The remains of a sixth-century Byzantine church dedicated to an unnamed “glorious martyr” with elaborate mosaics, a rare crypt and a large collection of lamps were unveiled in central Israel on Wednesday. The complex, which spans over a third of an acre, was found during salvage excavations ahead of the construction of a new neighbourhood for the city Bet Shemesh, west of Jerusalem. The mosaics in the church depict themes from nature, such as leaves, birds and fruit, as well as geometrical elements, with imported capitals topping pillars, according to the Israel Antiquities Authority, which carried out the excavation. Most of the construction of the church began during the reign of Emperor Justinian, who ruled between 527-565, with a chapel added later under Emperor Tiberius II Constantine, with rare financial support from him, the IAA said in a statement. An underground burial chamber with two separate<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The remains of a sixth-century Byzantine church dedicated to an unnamed “glorious martyr” with elaborate mosaics, a rare crypt and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[97],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-publications"],"yoast_head":"\n