Byzantine Mosaic Floor of 1,500-year-old Found in Jerusalem
From Haaretz: While digging to lay a cable network by the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem's Old City, workers uncovered an intact mosaic with Greek writing on what seems to have been the floor of an ancient version of a boutique hotel 1,500 years ago. The writing reads: "In the time of our most pious emperor Flavius Justinian, also this entire building Constantine the most God-loving priest and abbot, established and raised, in the 14th indiction," according to Leah Di Segni, of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, an expert on ancient Greek inscriptions. "'Indiction' is an ancient method of counting years, for taxation purposes. Based on historical sources, the mosaic can be dated to the year 550 or 551 C.E.," Di Segni says. Both she and David Gellman, the director of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority believe the mosaic decorated the floor of what had probably been a hotel for pilgrims flocking to Jerusalem as Christianity t...
