Ancient Marble Statue of Naked Hercules Found in Jezreel Valley
Israeli archaeologists excavating in the Jezreel Valley uncovered a 1,800-year-old marble statue of a naked Hercules leaning on a club and showing off the skin of a Nemean lion.
“This is a rare discovery,” Israel Antiquities Authority’s Walid Atrash said in an e-mailed statement. He said the statue was about half a meter tall, made of smooth, white marble and “of exceptional artistic quality.”
The statue was found in Horvat Tarbenet as part of an excavation before a new railway that will link northern Israeli communities of Haifa, Afula and Beit Shean, the Antiquities Authority said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Gwen Ackerman in Jerusalem at gackerman@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Beech at mbeech@bloomberg.net.
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