A man was caught last Wednesday with dozens of ancient floor tiles in the trunk of his car, tiles believed to be from 2,000 years ago and connected to the destruction of the Second Temple, according to the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA).
Police apprehended the man in a neighborhood in East Jerusalem. In the trunk of his car, they discovered dozens of ancient floor tiles produced by the Tenth Roman Legion, the military unit that ransacked Jerusalem and burned down the Second Temple.
The bricks looked fairly plain but were stamped with the well-known emblem of the legion. Authorities think they were probably from an oven in a bathhouse used by Roman soldiers. The man told authorities that he had gotten his cargo from somewhere near Hebron—but he did not divulge the location of the archaeological site.
“It hurts to see that for filthy lucre, people deface the floor of a…
