Unable and unwilling to go underground

.

A few weeks ago you came on our small group night hike to a little-known ancient cistern just outside Meitar.
I went back on my own in the sunlight to explore better. 
Several meters above the ceiling of the cistern I found the opening from which people (farmers? monks?) would lower their buckets and draw water some 1,500 years ago.
Now it is covered with rebar so no one will fall in.

Lower down you see the built stone wall near the entrance to the cistern.

 The sign says "Cistern [ma-agurah].  A typical Roman and Byzantine era water-collection cistern."

The ancients did a beautiful job of carving it out of the soft chalk stone.

A major disappointment was to find the carved steps were now worn down to almost nothing, very slippery and on a steep incline.
I was dying to see the inside but I really didn't want to die alone in the desert if I slipped and fell into the deep cistern.  No one would have found me. 

From a distance you can see how rain water from the higher hills ran down and collected in the big cistern.
Probably in former times there were channels to direct the rain water.

 "DANGER! -- open pit" sign in Hebrew and Arabic.

I turned back to head home through the forest on the Israel Trail.
 .
 (Linking to ABC Wednesday  U-Day and to signs, signs.)
.

Night hike to a Byzantine-era cistern!

.

A cistern from the Byzantine period, right in my town's backyard, near the Meitar Forest!
Some 1,500 years ago people (farmers? monks? villagers?) collected and stored rain water  down there in a big plastered cistern.

I edited the first photo lighter so you could see the nice handwork, how the folks carved out the stairs and entrance in the soft chalk.
But actually we were out there in  the dark, after 8:00 pm!

The group of about 20 was fortunate to have our neighbor, Dr. Zeev Zivan, as our gude.
The hike was part of the worldwide Jane's Walk  global festival of citizen-led free community walks.
Here Zeev was explaining the blaze for the Israel National Trail.

The whole walk to the wilderness was only an hour and a half but we were blessed to witness both sunset and moonrise.
I came home exhilarated, feeling lucky to live so near the desert and its ancient history!
.

More cisterns

.
The lively kitten in the flowerpot was playing hide-and-seek with a litter-mate.
She is my contribution to Camera Critters meme today. However, the other photos are in response to the many readers who got excited about cisterns in new Jerusalem in yesterday's post.

Jews began moving out of the overcrowded walled Old City in 1860, when the first Jewish neighborhood in new Jerusalem was built. Many of the new houses where built around a courtyard which could be locked at night for better protection. Robber bands and wild animals were a danger then, outside the city wall.

Big cisterns were built underground.

Today the openings into the cisterns are plastered shut or locked. Some pumps have become quite decorative.

The three photos above (which are clickable, as usual) show the courtyard of the late Rabbi Kook's yeshiva and of the Museum of Psalms.

The slight curve signals the vault of a cistern below the street.

The two photos above are from the old neighborhood of Nachlaot.

The complex of city center neighborhoods, officially known as Lev Ha-Ir (meaning the heart of the city), was declared an area to be conserved. The are quite charming now.

Can you imagine the hardworking mothers who once gathered here draw water and to wash the laundry and exchange the latest news?

A courtyard of one of the many the ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods near the market. Often all the houses surrounding the courtyard made up one little "neighborhood," with a name of its own.

They have big families. With all the little kids playing outside, the openings to the deep cisterns are today carefully blocked.

The beautiful cistern roof in Sergei Courtyard!

The building houses the Jerusalem branch of the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel.

As we said yesterday, the SPNI is campaigning to have City Hall allow the re-opening of some of Jerusalem's 11,000 cisterns so that rainwater can be caught and held and used, instead of going down the drain.

After five straight years of drought, we need to conserve any rain that might come.

.

Bench and cat on a cistern

.
Come into an old courtyard off The Street of the Prophets.

In the old style, Jewish houses of 19th century neighborhoods (outside the Old City wall) were built around a central courtyard. In the winter, rainwater was collected from the roofs into the cistern.
The water was good enough for laundry, washing the floor, irrigation, etc..

Whenever you see a slightly convex paving like this in a back street or in a courtyard, you know it is the arched ceiling of a big cistern below.
At some point in modern history, I think because of epidemics, the cisterns were all locked and were no longer used.
Today, our branch of the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel has a dream. Their website says,
"In Jerusalem, some 11,000 cisterns that once provided water for tens of thousands city homes are neglected or blocked off. SPNI-Jerusalem's cistern restoration project intends to use this valuable source of non-potable water for gardens and other purposes."
.
Oh, and did you notice the old bench in the little garden?
Actually, this post was meant for "Bench of the Week," RuneE's pleasant Friday opportunity for sharing benches of our worlds. His lovely ones are at Visual Norway.
.