Why Were Two Roman Marble Statues Buried Face-Down in an Ancient Winepress Near Caesarea?

Two Roman marble statues were deliberately buried face-down inside an ancient Byzantine-era winepress near Caesarea, Israel — hidden for approximately 1,700 years, most likely to protect them from iconoclastic destruction as Christianity spread across the Roman Empire.

The Discovery Near Caesarea

Archaeologists from the Israel Antiquities Authority uncovered the statues at a site near Caesarea, the stunning Roman port city originally constructed by Herod the Great along the Mediterranean coast. Caesarea was no provincial backwater — it was one of the most strategically and culturally significant cities in the entire eastern Mediterranean, serving as a hub of Roman imperial power, commerce, and culture for centuries.

The statues were crafted from fine Roman marble and show a remarkable level of artistic skill, indicating they almost certainly once occupied a place of public or civic prominence. Alongside the statues, excavators found a Greek inscription — a rare additional find that adds significant historical weight to the discovery.

Why Were They Hidden in a Winepress?

The location of the burial is one of the most compelling details of the find. A winepress floor is not a glamorous hiding place — and that was precisely the point. Scholars believe that as the Roman Empire progressively Christianized following Emperor Constantine’s Edict of Milan in 313 CE, pagan imagery and statuary came under increasing threat. Figurative sculptures associated with polytheistic worship were systematically defaced or smashed during waves of religious iconoclasm.

Someone — likely a person who valued these works either for their artistic or cultural significance — chose to bury the statues face-down in the winepress floor rather than see them destroyed. Placing them face-down may have been intentional, either to protect the carved surfaces or as a symbolic act of concealment.

Who Hid Them — and Why Did They Never Return?

This is the haunting question at the heart of the discovery. The person or people who hid the statues never came back to retrieve them. Whether they died, fled, were prevented from returning, or simply could not risk exposure, we will never know. What is certain is that their act of preservation worked — against all odds, the statues survived nearly two millennia beneath the ground while the Byzantine Empire rose and crumbled, the Crusades swept through the region, and the modern world took shape above them.

The Greek Inscription

The presence of a Greek inscription alongside the statues adds another layer of intrigue. Greek remained the dominant language of culture, administration, and intellectual life in the eastern Roman Empire long after Latin dominated the west. The inscription may help researchers date the burial, identify the statues, or shed light on who commissioned the act of concealment — analysis is ongoing.

What This Find Tells Us About the Ancient World

Discoveries like this one illuminate how people navigated cultural and religious upheaval in antiquity. Rather than passive victims of historical change, individuals made active choices — sometimes at great personal risk — to preserve the art and knowledge of their world. The Caesarea statues are a testament to that human impulse: to protect beauty from destruction, even when the future is uncertain.

The find also underscores how much of the ancient world remains buried and waiting. Caesarea’s soil has yielded extraordinary artifacts before, but a cache of exquisitely preserved marble statues alongside a Greek inscription, sealed beneath a winepress for seventeen centuries, is rare by any measure.