“The finds sit where the HOLY sources place the

 battle, along the old road below the village. 

They give us, for the first time, an archaeological echo of the confrontation described in the texts.”

Also a bronze coin from the Asia Minor city of Side was found at Horbat Bet Zecharia south of Jerusalem, where the Maccabees fought the Greek Seleucid army. 

One side shows the Greek goddess Athena wearing a Corinthian helmet. 

The other features a pomegranate, which was the symbol of Side. Foreign mercenaries fighting with the Greeks were paid with such coins.

, this is the first time that a Side coin has emerged from a location explicitly connected to

F Hasmoneans - chashmonaim. - Maccabees

Their importance, Raviv says, lies in offering the first independent support for the historicity of the battle itself.

. “It is the first instence from one of Judah Maccabee’s

battlefields,” 

. “This is where history, text and ground finally begin to meet.”