There is literally no other people or society that remains essentially unchanged from ancient times until today
A few years ago, in the course of mapping out a new building project in Ramat Beit Shemesh, the surveyors found a settlement that had clearly housed our religious ancestors. Behind the outer fortifications that we’d unwittingly walked past so often lay the world of the RBS founding fathers.
Not for them, working American hours for outsourcing firms, it seems. They were employed in the wine and oil business.
The excavations revealed a beautifully preserved wine press. The basin where the grapes were trodden, the channel where the juice ran off, and then the lined pit where it was stored are all still there, waiting for the next batch of Beit Shemesh Bordeaux.
A few meters over lies the olive press. Large millstones about the size of an SUV tire lie a-jumble. The storage vats that held the precious liquid invite kids to scramble all over them now.
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