The settlement of Qumran is located on the northwestern shore of the Dead Sea. While the settlement had been known to archaeologists since 1851, interest in the site was sparked when the Qumran Scrolls or Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in 1947. The inhabitants of Qumran were responsible for the production of the scrolls.
The earliest pottery evidence from Qumran indicates that the site was inhabited from the 8th to the 6th centuries B.C.E. when it was violently destroyed probably as a result of the fall of Judah to Babylon. In the 2nd century B.C.E. a new group, the Essenes, settled the site. The group experienced rapid growth although the number of inhabitants probably never reached more than 200. The water supply was vastly improved when a dam was built to direct winter flash floods into an aqueduct which then fed the Qumran water system. Following an earthquake in the 1st century B.C.E. the city was abandoned for a generation and then resettled. The Romans occupied the site when they were crushing the first Jewish rebellion against Rome (66-74 C.E.), especially during the siege of Masada. During the second Jewish rebellion against Rome (132-135 C.E.), elements of the Jewish resistance used the site but added no new structures.
A number of caves are in the hills around Qumran. Forty of those caves contained materials indicating that the caves were used and Caves 1, 4, and 11 have provided hundreds of biblical and non-biblical texts. Qumran has no buildings that look like they were used for living quarters so some suspect that inhabitants may have lived in surrounding caves as well as pitched tents within the settlement.
Pictures by Robert C. Dunston