Ruins [Arabic: Khirbet]
of a settlement on a low plateau on the west bank of the Dead
Sea at Wadi Qumran, 1.5 miles north of the spring/oasis of 'Ain
Feshka & about 8 miles south of Jericho,
near the caves
where the Dead
Sea Scrolls were
discovered (1947-1956).
Khirbet Qumran was the site of a
sizeable fortified Judean town from the 8th-6th c. BCE, but was
abandoned until the reign of Johanan
Hyrcanus (135-104 BCE)
when a large integrated complex of buildings including rooms
identified by excavators as a "scriptorium",
"refectory", kitchen, & stables was constructed.
An aqueduct supplied water to an elaborate system of reservoirs
& ritual baths. This complex was destroyed by earthquake in
31 BCE but rebuilt on the same plan about the beginning of the
current era.
This settlement did not employ usual architectural
features of the Hasmonean & Herodian eras. A cemetery with
more than 1000 tombs to the east of the city held exclusively
male skeletons. A handful of women & one child were found
buried in a separate section. These facts, combined with the
discovery of fragments of hundreds of scrolls concealed in large
pottery jars in many caves in the hills above the settlement led
excavators to conclude that Qumran was the center of the
secretive ascetic sect of the Essenes who had been described by Josephus,
Philo & Pliny. That
conclusion has been challenged, however, by scholars & archaeologists
who point out discrepancies between classic descriptions of the Essene
religious sect & the archaeological evidence found at the site.