Rare 1,700-Year-Old Roman Marble Statues Unearthed Near Binyamina

Two marble statues about 1,700 years old from the Roman era were uncovered in an Israel Antiquities Authority excavation near the entrance to Binyamina, as part of work to double the Coastal Railway line. The figures, which depict characters from the classical world, were found inside a wine-collection pit belonging to an ancient winery.

One of the statues still bears a Greek inscription with the name “Lycurgus.” Researchers believe the sculptures once decorated a lavish villa owned by one of Caesarea’s wealthy residents. The archaeologists called the discovery a “once-in-a-lifetime find.”

The statues will be shown to the public for the first time at an archaeological conference on Thursday, June 18, at the Eretz Israel Museum in Tel Aviv. The find comes about a year after another rare classical object was discovered in the same broader area, a unique Roman marble sarcophagus found in Israel Antiquities Authority excavations.

That coffin featured a carved scene of a drinking contest between Dionysus, the wine god, and Hercules, the mythological hero.