Photo exhibition “Horvat Kur” at NINO

10 information panels with texts and photographs on the fieldwork project at Horvat Kur are on display in the hallways of the NINO offices in the Herta Mohr building.

Fieldwork at Horvat Kur was carried out between 2008 and 2018 under the direction of Jürgen Zangenberg as part of the Kinneret Regional Project, an international archaeological expedition to the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee sponsored by Leiden University, the University of Bern, Helsinki University, Wofford and Danville Colleges and the University of Oklahoma at Tulsa. KRP has been exploring Horvat Kur and its surroundings since 2007 with the help of hundreds of volunteers, mostly students from the sponsoring Dutch, Swiss, Finnish and US universities, but als from Rumania, Germany, Russia and many other countries.

The photo exhibition consists of 10 information panels with bilingual texts (Dutch and English), plans and photographs highlighting a synagogue in use between the 4^th through the 7^th c. CE and many of its unique features.

In addition to the synagogue, a cistern and parts of the surrounding domestic quarters were excavated. Though not well preserved, the synagogue provided valuable new information on the layout, decoration and liturgical and communal use of village synagogues during the Roman and Byzantine periods in the Galilee and beyond.

The building has two phases dating to the 4th and 5th c. (small and decorated with a floor mosaic) and 5th–7th c. CE (larger but less elaborate).

For more information on the excavations at Horvat Kur, visit the Kinneret Regional Project website.

The photo/text panels have been designed by Leonie van Esser and colleagues and produced by the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden, Leiden. Kinneret Regional Project and NINO are grateful for the wonderful cooperation!

Image: The synogogue at Horvat Kur during the 2013 fieldwork season (photographed by B. de Groot; © Kinneret Regional Project)