According to the “Book of Revelation”, Megiddo – an ancient “city” located 90 kilometers from Jerusalem – will be the chosen place for the battle of Armageddon (Hebrew, Har Megiddo). The Book of Revelation essentially tells us that there’s a place on Earth where the armies of the world will gather during the end of times. This place exists and has been excavated for years.
Armageddon’s location is interpreted in various ways, including literally and symbolically. Armageddon is, in popular culture but also throughout history, used to essentially describe the end of the world. Megiddo, as it is known today (Tel Megiddo) is perhaps more famously known for its theological, geographical and historical importance, especially under its Greek name of Armageddon, the city of the end of days. Its importance is attested by the fact that the site is now know protected as a world heritage site, known as Megiddo National Park.
The mount of Megiddo is commonly mistaken as a mountain, but it’s essentially a tell: a mound created after the accumulation of material caused by various generations of people living at the place, rebuilding the same spot over and over again. Studies and excavations have long confirmed that the remains of at least twenty ancient cities built on top of each other are found within the mound.
An important ancient city
Megiddo was where the ancients built forts that safeguarded Via Maris, an important ancient trade route that gave Egypt access to empires of Syria, Mesopotamia as well as Anatolia in present-day Turkey.
Its importance was confirmed in records that date back from Ancient Egypt in hieroglyphic writing and is cited in cuneiform script. According to the “Amarna Letters”—a series of ancient documents engraved on clay tablets that Egypt sent to its vassal states of Syria–, Megiddo was a very important place because it was located at the crossroads of the Jezreel Valley, confirming its importance in the trade route between Egypt, Europe, and Mesopotamia.
Since ancient times, Megiddo was the location for numerous battles in ancient times the most famous of which took place in the 15th century before Christ between the armies of the Egyptian pharaoh Thutmose III and a large Canaanite coalition, and one in 609 BC between pharaoh Necho II and the Kingdom of Judah.
The history of Megiddo speaks for itself. According to the Jewish tradition, it was King David and Solomon, at the head of the Israeli people, who formed a great empire in the 10th century BC. with Megido being one of their main allies. But one of the most important events was the civil war that led to the formation of two opposing kingdoms: that of Israel, in the north and with the capital in Samaria, and that of Judah, in the south and with the capital in Jerusalem.
A 2014 excavation led by researchers from Tel Aviv University in Israel discovered a “Great Temple” from 3000 BC. There, they discovered a massive industrial animal sacrifice, which casts doubts over what deities were worshiped at the temple, more than 5,000 years ago. Most of the sacrificed animals (around eighty percent) belonged to young sheep and goats, while the meaning 20 percent of animals were cattle. The discovery of the ancient temple was described by experts as “the most monumental single edifice so far uncovered” in the early Bronze Age Levant.
The temple at Megiddo was one of the largest monuments in the Near East during its time, between 3300-2500 BC. Traces of habitation at the site can be traced back further than 5,000 BC. Experts have discovered the site was inhabited from around 6,500 BC, or even possibly since 7,000 BC, which makes it one of the oldest cities in the world. Nonetheless, the most significant remains of th city date to a period between 4,500 to 3,500 BC.
This means that around 4,000 years before the oldest pyramids of Egypt were even envisioned, Tel Megiddo, aka Armageddon, was already an important social center in the region, probably thanks to its geographical location overlooking the rich Jezreel Valley from the west.
Armageddon—Harmagedon in the Book of Revelation
And they assembled them at the place that in Hebrew is called Harmagedon.The seventh angel poured his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out of the temple, from the throne, saying, “It is done!”And there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, and a violent earthquake, such as had not occurred since people were upon the earth, so violent was that earthquake. (Revelation 16:16)
The Book of Revelation, in the New Testament of the Christian Bible, the armies were assembled at Harmageodn (Armageddon) and how it was there where the final battle was fought. In the Greek New Testament, the word Armageddon appears only once. In the Olde Testament, Megiddo—Armageddon the city—was mentioned twelve times, ten times of which in reference to the city, and twice in reference to the “plain of Medigdo.”
