Synagogue of Aegina
The Synagogue of Aegina was an ancient synagogue on the Greek island of Aegina off Piraeus . It is dated to the 4th century.
The ruins of the synagogue had already been noticed by a traveler in 1829, but the building was not examined until 1901 and 1904. Eleazar Sukenik explored the synagogue in 1928; In 1932 it was excavated by German archaeologists.
The central room was 13.50 meters long and 7.60 meters wide. The apse in the east was 5.5 meters in diameter. The room was entered from the west; there may have been an anteroom here. Traces of other adjoining rooms have been found.
A moderately well-preserved mosaic floor shows geometric patterns. In the entrance area there are two Greek inscriptions in Tabulae ansatae . With the first inscription, the synagogue ruler Theodotos documents that he built the synagogue during his four-year term in office. The second inscription reports that the younger Theodotos had the mosaic laid with funds from the synagogue during his tenure.
The mosaic was moved from its place of discovery near the harbor to the site of the island's Archaeological Museum.
Web links
- Gideon Foerster: A Survey of Ancient Diaspora Synagogues
literature
- Lee I. Levine: The Ancient Synagogue: The First Thousand Years. Yale University Press 2005, ISBN 0-300-07475-1 , p. 268.