{"id":321527,"date":"2025-08-06T03:54:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-06T03:54:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/321527\/"},"modified":"2025-08-06T03:54:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-06T03:54:14","slug":"study-suggests-4th-century-prayer-site-may-be-one-of-spains-earliest-synagogues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/321527\/","title":{"rendered":"Study suggests 4th-century prayer site may be one of Spain’s earliest synagogues"},"content":{"rendered":"

A 4th-century building in the Ibero-Roman city of C\u00e1stulo in south-central Spain, traditionally interpreted by experts as an early Christian church, might have instead been a synagogue, a group of Spanish archaeologists has argued.<\/p>\n

In a paper published last month in the journal Vegueta<\/a>, the scholars explained that some of the structure\u2019s characteristics are unusual for a church and pointed to the presence of Jewish artifacts in its vicinity.<\/p>\n

\u201cSituated on the right bank of the Guadalimar River, C\u00e1stulo was one of the most important centers in the southern Iberian Peninsula during Antiquity, both for the size of its walled enclosure (50 hectares) and for its strategic position,\u201d Bautista Cepri\u00e1n del Castillo, one of the paper\u2019s authors, told The Times of Israel via email.<\/p>\n

The city stood at the crossroads of many significant commercial routes and had access to critical natural resources, including iron, silver, and copper.<\/p>\n

Researchers first began investigating the possibility of a Jewish presence in C\u00e1stulo about 15 years ago, Cepri\u00e1n said, after a handful of telling artifacts were found near the structure in previous years: three broken oil lamps bearing images of a seven-branched menorah, a tile fragment with a five-branched menorah, and a Hebrew inscription inked on the lid of a storage jar.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe artifacts found at the site \u2014 and the broader material culture documented \u2014 are typical of the Roman city of C\u00e1stulo in the 4th and 5th centuries,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/p>\n

In July 2025, a group of Spanish scholars suggested that a 4th-century building in the Roman city of C\u00e1stulo in south-central Spain served as a synagogue and not as a church as previously believed. In the picture, excavations at C\u00e1stulo in 2024. (Courtesy of Bautista Cepri\u00e1n)<\/p>\n

\u201cThe three oil lamps, each bearing the unmistakable symbol of Judaism, the seven-branched menorah, provide compelling evidence of a Jewish presence \u2014 especially given that only three other lamps of this kind have been discovered across the entire Iberian Peninsula,\u201d he added. \u201cThen there\u2019s the Hebrew inscription, which stands as one of the clearest indicators of a distinct Jewish identity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Due to the inscription\u2019s poor preservation \u2014 and what the paper describes as the scribe\u2019s \u201climited writing skills\u201d \u2014 experts have been unable to conclusively decipher its meaning. Some suggest it reads \u201cof forgiveness,\u201d others interpret it as \u201clight of forgiveness,\u201d while a few believe it says \u201cSong to David.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/p>\n

In July 2025, a group of Spanish scholars suggested that a 4th-century building in the Roman city of C\u00e1stulo in south-central Spain served as a synagogue and not as a church as previously believed. In the picture: The reconstruction of an oil lamp featuring a menorah found in the vicinity of the building. (Courtesy of Bautista Cepri\u00e1n)<\/p>\n

In the past few years, archaeologists have set out to learn more about the Jewish community that may have lived in C\u00e1stulo.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn 2019, we expanded the excavation site, though the main objective then was to study an earlier structure \u2014 specifically, an imperial temple with a square portico,\u201d\u00a0 Cepri\u00e1n said. \u201cNonetheless, we continued gathering information about the Jewish community that lived in this central area during the 4th and 5th centuries.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn 2023 and 2024, we resumed the original project under the new name \u2018C\u00e1stulo, Sefarad: First Light,\u201d he added. \u201cThis phase involved the excavation of roughly 600 square meters, focused specifically on 4th- and 5th-century layers with the support of the Ministry of Culture and Sports of the Andalusian Regional Government.\u201d<\/p>\n

The new excavation enabled the archaeologists to uncover additional architectural evidence supporting the hypothesis that the structure previously identified as a church served as a synagogue.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/p>\n

In July 2025, a group of Spanish scholars suggested that a 4th-century building in the Roman city of C\u00e1stulo in south-central Spain served as a synagogue and not as a church as previously believed. In the picture, a fragment of a jar lid bearing a Hebrew inscription. (Courtesy of Bautista Cepri\u00e1n)<\/p>\n

In the most recent study, Cepri\u00e1n and his colleagues, David Exp\u00f3sito Mangas and Jos\u00e9 Carlos Ortega D\u00edez, focused on the characteristics and the position of the building.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe structure features an almost square floor plan with an apse facing east and doors on both the north and south sides,\u201d Cepri\u00e1n said.<\/p>\n

According to the archaeologists, there are several reasons to believe the building served the city\u2019s Jewish community rather than its Christian one.
Its near-square layout mirrors that of other Late Antique synagogues found in Galilee and elsewhere in the Land of Israel.<\/p>\n

The structure also appears to have included a bimah \u2014 a central raised platform typical of synagogues \u2014 and a base where a menorah may once have stood.<\/p>\n

No Christian artifacts have been uncovered in or around the building, and \u2014 unlike most Christian worship sites from the period \u2014 it also does not include graves. By contrast, a clearly identified Christian baptistry found elsewhere in C\u00e1stulo contains several graves.<\/p>\n

Synagogues from this period never included graves, which were required to be situated at a certain distance from residential areas.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/p>\n

In July 2025, a group of Spanish scholars suggested that a 4th-century building in the Roman city of C\u00e1stulo in south-central Spain served as a synagogue and not as a church as previously believed. In the picture: The reconstruction of an oil lamp featuring a menorah found in the vicinity of the building. (Courtesy of Bautista Cepri\u00e1n)<\/p>\n

Additionally, the building\u2019s location \u2014 in a secluded part of the city, next to a bathhouse and other pagan structures viewed as immoral by early Christians \u2014 suggests it would have been an unlikely choice for the Christian community, which by the late 4th century was already well-established and thriving.<\/p>\n

\u201cFinally, the archaeological record from the excavation dates the building\u2019s abandonment to the 6th century CE,\u201d Ceprian and his colleagues wrote in the paper. \u201cThis coincides with the apparent disappearance of the Jewish community that may have inhabited C\u00e1stulo at the time, as suggested by the 612 CE anti-Jewish law issued by the Visigothic king Sisebut.\u201d<\/p>\n

C\u00e1stulo was fully abandoned only in the 14th century.<\/p>\n

The archaeologists emphasized that there is still no definitive proof that the building functioned as a synagogue, though they remain hopeful that future excavations will uncover evidence to support the hypothesis.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur understanding of the Jewish settlement [in C\u00e1stulo] is far from complete,\u201d Cepri\u00e1n wrote. \u201cFor example, no work has yet been done to determine the full extent of the Jewish quarter within the city. And beyond the Jewish presence, many other important questions remain to be explored throughout the broader archaeological site of C\u00e1stulo.\u201d<\/p>\n

If confirmed as a synagogue, the structure at C\u00e1stulo would rank among the oldest in Spain.<\/p>\n

According to the Historic Synagogues of Europe database, a project by the Foundation for Jewish Heritage and the Center for Jewish Art at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, to date, only two other synagogues from Late Antiquity are known in the country \u2014 one in Barcelona and another in Elche.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 4th-century building in the Ibero-Roman city of C\u00e1stulo in south-central Spain, traditionally interpreted by experts as an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":321528,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5312],"tags":[2000,299,104],"class_list":{"0":"post-321527","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-spain","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-spain"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114979803344621275","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/321528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}