Biblical Archaeology Review

Adomnan, De Locis Sanctis 1:15:1.

Saewulf, Relatio de peregrinatione 17; compare Theoderic, Liber de Locis Sanctis 24, Second Guide 124.

In the Maresha cave, stone slabs, cut with concave arcs to fit snugly, were placed over the tops of ledges that had been cracked by extensive use. See Kloner and Sagiv, “Olive Presses,” pp. 127–128.

Piacenza Pilgrim, Itinerarium 17.

In my book, Christians and the Holy Places: The Myth of Jewish-Christian Origins (Oxford: Clarendon, 1993), p. 200, I suggested that these “ledges” may have been the remaining uprights of screw operated presses. I am indebted to Dr. Kloner for pointing out that such screw presses only appeared at the end of the Roman period and were not in use at the time of Jesus.

Theodosius, De Situ Terrae Sanctae 10.

Bernard, Itinerarium 13.

For further details, see Amos Kloner and Nahum Sagiv, “The Olive Presses of Hellenistic Maresha, Israel,” in Bulletin de Correspondence Hellénique Supplement XXVI, pp. 119–135.

I am indebted to Dr. Amos Kloner for this observation. I am also grateful to Dr. Kloner for taking me to visit some of these caves when I was annual scholar at the British School of Archaeology in 1986.

Dalman, Arbeit und Sitte, p. 322. There are many examples of underground oil-presses from the region of Beth Guvrin. See Y. Teper, “The Oil Presses at Maresha Region,” in Olive Oil in Antiquity, pp. 25–46, and Amos Kloner and Nahum Sagiv, “The Technology of Oil Production in the Hellenistic Period: Studies in the Crushing Process at Maresha,” in Olive Oil in Antiquity, pp. 133–138.