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Friends of ASOR presents a webinar on December 15, 2022 from 3:00pm to 4:30pm EDT, “From Paganism to Christianity to Islam: The Transformation of Ancient Caesarea,” featuring Prof. Marsha Rozenblit, Prof. Yael Arnon, and Anna Iamim. This webinar will trace the archaeological evidence for the history of Caesarea Maritima, built by King Herod the Great of Judaea in the late first century BCE on the coast of what is today Israel. At Caesarea, Herod built a splendid city, replete with a theater, hippodrome, palace, aqueduct, city streets, sewers, and especially a magnificent temple dedicated to the pagan gods Roma and Augustus. This temple was located on a specially constructed “hill,” the so-called Temple Platform, and it served as a “harbor temple,” visible to ships entering the artificial harbor constructed by Herod and his engineers. Caesarea flourished as the capital of Roman Palestine and especially in the so-called “Byzantine” period after the Christianization of the Roman Empire in the fourth century CE, reaching its largest extent in size and population in the sixth century CE. The city continued to thrive in a somewhat smaller form after the Muslim conquest in 640 CE and also during the Crusader occupation in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, but finally ceased to function with the defeat of the Crusaders in 1265.

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Archaeologist Kenneth Holum, a professor of Ancient History at the University of Maryland, who passed away in 2017, led the excavations between 1989 and 2003 on the Temple Platform at Caesarea as part of the Combined Caesarea Expeditions with the late Avner Raban of Haifa University leading the excavations of the harbor. This webinar will focus on the archaeological findings on the Temple Platform from the Roman and Byzantine periods, including discoveries about the pagan temple, its willful destruction by the Christian authorities of Caesarea around the year 400 CE, and the construction on the same spot around 500 CE of a large, beautiful, octagonal Christian church, which served as a “harbor church,” visible to all boats that entered the still active harbor in the sixth and seventh centuries. These findings have been meticulously described in Caesarea Maritima: Excavations in the Old City 1989-2003 Conducted by the University of Maryland and the University of Haifa, Final Reports, Volume 1, edited by Kenneth G. Holum (ASOR, Archaeological Reports 27, 2020). Holum finished all the work on the volume before his death, and his wife, Marsha Rozenblit, the moderator of this webinar, oversaw the publication of the volume.

The webinar will consist of short presentations by Rozenblit (University of Maryland) as moderator, by Yael Arnon, the chief ceramicist at the site; and Anna Iamim, who completed all the architectural plans. Rozenblit will then moderate a discussion of the most important findings at the site. The final 20 minutes will be devoted to a live Q&A session with the audience and panelists. The event will be recorded.

ASOR Sustaining Members: $0 | ASOR Members: $6 | Public: $12

Marsha Rozenblit is the Harvey M. Meyerhoff Professor of Jewish History at the University of Maryland. She is a specialist in the history of the Jews in Austria-Hungary and its successor states, and she has written several books and many scholarly articles on such topics as the Jews of Vienna, the impact of World War I on the Jews, and Jewish marriage and courtship practices. She is the moderator of this session because her late husband Kenneth Holum directed the land excavations on the Temple Platform at Caesarea for many years. After his death in 2017, she oversaw the publication of the final reports from his excavations at Caesarea.

Yael Arnon is a Professor of Archaeology at Oranim College in Israel. At the beginning of her academic career, she focused on early Islamic archaeology, especially material culture. Over the years, she has expanded her studies to include artistic and architectural aspects of archaeology as well as more recent periods of history in the Islamic world in general and the Land of Israel in particular. In 2008, Arnon published a book about the material culture of the early Islamic and Crusader periods in Caesarea, and the relationship between pottery styles and coin dating (Oxford University Press). Arnon’s future research includes changes in Islamic art over time, in particular in Israel and the Galilee. For many years she worked as registrar and ceramicist at Caesarea.

Anna Iamim was a long-time friend and colleague of Ken Holum. At Caesarea, she produced the graphic field documentation, contributed chapters, and drew the architectural reconstructions on the cover of Caesarea Maritima: Excavations in the Old City 1989-2003, Final Reports, Vol. 1, edited by Kenneth G. Holum, ASOR, Archaeological Reports 27 (2020).

ASOR Sustaining Members: $0 | ASOR Members: $6 | Public: $12

To receive your ASOR member discount, . If you are new to ASOR, please click on the “” link to register your e-mail address and choose a password for our online store. Once logged in, navigate to “Meeting and Event Registration” to register for the webinar and pay the fee. Each paid registrant will receive a confirmation e-mail when you pay for the webinar. If you do not receive this e-mail, then you are not registered. Please e-mail membership@asor.org with any questions or issues with registering.

You will be e-mailed the Zoom Webinar link in the week prior to the lecture on December 15, 2022. If you do not receive the link by the close of business on the Tuesday before the webinar, please e-mail membership@asor.org immediately. This webinar will be recorded and all paid registrants will be sent a link to view the recording.

All proceeds from this lecture are used to fund scholarships for members impacted by COVID-19 as well as increasing ASOR’s online resources, which are free to the public.