Fortress Antonia

[DaveW]

The above photo is a model of the Fortress Antonia attached to the side of the Temple Compound. This Model apparently resides in the Israel museum.

The Photo is from Wikipedia.

My question though relates to some of the details in the book of Acts.

Act 21:30-40
(30)  And all the city was moved, and the people ran together: and they took Paul, and drew him out of the temple: and forthwith the doors were shut.
(31)  And as they went about to kill him, tidings came unto the chief captain of the band, that all Jerusalem was in an uproar.
(32)  Who immediately took soldiers and centurions, and ran down unto them: and when they saw the chief captain and the soldiers, they left beating of Paul.
(33)  Then the chief captain came near, and took him, and commanded him to be bound with two chains; and demanded who he was, and what he had done.
(34)  And some cried one thing, some another, among the multitude: and when he could not know the certainty for the tumult, he commanded him to be carried into the castle.
(35)  And when he came upon the stairs, so it was, that he was borne of the soldiers for the violence of the people.
(36)  For the multitude of the people followed after, crying, Away with him.
(37)  And as Paul was to be led into the castle, he said unto the chief captain, May I speak unto thee? Who said, Canst thou speak Greek?
(38)  Art not thou that Egyptian, which before these days madest an uproar, and leddest out into the wilderness four thousand men that were murderers?
(39)  But Paul said, I am a man which am a Jew of Tarsus, a city in Cilicia, a citizen of no mean city: and, I beseech thee, suffer me to speak unto the people.
(40)  And when he had given him licence, Paul stood on the stairs, and beckoned with the hand unto the people. And when there was made a great silence, he spake unto them in the Hebrew tongue, saying,

Lots of interesting things here, but probably the most important to this little box of thoughts, is vs 32.

We see that the Chief Captain of the band took soldiers AND Centurions.

Now this is possibly speculation, but in my memory a "Centurion" was a "captain of 100 men", and the chief captain brought at least two centurions with him (plural reference - it may have been more, but no less than two.)

The speculation enters at the point hat we realise that just because ther were multiple centurions that doesn't mean there were necessarily the WHOLE century with each of the centurions. It would make sense that this were so, but it is not absolutely stated.

Anyway.......... my point is that this means that there were at least two hundred soldiers close at hand, apparently in the fort which was very near to the Temple.

Now a Fort doesn't just hold soldiers, but also support staff - cooks, stewards etc.

We also know that the fort had more than just footsoldiers in it:

Act 23:23  And he called unto him two centurions, saying, Make ready two hundred soldiers to go to Caesarea, and horsemen threescore and ten, and spearmen two hundred, at the third hour of the night;

This is from a bit later, when the Chief of the band was sending Paul to Felix, but note that this group, which was to safely escort Paul (What a blessing for Paul!!!!) consisted of two hundred men, 70 horsemen, and two hundred spearmen.

That is 400 men and 70 horses. And I very much doubt that the chief of the band would have sent ALL the troops to guard Paul - with the people in a riotous mood, he would need some men to stay and keep order and peace.

Anyway, the fortress in the model above would be 490' long and 260' wide.

For comparison, a Grid iron field is 330' long and 160' wide - so we are talking about two to three grid iron fields worth of space.

Do you think you would be a happy Roman soldier crammed into a fortress that was the size of three football fields, along with another 500 or so men and 70+ horses?

Look at that photo folks - does that look like it would hold, say 1000 men (including those who went and a speculation on those who stayed)?

 

Any "military associated" people want to hazard a guess at how much space would be required to house 1000 men, 150 horses, support staff, all with sleeping quarters, mess facilities, ablution facilities, and when was the last time you saw a military base without a parade ground??????

Just looking at the photos of this so called "Fortress Antonia", I think they really need to find another place to speculate about for the site of it. It is just not big enough.

 

 

 

Edited October 26, 2016 by DaveW
a plethora of spelling mistakes - I can type fast or I can type well, but not both.

[Ukulelemike]

The first US Navy ship I was on was the USS Cleveland, an LPD, (Amphibious Landing Platform). The dimensions were 570'L x 100'W, with as I recall, multiple decks, of course, with sleeping, mess, woorking, maintenance facilities, and a big open section in the back, the well deck, that was open, and held boats, so cut off about 1/6th of that overall space from the overall size.  We operated with 424 crew and officers, and underway for 6 month cruise, add to that 840 troops and 90 flag staff, (when there). So that adds up to roughly 1264 people, without flag staff, for 6 months at a time.

So yeah, I could see it, especially since they could walk outside of that area when needed or wanted. They didn't have to stay inside the walls at all times for weeks at a time. How many levels were there to the castle? I would think a castle set up for troops would have multiple areas. We slept 3 high onboard ship, they may have done the same, and even has closer quarters.

[DaveW]

And land bases?

Otherwise you are talking oranges to my apples.

[Ukulelemike]

Youou asked "Any "military associated" people want to hazard a guess at how much space would be required to house 1000 men, 150 horses, support staff, all with sleeping quarters, mess facilities, ablution facilities, and when was the last time you saw a military base without a parade ground??????"

It doesn't really matter land or sea; my point was, that a very large amount of people could live, work, eat and even recreate in a fairly small and compact area for an extended period. The biggest difference being, that in a land base, they had the option of leaving it as they pleased or needed, could stretch out. And they didn't need large amounts of that compact space reserved for huge amounts of machinery, probably half was not able to be used for living or eating or even storage, whereas in a land fortress, there was more room availavle per square foot for those things.

[DaveW]

Still apples and oranges because we are not talking about how little space you MIGHT squeeze that many people into, but how much space a working FORT would need.

I guarantee that you don't sleep three deep in any naval shore base.

I do thank you for your info, but it is not really relevant. Ships don't have parade grounds, don't normally carry horses, etc. but shore bases do.

The local Airforce base here has a parade ground that in itself is more that 500' long and 300' wide. I have taken Parade on it.

This is reality for ground bases - I have NEVER been to a military base without a dedicated parade ground that is at least the size of a football ground. And I have been to a few. Army, Navy, and Air Force.

And the Romans paraded - it was part of their discipline.

How many are on the base you service, and roughly what size? 

(But you know, even that is not entirely relevant because tanks and planes take up a lot more space than horses.)

[Salyan]

If you look at early fur trading posts in the West, it is ridiculous how many people would live within a space we would today consider only fit to house 1 or 2. They seemed to have different ideas about space back then.  Perhaps the stables were actually outside the fortress?

[DaveW]

Possible, but I know the Aussie Light Horse Brigade of WW1 wouldn't be away from their horses.

The "model" doesn't seem to make any provision for horses even outside,  but it is made primarily from speculation so who knows what details they didn't think about. 

My actual point is that to me their "historical speculation" doesn't seem to make sense when you do the math, even according to what we KNOW from the Bible, let alone historians themselves who say there was a full legion there.

Actually, if you read the account in Acts not much of it "looks right" with the model.

To me anyway......

 

But who really cares - it is a made up model.

I thought it might be an interesting discussion. ....

[John Young]

Forts are not meant to house everybody and everything during peace time operations. However, they are designed to be strategically placed to be defensive locations. More than likely they had additional forts towers and check points and barracks and storehouses to house the army while the temple mount fort was for the main contingent guarding a base of operations as an army HQ. That in itself could explain why you have more high ranking officers present while not necessarily all of their men.