The Jordan Valley city of Jericho, about 15 miles east of Jerusalem, was the relatively warm spot chosen by three kings of the Hasmonean dynasty to build their winter palaces.
Constructed in stages from the end of the second century BCE, the palaces apparently were destroyed by an earthquake in 31 BCE.
Excavated over 10 seasons beginning in the 1970s by Hebrew University archeologist Ehud Netzer, the Hellenist-style palaces featured an open courtyard surrounded by rooms.
There were elegant colonnaded rooms for entertaining, bathtubs decorated with colored frescos, ritual and swimming pools, towers and moats, orchards and ornamental gardens. A building believed to be a synagogue was found in 2001 in the northeastern part of the Hasmonean palace complex.