A large building with rooms carved into the rock and mysterious V-shaped marks on the floor was found in Jerusalem. Photo

Archaeologists have discovered a unique structure on the eastern slope of the city of Jerusalem in a national park. It has eight rooms carved into the rock, containing an altar, an obelisk (masseba), and an oil and wine press. They also found mysterious V-shaped marks on the floor.

According to archaeologists, this building is the only one of its kind in Jerusalem. It was abandoned in the eighth century BC during a religious reform, the Times Of Israel reports.

Researchers believe that the ancient multi-room building, with an area of 220 square meters, was probably used for rituals and worship almost 3000 years ago.

The City of David, an archaeological park adjacent to Jerusalem's Old City in the Silwan neighborhood, is believed by most scholars to contain part of Jerusalem's ancient major structures from the Bronze and Iron Ages and is an important site for biblical archaeology.

The building was first excavated in 2010, although part of the structure was discovered by British researcher Montague Parker in 1909, who excavated the site for several seasons in search of the Ark of God. Archaeologists discovered that the building was practically preserved in place, which is rare for excavations from the time of the First Temple: "It was closed... no one knew about it, no one touched it for many years," said Eli Shukron, the head of the excavations.

Each room in the building had a different purpose. In addition to the rooms used for oil and wine production, one room contained a carved installation with a drainage channel that was probably used as an altar, while another room contained mysterious V-shaped carvings engraved on the floor. According to Eli Shukron, they could have served as the basis for a tripod, a three-legged installation used for ritualistic acts.

According to ArkeoNews, a small cave carved into the edge of the structure revealed a cache of eighth-century BCE objects. These items included pots for cooking, jugs with fragments of Hebrew inscriptions, weights for looms, scarabs, stamped seals with decorative motifs, and grinding stones for grinding grain.

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