5 things to know about The Pilgrimage Road:

  1. The Pilgrimage Road in the City of David is considered one of the most expensive and complex excavations currently taking place in Israel, due to all of the construction required and the challenging underground conditions of the excavation.
  2. The total length of the road connecting the Siloam pool at the south of the City of David to the Temple Mount is 600 meters long. It is 8 meters wide, however at its southern end the road widens even more and reaches a width of 30 meters!
  3. The Pilgrimage Road is like the Mahane Yehuda Market, or 5th Avenue if you will, of ancient Jerusalem: many coins, weights and even a special weighing table were discovered along the route – all these were used for the extensive commercial activities that happened on the route.
  4. An ancient drainage channel passes underneath the road. The channel was used in the days of the Second Temple as a hiding place for Jewish rebels who were hiding from Roman soldiers. Cooking pots, oil lamps, hundreds of bronze coins from the Great Revolt and even a sword that belonged to a Roman legionnaire, were all discovered in the channel.
  5. Even though many attribute the building of the road to Herod the Great, recent research shows that the road was built after Herod’s time, under the Roman governors of Jerusalem. It was most likely built by the Roman Governor Pontius Pilate, also known for sentencing Jesus to crucifixion.
The Pilgrimage Road. Photo: Kobi Harathi