Gamla

The Roman Emperor, Nero, aware of the seriousness of the rebellion in Palestine, sent his best general Vespasian, with three legions, to quell the outbreak. Vespasian’s troops easily penetrated Josephus’ defences and dispersed the Galilean army.

Josephus himself took refuge with 40 men in the fortress of Jotapata. There each man resolved to slay his neighbor rather than be captured. Josephus cast the lots, managing by deceit to be one of the last two alive, and then persuaded his companion to join him in surrendering to the Romans. (A communal suicide pact was also made by the 960 defenders at Masada, but, there, the commander Eleazar Ben Ya’ir died with all his followers.) Josephus relates that he was imprisoned by the Romans, but Vespasian spared his life when he—Josephus—foretold greatness for the Roman commander. By this trick Josephus lived to write his famous histories, The Jewish War and The Antiquities of the Jews, which today provide a window, distorted though it may sometimes be, to those violent and passionate times. Josephus’ account of the fall of Gamla follows.—Ed.

After the fall of Jotapataa such Galilaeans as still remained in revolt from Rome now, surrendered; and the Romans received the submission of all the fortresses and towns except Gischalab and the force which had occupied Mount Tabor.c Gamla was also in league with these rebels.

Gamla refused to surrender, relying even more confidently than Jotapata upon the natural difficulties of its position. From a lofty mountain there descends a rugged spur rising in the middle to a hump, the declivity from the summit of which is of the same length before as behind, so that in form the ridge resembles a camel; whence it derives its name. (The name Gamla has the same root as the word for camel.) Its sides and face are cleft all round by inaccessible ravines, but at the tail end, where it hangs on to the mountain, it is somewhat easier of approach; but this quarter also the inhabitants, by cutting a trench across it, had rendered difficult of access. The houses were built against the steep mountain flank and astonishingly huddled together, one on top of the other, and this perpendicular site gave the city the appearance of being suspended in air and falling headlong upon itself. It faced south, and its southern eminence, rising to an immense height, formed the citadel; below this an unwalled precipice descended to the deepest of the ravines. There was a spring within the walls at the confines of the town.

Read the rest of The Fall of Gamla in the online Biblical Archaeology Society library.