Masada is the most famous of Herod's fortified desert palaces, both because of its spectacular natural setting and because it was the site of a reported mass suicide of Jewish insurgents seventy-five years after Herod's death. We begin this chapter by reviewing the remains of Herod's palaces atop Masada, and end with a discussion of the mass suicide story.

Herod's Palaces at Masada

Masada is a mesa – a flat-topped mountain with steep cliffs on all sides – overlooking the southwest shore of the Dead Sea (see Figure 6.1). The name Masada derives from the Hebrew word for “fort” or “fortress,” reflecting the mountain's natural suitability for that purpose, which was exploited by Herod. Early in his reign, Herod sought to protect the southern and eastern borders of his kingdom from Cleopatra's ambitions by constructing a series of fortresses. Like Masada, some of these were built over fortified palaces that had been established by the Hasmonean kings, such as Alexandrium-Sartaba (in the Jordan Valley north of Jericho) and Hyrcania (west of Qumran). Although Josephus tells us that Masada was first fortified by a Hasmonean king named Jonathan (referring either to Judah Maccabee's brother or to Alexander Jannaeus, whose Hebrew name was Jonathan), archaeologists have not succeeded in identifying any buildings at Masada from the Hasmonean period. Apparently Herod's construction projects at Masada obliterated earlier remains. When Herod fled Judea in 40 B.C.E. in the wake of the Parthian invasion, he deposited his family for safekeeping in the Hasmonean fortress at Masada before proceeding south to the Nabataean kingdom.