AFP

Jerusalem, May 9: An Israeli archaeologist said on Tuesday that the tomb of King Herod, famed for expanding the Jewish second temple during his reign in the first century BC, had been discovered in the occupied West Bank.

Pieces of an elaborate sarcophagus believed to contain Herod’s remains were found three weeks ago, Ehud Netzer, professor of archaeology at Hebrew University, told a news conference.

“Three weeks ago we found the sarcophagus and we knew that it was it,” said Netzer, who led the digs and has been working at the site since 1972.

The tomb was located at Herodium, a mesa rising more than 750 metres (2,475 feet) above sea level some 12 kilometres (7.5 miles) south of Jerusalem in the West Bank, Netzer said.

Herod built a palace on the flattened hilltop and was thought to have been buried there, but years of excavations failed to find the burial site.

“The location and unique nature of the findings, as well as the historical record, leave no doubt that this was Herod’s burial site,” Netzer said, adding that no inscriptions have yet been found.

The pieces of the “large unique” sarcophagus, made of Jerusalem reddish limestone and decorated with rosettes, was discovered on the northeast slope of the mesa, where archaeological excavation began in August 2006.

“Only very few similar sarcophagi are known in the country and can be found only in elaborate tombs,” he said.

It “was broken into hundreds of pieces, no doubt deliberately,”  Netzer said, adding that it appeared to have been destroyed between 66 and 72 AD during the first Jewish revolt against the Romans.

“It is an important discovery, first of all because Herod is well known,” he said. “Secondly, because Herod is a personality that is important to the Christians -- he is mentioned many times in the New Testament.

“Thirdly, Herodium is a wonderful building that Herod left us,” he added.

Herod, sometimes called Herod the Great, was appointed king of Judea by the Romans in around 40 BC. He greatly expanded the Jewish second temple and ordered building works in Caesaeria, Jericho and at the hilltop fortress of Masada overlooking the Dead Sea.

He is best known to Christians from the Gospel of St Matthew in the Bible for ordering the Massacre of the Innocents -- the mass killing of male babies in Bethlehem in a bid to avert a perceived threat to his rule.

Herod reportedly ordered his troops to slaughter the children after a prophecy that he would lose his throne to a newly born “King of the Jews” -- Jesus Christ.

The Herodium discovery is likely to spark political fallout in a region where archaeological finds inevitably become linked to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and any claims that appear to strengthen one side’s connection to the land are viewed suspiciously by the other.

After the news conference, Shaul Goldstein, an official with the Gush Etzion Jewish settlement near the Herodium site, told army radio that the find “constitutes new proof of a connection between Gush Etzion and the Jewish people and Jerusalem.”

He called on the government to name Herodium “a national and religious site.”

Palestinian tourism minister Khulud Dwaibess, who oversees archaeological sites, told AFP that a team of Palestinian archaeologists was due to inspect the site and that her ministry would not comment until after receiving their report.