Archaeologists with Israel Antiquities Authority and Tel Aviv University have discovered a large moat within Old Jerusalem.

This confirms the Biblical record that the city was divided into two distinct areas. This included a residential/commercial area located in the lower southern half of the city and an acropolis located on higher ground in the northern half, the Daily Mail reports.

Many of the larger cities in Ancient Greece had an acropolis, which was located on the highest ground in the city. It typically had additional fortifications and usually housed the city palaces/government and other important structures.

It appears that Jerusalem had a similar walled acropolis, which was referred to as the ophel in 2 Chronicles 27:3; 33:14 and Nehemiah 3:26; 11:21.

Likewise, it was located on the higher ground in the northern half of Jerusalem, which included the Temple Mount, where the Jewish Temple was built under King Solomon.

Within this upper northern half of the city was another area called the millo. Cited in 2 Samuel 5:9, it was here that King Solomon built a massive palace (1 Kings 9:15, 24), which was later referred to as the House of Millo in 2 Kings 12:20.

Archaeologists working in Old Jerusalem believe they have found evidence of a large defensive structure which provided additional fortifications for Jerusalem’s acropolis, containing the ophel and millo.

It involves a massive moat, 30 feet (ca. 9 m) deep and 100 feet (ca. 30 m) high and 230 feet (ca. 70 m) long, that separated the residential area of the city from the acropolis in the northern part of the city.

‘It created a clear buffer between the residential city in the south and the upper city in the north,’ said Dr. Yiftah Shalev who along with Professor Yuval Gadot from Tel Aviv University helped excavate the moat.

The banks of the moat were almost vertical making it impossible to climb and clearly created a dividing line between the two sections of the city.

The moat was originally discovered in the 1960s but was believed at that time to be a natural ravine.

However, recent excavations revealed that it was man made and intended as a defensive barrier for the acropolis, and as such would have been a major engineering achievement.

It’s uncertain when the moat was originally created, but there is evidence it was in use almost 3,000 years ago during the reign of King Josiah (640 BC to 609 BC), when he tried to break free from the Assyrian Empire.