers who were garrisoned there after suppressing the Bar Kokhba uprising in 135 A.D., when the pagan city Aelia Capitolina was established,” Sion said.

SEE ALSO: Pagan Antiquities Unearthed in Israel

The discovery sheds a new light on the city built by Emperor Hadrian (76 –138 A.D.) to erase the name of Jewish Jerusalem.

"The new find, together with other discoveries of recent years, shows that the city was considerably larger than what we previously estimated," Yuval Baruch, Jerusalem district archaeologist, said.

According to Baruch, this is the first time that archaeologists have uncovered a building in the Jewish Quarter that belonged to the Roman legion.

Getting new information on Aelia Capitolina is important because it was that city that determined the shape of Jerusalem's historic walls "and the location of the gates to this very day," Baruch said.

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