Archeologists discover footprint made by sandal of Roman soldier

Haaretz ^ | Wednesday, August 15, 2007 | Ofri Ilani

[SunkenCiv]

Archeologists have discovered a footprint made by the sandal of a Roman soldier - one of the few such finds in the world - in a wall surrounding the Hellenistic-Roman city of Sussita, east of Lake Kinneret. The discovery of the print made by a hobnailed sandal, the kind used by the Roman legions during the time when Rome ruled the region, led to the presumption that legionnaires or former legionnaires participated in the construction of walls such as the one in which the footprint was found... Last year, the archeologists found an inscription written by two Sussita residents when they finished their Roman military service, leading to the theory that the sandal print may also have been left by someone who was no longer serving in the Roman army... Prior to this finding, the sandal prints of Roman legionnaires had been discovered only in Hadrian's Wall in Britain. Sussita, which has existed for about 1,000 years, was apparently founded during the days of the Seleucid king Antiochus Epiphanes, known in Jewish history for his decrees against the Jews. The Greek name of the city was Hippos, which means horse, and the name Sussita is the Aramaic version of the same name. The meaning also holds in modern Hebrew, in which sus means "horse." ...Most of the construction in Sussita took place during the Roman period, when Beit She'an, Caesarea and other ancient cities also flourished... an earthquake hit the region in 749, during the Umayyad dynasty, causing the destruction of Sussita, which lies on the Syrian-African rift.

[SunkenCiv]

The footprint found near Sussita. (Zinman Institute, Haifa University)

[SunkenCiv]

More than 800 people have signed a petition seeking to deny tenure to a Barnard College professor accused of shoddy scholarship and a pro-Palestinian agenda. Professor Nadia Abu El-Haj, an assistant professor of anthropology, is under from her book "Facts on the Ground." The book attacks the field of Israeli archaeology, arguing that it has produced knowledge central to the creation of Israel's foundational myths and therefore is complicit in Israel's supposed crimes against the Palestinians. Paula Stern, a 1982 Barnard graduate and the organizer of an online petition calling on the college to deny tenure to El-Haj, claims the professor's scholarship is shoddy and her claims unsubstantiated. "We are embarrassed that Columbia would consider granting tenure to a scholar who is so patently ignorant about the subject of her only book," the petition reads. Neither Barnard nor its institutional parent, Columbia University, would confirm the status of El-Haj's tenure application.

[SunkenCiv]

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[CholeraJoe]

That’s pretty cool.

[SunkenCiv]

Tracks what I thought.

[wildbill]

That may be a holy relic! It could be the track of Brian’s father.

[PzLdr]

Caligae. The Roman military sandals that, as part of a child’s legionary uniform when his father commanded on the Rhine, led to his nickname: Caligula [”Little Boots”].

[colorado tanker]

Paula Stern, a 1982 Barnard graduate and the organizer of an online petition calling on the college to deny tenure to El-Haj, claims the professor's scholarship is shoddy and her claims unsubstantiated. "We are embarrassed that Columbia would consider granting tenure to a scholar who is so patently ignorant about the subject of her only book," the petition reads.

Barnard, eh? That's pretty hefty tuition to pay to be fed Pali propaganda and antisemitism.

[afraidfortherepublic]

Please explain what this petition has to do with the sandal print? You’ve lost me.

[martin_fierro]

Archeologists discover footprint made by sandal of Roman soldier

Rest his immortal sole.

[mikrofon]

It just shoes, er.. shows that the practice of putting your print in freshly-laid concrete (or whatever) goes way back.

[SunkenCiv]

Hey, at least it wasn’t “Roman buttocks imprint”... ;’)

[SunkenCiv]

Oh yeah, and [rimshot!] ;’)

[SunkenCiv]

“The book attacks the field of Israeli archaeology”

[Fred Nerks]

the sub-title says it all...typical muzzie, when all they've got to lay claim to the Temple Mount as a sacred islamic site is the 'hoofprint of mohammad's flying magic horse' (the one with the face and breasts of a woman and peacock feathers for a tail) and an opium-dream of the 'prophet' riding Barak all the way from Medina in one night and horse and all, rising to meet 'allah' at the site of a 'mosque in a far place'.

Archaelogical Practice and Territorial Self-Fashioning in Arab Society

there, I fixed it!

[Fred Nerks]

shows that the practice of putting your print in freshly-laid concrete (or whatever) goes way back.

interesting observation...if the imprint was made in soft ground, it would very quickly disappear through normal weathering. Something took place that allowed the imprint to be preserved. How might that have happened?

[afraidfortherepublic]

Thanks for the clarification.

[SunkenCiv]

Nice, appropriate fix (message 15).

The wearer of the sandal walked in mud; it’s hot there in the Galilee, and the mud got baked into a sort of mud brick. It got covered up by soil and not wet again. IMHO. :’)

[Dustbunny]

WOW, that is so neat !!!!

[cake_crumb]

A THOUSAND years?? BIG typo.