Beit Shean

Beit Shean, the ancient Scythopolis, was the foremost city of the Roman Decapolis and the only one west of the Jordan River. Human settlement on its tell spans more than 5,000 years: Egyptian New Kingdom pharaohs held the site in the 15th century BCE, and the Bible records it as the place where the Philistines displayed the bodies of Saul and his sons. At its Byzantine peak the population reached 40,000. An earthquake on 18 January 749 CE levelled the city in moments, preserving columns, streets and façades beneath a single destruction layer that archaeologists have spent decades uncovering.

Within Beit Shean National Park a marked circuit leads through Scythopolis. The Roman theatre, originally seating some 7,000 spectators across three tiers, anchors the site. Palladius Street and Silvanus Street carry colonnaded façades past a nymphaeum, temples and bathhouses to the ancient tel, climbable for a Jordan Valley panorama. Byzantine mosaics and toppled granite columns — still lying where the earthquake threw them — give the ruins an unmatched immediacy.

Beit Shean lies 116 km north-east of Tel Aviv (1.5 hours) and 131 km from Jerusalem (2.5 hours). Jordan Valley heat makes early-morning visits advisable from June to September; spring and autumn are ideal. The site combines naturally with the Sea of Galilee (45 minutes north) and Belvoir Crusader fortress.