Original subtitles

[Narrator] In northern Israel,

a team of archaeologists use state-of-the-art equipment

to hunt for signs of an ancient apocalypse.

We use the technology of the future.

Wow!

Yeah, this is exciting.

Here we can see in real time.

I think that we should dig here.

[Narrator] The drone reveals an ancient fortification

buried for nearly 3,000 years.

This is great, really.

This is fantastic.

[Narrator] These groundbreaking discoveries could shed light

on the site's violent past.

And the truth behind one of the Bible's most powerful

and disturbing tales,

the Battle of Armageddon.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

The stories in the Bible are famous across the world.

They tell of earth-shaking catastrophes,

epic heroes,

and violent confrontations.

But the most apocalyptic of all,

as told in the New Testament,

is a showdown between the forces of good and evil

at the end of days

in a place called Armageddon.

This story intrigues archaeologists,

because Armageddon is a real place.

The ancient city of Megiddo in northern Israel.

Why did the biblical authors believe

that this was where the world would end?

Now, experts are on a mission to investigate the history

of this city and the real events

that might have inspired the story.

[Professor] Why Megiddo? Why this place?

[Narrator] They use pioneering technology...

[Assaf] Wow! Yeah, this is quite exciting.

[Narrator] ...and study ancient warfare...

[Yosef] Boom, boom.

We have a destroyed city.

[Narrator] ...to discover the secrets of Armageddon.

The ancient city of Megiddo lies in modern-day Isreal,

55 miles north of Jerusalem.

Here, archaeologist Assaf Kleiman is on a mission

to decode the history of this mysterious and important site.

[Assaf Kleiman] I've been working at Megiddo 15 years,

and this site has so many fantastic riddles

to be investigated.

[Narrator] Archaeological evidence reveals people

first started living here up to 9,000 years ago,

around 4,000 years before the pyramids of Egypt.

[Assaf] Tel Megiddo was inhabited

for thousands of years.

This site has more than 20 occupational layers.

[Narrator] Megiddo is mentioned in the Old Testament 12 times,

usually in connection with battles.

Its sole appearance in the New Testament

is in the Book of Revelation,

as the site of the final battle between good and evil.

[Assaf] Armageddon is a corruption of the Hebrew term

"Har Megiddo," which can be translated

as "the mountain of Megiddo."

[Narrator] Revelation, the last book of the Bible,

is a series of doomsday prophecies

given to a mysterious author known only as John,

in the first century CE.

Revelation foretells the second coming of Christ.

In an epic battle, heaven will open

and an army of angels will descend.

Leading them is Jesus Christ.

On Earth, the devil and his minions

assemble an army of evil

to march against the heavenly legions.

[growling]

As the fate of the world hangs in the balance,

Jesus and his army defeat the forces of darkness

in a titanic battle at a place called Armageddon.

Why did the writer of Revelation name Megiddo

as the site of this titanic battle?

Assaf explores the site's impressive ruins

to investigate.

[Assaf] This is the gate of Megiddo.

As we can see here,

the original stones were preserved for more than a meter.

[Narrator] The gate dates to the 14th century BCE.

It was built by a people called the Canaanites.

We're actually speaking about the original

populations that lived here at Megiddo.

The Canaanites lived in this region for thousands of years.

[Narrator] Megiddo is first mentioned in the Old Testament

as a Canaanite city.

The Bible describes its people as the enemy of the Israelites.

Could the events of this time shed light on its significance

for the writer of Revelation?

To find out, archaeologists investigate nearby towns

that share its history,

beginning 37 miles from Megiddo

at the vast archaeological site of Tel Hazor.

Here, an excavation team arrives at the break of dawn.

Today, they face a race against time,

as a recent heatwave has seen temperatures soar

above 100 degrees Fahrenheit.

Just like Megiddo, Tel Hazor was a Canaanite city.

Archaeologist Igor Kreimerman leads a team of 50 people here.

We do have some plastered fragments.

To find them in situ would be tremendous.

Let's hope for the best.

[Narrator] They unearth the walls and stairs

of a huge structure.

[Igor Kreimerman] Right over here, you can see

the section of a stair,

how it perfectly fits the section of the pillar.

That's really the highest level of stoneworking

in Canaanite culture.

It would suggest it is a very important structure.

[Narrator] This building could be up to 215,000 square feet

in area, over three times the size

of an American football field.

[Igor] We must be at the entrance

to the palace of the king of Hazor.

[Narrator] But once inside, Igor makes a discovery

that seems out of place.

[Igor] So here we see those depressions

that are basically troughs for animals

such as sheeps, goats, donkeys, and horses.

[Narrator] Livestock roamed the royal corridors,

a hint that all was not well with Canaanite society.

[Igor] The fact that now animals were brought to the palace

of the king probably symbolizes the decline

of the power of the king and of the ruling class.

[Narrator] Igor needs to dig to find out why the palace

was turned into a place for livestock.

Suddenly his team makes a startling discovery.

[Igor] Oh, wow!

That's fantastic.

Also here.

It seems to be a pithos, a large vessel

that was probably about one meter 20 high.

[Narrator] The pithos jug is scarred

by a very specific kind of damage.

[Igor] We see this very white material, right,

that's probably the contents of that vessel,

and they just calcinated due to intense heat.

[Narrator] Calcination is when carbon is removed

from a substance by very high temperatures,

changing its chemistry.

[Igor] It's really spectacular,

I've never seen anything like that.

[Narrator] On the hunt for more evidence of what happened here,

the team casts the net wider.

[Igor] You can see in here burnt mud bricks.

At the bottom we see the remains of charred wood,

probably wooden beams that supported the roof

and just collapsed on the floor.

[Narrator] Together, these clues build a picture

of Tel Hazor's devastating fate.

At the end of the Bronze Age,

the whole Canaanite city was destroyed by fire.

[Igor] The destruction layer of Hazor

is dated to the late 13th century BC.

We have radiocarbon dates to support this dating.

[Narrator] The obliteration of Tel Hazor was part

of a wider pattern of destruction across the region

at this time, which included the city of Megiddo.

Who caused this damage?

In the Old Testament, the destruction of Megiddo

is part of one of the most famous Bible stories,

the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites.

Moses leads the Israelite people out of Egypt,

after 40 years of wandering the desert

in search of what they call the Promised Land.

They are led by his successor, Joshua,

into Canaan, which they must take by force.

They violently conquer every city in Canaan,

including Tel Hazor and Megiddo,

until the land is theirs to divide amongst themselves.

But there's a puzzle.

Archaeologists aren't sure who destroyed

all the Canaanite cities,

as there were many groups of raiders active at the time.

[Igor] Some cities on the coast could have been destroyed

by the Sea Peoples, some other cities were, could have,

could have been destroyed by other tribes

such as the Arameans who were just on the right.

[Narrator] Many experts believe the Old Testament story

was written by Israelite authors hundreds of years

after these attacks at Tel Hazor and Megiddo.

So why did they believe their ancestors

were the ones who conquered these cities?

[Narrator] At Tel Hazor, away from the main excavation,

Igor Kreimerman explores a much later part of the site.

After the destruction in the 1300s,

there's scant evidence that anyone lived here.

Until around the 10th century BCE

when it was rebuilt by new residents.

Massive double walls and a six-chambered gate

are a characteristic style of architecture

that reveals the new occupants to be the Israelites.

But oddly, among the new buildings

of this impressive city,

are the remains of much older structures

dating from hundreds of years before.

Why did the Israelite people

leave these ancient ruins untouched?

[Igor] Look how well the walls have preserved,

in certain places about two meters above floor level;

that's quite unusual.

The reason that this structure preserved so well

is that actually no Iron Age structures were built on top.

[Narrator] The Israelites shied away from altering the ruins.

[Igor] The people of the Iron Age lived with those ruins

just in the heart of their city.

[Narrator] Even if archaeologists can't be sure

they destroyed the original city,

it's clear that remembering the destruction was so important

to the Israelites that they left the ruins

rather than covering them up.

[Igor] They reinterpreted the ruins.

As time went on, some legends and some stories developed

about the structure itself and probably whoever destroyed it.

[Narrator] It's evidence the Israelites were people

to whom the past mattered.

They preserved ruins and recorded their history

through generations as a chronical of their people

in the form of the Bible.

[Igor] From generation to generation,

the story gets told again and again,

and eventually that turned out to be the story

that we hear in the Book of Joshua.

[Narrator] The story of the conquest of Canaan

is a major event in the Old Testament Book of Joshua.

The biblical account tells how the Israelites defeated

many cities; Megiddo is mentioned.

But its minor role in the narrative

means this event on its own is unlikely to have influenced

the story in the Book of Revelation.

So, was this the only battle to take place here?

The very first mention of Megiddo in history

dates to a time many centuries before it appears in the Bible,

back in the 15th century BCE.

This record is found some 500 miles away from Megiddo

among the ancient wonders of modern-day Luxor, Egypt.

The Karnak Temple Complex is one of the largest

religious sites of ancient Egypt.

Here, many temples were built to honor the gods.

Inside one, dedicated to the king of the gods, Amun-Re,

the walls are carved with hieroglyphics.

They chart the military victories of one pharaoh,

including an epic battle at Megiddo.

Could this clash be the one that inspired

the Book of Revelation story?

Egyptologist Chris Naunton investigates

the Egyptian pharaoh of the inscription,

a ruler called Thutmose III.

[Chris Naunton] We think that this is an image

of Thutmose III, who has the reputation

of being perhaps Egypt's greatest warrior pharaoh.

[Narrator] Thutmose III ruled Egypt in a period

known as the New Kingdom,

nearly a century before the time of Tutankhamun.

[Chris] If there's one king who more than any other

was responsible for the expansion of Egypt's territory

and a series of incredible victories, it is Thutmose III.

[Narrator] He expanded Egyptian power into Canaan

as far as modern-day Syria.

But in 1457 BCE, the people of Canaan decided to resist.

It was a threat to his power

that the mighty Thutmose couldn't ignore.

[Chris] This is a big, big, seriously bad moment

for Megiddo.

[Narrator] Thutmose assembled a mighty army

of 20,000 men and chariots,

to attack the Canaanites in Megiddo.

Against the advice of his generals,

he led his troops through a narrow mountain pass,

a highly risky move.

But it gave him the element of surprise,

and in a titanic battle at Megiddo,

he routed the Canaanite army.

After a siege of the city that lasted seven months,

the rulers of Megiddo eventually surrendered.

At Karnak, the fate of Megiddo's citizens

is immortalized in a stone relief.

[Chris] The king has triumphed over his enemies

and is now holding them all literally by the hair,

and he is about to bring about their final defeat

with this thwack of his mace.

[Narrator] Never before had a battle been recorded

in such detail;

the spoils of war revealing Megiddo's wealth.

[Chris] We can see a great deal of what we believe to be

genuine historical detail

in these long hieroglyphic inscriptions,

so we get some sense of the scale of this battle.

340 individuals were captured

and over 2,000 horses were captured as well.

[Narrator] Not to mention gold and silver,

900 chariots and 20,000 sheep.

[Chris] Thutmose III then took control of the city

and subjected it to taxation.

So, you can see why perhaps for some of the people

who were living there, who stood to lose an awful lot,

this might have seemed like an apocalypse.

[Narrator] But why in all of Canaan

did the battle take place at Megiddo?

At the city itself in modern-day Israel,

Assaf Kleiman believes the answer to this question

is to be found at the highest point

of the 160-foot-tall hill on which Megiddo sits.

This elevation and 360-degree views allowed any ruler

to monitor goings-on in the Jezreel Valley below.

[Assaf] Whoever sat here at the site could control whatever

commercial activity that was going through the valley.

Also from the military perspective,

allowing them to see whatever enemy approaching to the site

from almost any direction.

[Narrator] For the Egyptians, the city of Megiddo

was a crucial fortress that controlled

the so-called Way of Horus,

a major trade route connecting Egypt and Mesopotamia.

Controlling this route was vital

for maintaining Egypt's power in the region.

♪ ♪

The Bible might not make any mention of this battle,

but what is clear is that Megiddo was a significant place

in the region that sat between empires

with fame that spread far beyond Canaan.

A place worth fighting for.

So just how desirable was Megiddo?

And could something in its violent history have inspired

the writers of Revelation?

[Narrator] Assaf is continuing his investigation

into Megiddo's violent history.

400 years after the Canaanite city was destroyed,

the city was resettled by the Israelites.

Ruins here at the site show they invested heavily

in structures like walls and gates.

[Assaf] Right now, we are looking at

the 8th century's fortification of Megiddo.

At that time Megiddo was fortified

by the kings of Israel.

They are a showcase of the importance of the city.

[Narrator] In the 8th century, Megiddo had become

one of the largest and wealthiest cities

in the region.

It had a monumental building for the Israelite rulers,

and housing for an estimated 1,500 people,

with a sophisticated water supply.

There were more than 15 stables capable of holding 450 horses

and a large exercise yard

covering more than 35,000 square feet.

An enclosed tunnel-like gate was the sole entrance,

the only break in a ring of thick stone city walls

guarded by lookout towers.

The rulers built these fortress-like walls

to a height and thickness of roughly 10 feet.

[Assaf] This kind of fortification

circled the entire mound,

channeling the enemies into a single location: the city gate.

[Narrator] Such heavily reinforced defenses

suggest Megiddo's rulers were living in fear.

[Assaf] It intended to prevent an attack by an enemy.

[Narrator] But who was the threat on the horizon?

Clues could be found some 70 miles away from Megiddo

at another ancient Israelite city named Lachish.

♪ ♪

As dawn breaks, archaeologist Yosef Garfinkel and his team

make an early start on excavations.

It's a steep climb to the top of this site,

around 130 feet above ground level.

Like Megiddo, this site has been occupied dozens of times

over thousands of years.

[Yosef Garfinkel] Lachish was a most important biblical city.

[Narrator] This year, Yosef is targeting a layer of occupation

called level five.

A time when the city was being fortified

by the Israelite kings.

[Yosef] I'm standing here near the city wall,

this gives you an impressive two-meter height

of the city wall, but originally it was at least three,

four times higher, eight or nine meter in height.

So, when enemy came here and look at Lachish

and see the plastered city wall and towers,

he would think twice whether he will try to conquer the city.

[Narrator] And yet as they dig into an 8th century layer

that Yosef calls level four,

the team unearths clues that point to conflict.

We have evidence for a battlefield,

and in it, hundreds of arrowheads.

[Archaeologist] This is a Scythian bronze arrowhead.

You see the area where the stick was attached,

and you can see the wings, and you see there the tip is bent,

which means hit may be a rock or something.

[Narrator] How did these arrowheads get here?

As they excavate the city walls even further,

they find evidence that it was a war

the residents of Lachish did not win.

[Yosef] Total destruction.

These are the stone foundations of the city wall

that has been destroyed.

It's very impressive.

[Narrator] In 701 BCE, ancient texts say Lachish was conquered

by a people known as the Assyrians.

[Yosef] The Assyrian was a very well organized military empire,

they knew how to conquer cities,

they knew how to fight in open area,

they have very well-trained soldiers,

and this was because of their well-organized army.

[Narrator] Just like Megiddo,

the city where the Bible's writers

set the tale of Armageddon,

Lachish had also been fortified by the Israelite kings.

Yet somehow these warriors breached its defenses.

To investigate how they did it, Yosef leaves the walled city

and descends the hill

where a strange heap of loose rocks stands out.

[Yosef] We have here a pile of stones.

So, they are rather small or medium sized stones.

The big question is why they have been deposited

in this location.

[Narrator] Yosef turns to ancient depictions

called the Lachish Reliefs.

These stone carvings were discovered

in the city of Nineveh and depict Assyrian forces

attacking Lachish in 701 BCE.

[Yosef] We can see here archers shooting hundreds of arrowheads

toward the city.

[Narrator] A closer look reveals an intimidating piece

of weapons technology

called a siege engine.

[Yosef] It has wheels, and it was pushed up the city wall,

inside there was a wooden beam, very heavy.

And at the edge was an iron spear,

and it will swing inside these installation, back and forth,

back and forth, and boom, boom, it hit the city wall

and destroyed the fortifications of Lachish.

[Narrator] But there was one big problem.

[Yosef] How to push the heavy siege engine,

which was one tonne or maybe more,

all the way up to the city.

The Assyrians were down there,

and they really want to conquer the city,

so they had to build a siege ramp.

[Narrator] To build this siege ramp,

men worked in constant rotation day and night

laying three million stones.

To protect the workers from enemy missiles,

the Assyrians put up large wicker shields

so they could build safely all the way to the city walls.

Finally, the Assyrians could push their mighty siege engines

up the 330-foot-long ramp to the city wall.

Then they used a heavy wooden battering ram

to break the defenses and take the city.

[Yosef] This is an operation that can be organized

only by an empire.

[Narrator] The Assyrians' great success was built upon

advanced military technology

and also the way it dealt with its captives.

[Yosef] One of the things that we know

about the Assyrian Empire that they used to deported

hundred thousands of people from various area into Mesopotamia.

They used to take prisoner of war

for building roads or military activities

or cultural activities,

and so they will have the manpower needed

for all these activities.

[Narrator] The evidence suggests that Israelite Lachish

was emptied and destroyed.

Did Megiddo suffer the same apocalyptic fate?

And could this shed light on the mystery of Armageddon?

[Narrator] At Megiddo, Assaf explores whether the Assyrians

conquered this city as they cut a swathe

across the kingdom of Israel in the 8th century BCE.

But he finds a puzzling contradiction.

Unlike the brutal conquest of Lachish,

there's no evidence of destruction

dated to the same time period.

But there are clues that something had changed.

[Assaf] In the second half of the 8th century BCE

the layout of Megiddo changed completely.

Instead of stables compounds,

this city included a new plan.

Domestic structures were built on both sides of each street.

[Narrator] This architectural transformation

could be evidence of a regime change.

[Assaf] This kind of architecture,

the inner courtyard and the surrounding rooms,

is typical to the Assyrian architectural tradition

of the first millennium BCE.

[Narrator] It seems the Assyrians

took up residence here.

But what happened to the Israelites

who lived here before them?

Did they suffer the same fate as the people of Lachish?

Forced resettlements by the Assyrians

were certainly well remembered by the authors of the Bible

as they're recorded in one of the Old Testament's

most ancient and troubling mysteries.

The Book of Genesis tells the story of Jacob and his 12 sons

who become the founding fathers of the 12 tribes of Israel.

The later Book of Kings talks of the Assyrians

deporting 10 of those tribes who then disappear

from the historical record

and become known as the Lost Tribes of Israel.

Their fate has troubled Jewish scholars for millennia.

[Assaf] The Lost Tribes of Israel

is the kind of designation for those communities

that were deported to Assyria,

to then assimilated within the society of the empire.

[Narrator] Historical texts and the Old Testament Bible story

paint a picture of cities emptied,

Israelite citizens deported,

and the kingdom destroyed.

It's an apocalyptic vision.

But is this the traumatic fate that befell Megiddo?

And if so, did these deportations inspire

the writers of Revelation to create the story of Armageddon?

Assaf moves the investigation 15 miles away from Megiddo,

to the ancient city of Hannathon.

[Assaf] So the drone going to be around 40 minutes in the air?

[Operator] Yes.

[Narrator] Previously nothing has been found here

after the city fell to the Assyrians

in the 8th century BCE.

The established view is that it was abandoned,

and the people relocated.

But the site is so large, it's hard to tell

whether the lack of evidence means there is none.

To find out, they're using state of the art technology.

We use the technology of the future for the...

For the study of the past.

Exactly.

[Operator] Yeah, it's very cool.

This is the LIDAR camera.

It needs to be precisely attached.

[Narrator] LIDAR drones use laser beams,

pulsing thousands of times per second to measure distances

and create detailed 3D maps of the landscape.

[Assaf] We will focus in the area of the fortification,

hopefully we can see like the, we can see the contour

of the fortification in a much better way,

and then we will know how, where exactly we want to dig.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

Using a drone gives you a different perspective.

[Narrator] LIDAR reveals features that can't be seen

from the ground and obscured objects

that satellite images can't show.

[Assaf] Can I see that? I don't see.

[Operator] Yeah.

[Assaf] Okay. It's showing you the site

not from the human perspective.

So, you can see things which may be hidden within vegetations,

all located in places which are not accessible.

♪ ♪

[Narrator] What new light can this technology shed

on the ancient mystery?

[Narrator] At the dig house in Hannathon,

after a few solid hours of data processing,

the 3D map reveals a hidden world.

[Assaf] Wow!

Yeah, this is quite exciting.

It's showing us many feature

that we might not have been able to see with the naked eye.

Specifically, if we look in here,

right, you see here the line?

It looks exactly like some kind of wall, man-made element.

[Assaf] I think that we should dig here.

♪ ♪

[Narrator] Assaf and his team get down to the dirty work

and unearth treasures hidden for centuries.

Right on top!

[laughs]

[Assaf] Wow!

This is fantastic, this is 7th century BC Phoenician jar.

And here we can see also like a nice specimen

of a store jar in a local style.

Very interesting.

[Narrator] Ceramics tell archaeologists a lot

about the people who lived in or passed through a site.

[Assaf] Yeah, it's an interesting piece,

you think you know these vessels,

because we've found hundreds of them by now.

And every time, like, there is a new piece that surprising you.

[Narrator] In this case, it's a surprise

to find any ceramics at all,

as these finds date to shortly after the Assyrian conquest,

a time when Hannathon was supposedly deserted.

[Assaf] The conventional wisdom was that the whole area

was abandoned after the destruction

of the kingdom of Israel for several centuries.

[Narrator] These new discoveries turn the established theory

on its head.

[Assaf] We were quite surprised when we came to Hannathon,

and we found so many sherds from this period.

We weren't ready for the high quantities of evidence

for human activity in this period.

[Narrator] Clearly some people remained, but who were they?

[Assaf] The Assyrian policy was to take whoever can be helpful

for the empire.

This is mean usually the elite group,

the upper stratum of society.

Most of the people that stayed here

after the Assyrian deportations were the common people.

[Narrator] This new discovery leads Assaf to a conclusion

about the 10 missing tribes of Israel.

[Assaf] The story of the Lost Tribe,

it sparked the imagination of so many people for generations.

But it seems that most of the Lost Tribes actually remained

in place, they never left the land of Israel.

They stayed here and rebuilt their life,

and it's such a beautiful place, it was not abandoned after all.

[Narrator] This discovery also sheds light

on the mystery of Megiddo.

Assaf hasn't yet found any evidence of destruction

there either, which could suggest there was no battle.

[Assaf] From the archaeological findings, we know that the city

was probably abandoned on the eve of the attack.

Its defenders were not in the city during the attack,

and the Assyrians probably didn't have any problem

entering the city and conquering it.

[Narrator] Many local Israelites who fled eventually returned,

assimilating into the new Assyrian culture.

Hardly the violent, world-ending scene

depicted in Revelation.

[Assaf] I don't think we can refer to the collapse

of the kingdom of Israel as an apocalyptic event.

I do think it was a very important event,

but on the other hand, life continued,

people rebuilt their life.

[Narrator] So how did a city that survived

the Assyrian conquest end up as the setting

for the battle at the end of times?

During his most recent excavation at Megiddo,

Assaf and his team set out to explore

the long-term consequences of this invasion for the city.

[Assaf] Our only hope was to find in the excavations

remains of the Assyrian city,

but the excavation provides us also with a big surprise.

[Narrator] What they discovered could finally lead

to a breakthrough in the quest to understand

the mystery of Armageddon.

[Narrator] At Megiddo, Assaf examines some puzzling finds

from his most recent excavation.

We found high quantities of very strange sherds

with very crude appearance and straw tempered.

This is the integration of straw

into the production of these kind of vessels.

We've never seen these kind of vessels before.

[Narrator] Nearly 100 pieces of crude pottery were pulled

from the ground, much of it dating to the 7th century BCE.

[Assaf] They were undecorated and had a very bulky appearance,

serving vessels, cooking vessels, storage vessels.

[Narrator] Microscopic analysis revealed the vessels

were neither Israelite nor Assyrian.

[Assaf] All of them were produced in Egypt

and were brought all the way here to Megiddo.

[Narrator] Why were such huge quantities of pottery

imported from Egypt in the late 7th century BCE

and used here at Megiddo?

♪ ♪

At Tel Aviv University,

archaeologist Israel Finkelstein led the dig

where the Egyptian pottery sherds were unearthed.

He believes they are connected to one very specific date.

[Israel Finkelstein] When people come to visit me at Megiddo

in my excavations, I always tell them the most important moment

in the history of Megiddo is that moment in 609 BC.

[Narrator] Around 100 years after the conquest of Megiddo,

the Assyrian Empire began to collapse.

It felt like an era of opportunity

for the Jewish people who were at the time

led by a ruler called Josiah.

He claimed to be the descendent of the legendary King David

and wanted to take back lands lost to the invaders.

[Israel] In the Biblical text, he's the ultimate good king,

the most righteous king in the lineage of David.

[Narrator] But another powerful force saw an opportunity

to control the region: the Egyptians.

In 609 BCE, Josiah faced a new threat

as Egyptian forces under a pharaoh named Necho II

attempted to cross his lands.

In a key moment of the Bible,

Josiah decided to confront them at Megiddo,

where it's said an Egyptian arrow

mortally wounded the legendary king.

Many archaeologists believe the death of Josiah really happened

and could explain the Egyptian pottery sherds at Megiddo.

They're low grade and in vast quantities,

because they were supplying the Egyptian army stationed there.

So, how might Josiah's death be connected

to the idea of Armageddon?

Israel believes answers lie in the prophecy of a messiah

in the Book of Revelation.

[Israel] The forces of God are going to prevail,

and then a redeemer from the lineage of David

will come after the battle to save us all.

[Narrator] Josiah was the descendant

of Israel's greatest king, David.

And his descendant was, according to the Bible, Jesus.

[Israel] It is connected to the story of Josiah at Megiddo,

because Josiah is described

as the most righteous Davidite that lived.

So, the most righteous king of the Davidic line

died at Megiddo, and the next Davidic redeemer

will come back after the battle at Megiddo.

[Narrator] The great redeemer of the prophecy of Revelation

is the Messiah of the New Testament, Jesus Christ,

who would establish God's kingdom on Earth

with his victory at Megiddo.

This season's pioneering excavations have unearthed

new discoveries...

[beeping]

...revealing the history of cities riven by conflict...

[Assaf] This is something exceptional,

this is the oldest siege ramp ever found in archaeology.

[Narrator] ...and uncovering evidence

of terrifying devastation.

[Igor] This is ash, wood that was burnt in high temperature,

clear evidence, destruction of Hazor,

the burning of the city by fire.

[Narrator] Inspired by this seemingly endless warfare

and perhaps the death of a famous king at Megiddo,

the writers of Revelation created a prophecy,

looking forward to a time when it is said

wrongs will be righted,

and when a descendant of David and Josiah will come again

to restore the land to his people on Earth.

[Assaf] It's a profound wish for a more optimistic future

in which there are perhaps no war anymore,

no more evil, just peace.