Archaeologists discover humongous gate in Goliath's hometown

(Image credit: Prof. Aren Maeir, Director, Ackerman Family Bar-Ilan University Expedition to Gath)

last updated 4 August 2015

Archaeologists at Israel's Bar-Ilan University announced on Monday the discovery of a massive gate and other fortifications in the ruins of Gath, the hometown of the Bible's Goliath. The ancient gate is one of the largest ever discovered in Israel and evidence of the Philistine city's power in the 10th and ninth centuries B.C.E, head archaeologist Professor Aren Maeir says. It even made a brief appearance in the Bible when David, Goliath's slayer and future king of Israel, "acted like a madman, making marks on the doors of the gate and letting saliva run down his beard."

The research team also discovered an "impressive fortification wall," a temple, a smelting complex, and other buildings in Tel Zafit National Park, which contains the ancient city. King Hazael of Aram-Damascus is said to have razed Gath around 830 B.C.E. — presumably via a single, well-placed pebble — and archaeologists are only now putting the pieces back together.