BIBLE HISTORY DAILY

Excavating Banias

New discoveries rewrite the story of Pan’s grotto

Aerial view of Pan’s Grotto and the surroundings at Banias. Photo by D. Gahali. Courtesy Erlich and Lavi.

Banias is, without a doubt, one of the more breathtaking natural archaeological sites in the Holy Land, a large spring-fed cavern surrounded by the ruins of Roman-era temples at the foot of Mt. Hermon. The site is recorded in the New Testament by the name given to the city built there by Philip the Tetrarch, Caesarea Philippi (Mark 8:27–30). While excavations have been carried out at the site for decades, the spring cave—the focal point of the surrounding temples—remained largely untouched. Yet, with some areas starting to collapse, a renewed salvage excavation was launched to study and conserve the site. Publishing in the online magazine The Ancient Near East Today, the directors of the three-year project announced some of their new finds and a fascinating reinterpretation of the archaeological remains.

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The Grotto of Pan

Associated with the Greek god Pan, from whom the Greek name Paneion/Paneas originates, the spring cave was the site of cultic activities during the Hellenistic and Roman periods (c. 332 BCE–324 CE), as well as non-Pan-related activities before and after those periods. The first temple was built near the cave by Herod the Great, who dedicated it to the emperor Augustus.

Pan’s Grotto filled with water before the excavations. Courtesy Nathan Steinmeyer, BAS.

Although frequently dry today, in antiquity the grotto of Pan was filled with spring water from the surrounding mountains. In the center of the cave stood a rock, the top of which was likely just above the water, serving as a dais for either a statue or an altar of Pan, seemingly floating on the water. During excavations in the 1990s, a series of shrines, temples, and courtyards was discovered along the terrace beside the spring, as well as a courtyard and niche walls right outside the cave. At that time, it was assumed that the courtyard and walls were the remains of Herod’s temple, which featured the cave as its rear section, the holy of holies. The signage at the site even displays an artist’s reconstruction of this theory.

The renewed excavations at the site, however, have shown this to be inaccurate; there was never a temple in front of the cave. Instead, the grotto and its deep pool were visible to all, serving as a focal point in the cultic landscape. The courtyard was also not constructed by Herod the Great.

Top: The grotto at Sperlonga, Italy. Bottom: Pan’s Grotto at Banias. Photo by D. Gahali. Courtesy Erlich and Lavi.

Uncovered by the excavation team, the first part of the courtyard to be constructed was an underground aqueduct, which allowed water to flow from the cave into the Banias River, keeping the rock in the center of the grotto just above the water. Above the aqueduct, the courtyard was built, featuring large stone floor slabs. On each side of the courtyard, niche walls were placed with alternating square and rounded niches. A small pool was then placed in the center, fed by the cave. Radiometric dating of the aqueduct’s plaster revealed the complex to have been constructed in the last third of the first century CE, long after the death of Herod the Great. This dating would place the construction firmly in the reign of another Herod, Agrippa II, the last king of the Herodian dynasty.

The great-grandson of Herod the Great, Agrippa II spent most of his early life in Rome. While there, he must have developed a great love for Roman architecture, as the new reconstructions of the grotto of Pan bear a startling resemblance to similar cultic grottos in Italy. A notable example is found at the coastal town of Sperlonga, which seamlessly integrates both natural and constructed elements around a cliffside grotto. According to the excavators, it seems that part of Agrippa’s purpose for building such a structure at Banias was likely a wish to “build for himself a little Italy in the Levant.”

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