Location Golan Heights Basin countries Israel | Type crater lake (maar) Surface elevation 940 m | |
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Primary inflows | ||
Lake Ram (Arabic: بحيرة مسعدة, "Buhāir Mas'ade", lit. Lake of Mas'ade; Hebrew: בריכת רם, "Brekhat Ram") is a crater lake (maar) in the northeastern Golan Heights, near Mount Hermon. The sources of the lake are rain water and an underground spring. The water does not leave the lake to any other body of water. The lake is traditionally known in Hebrew as "Brekhat Ram" (also written Berekhat Ram), meaning high pool. It is also called Birket Ram, using the Arabic word for pond. The area is associated with the Druze community.
Contents
Map of Birkat Ram
Geology
Most geologists believe that the lake formed inside the crater of an extinct volcano.
Archaeology
The site has been excavated for evidence of human activity during its history. Research on lacustrine sediments at the site concluded that the area has been heavily settled four times over history, first during the early Bronze Age, secondly during the "Hellenistic–Roman–Byzantine periods", thirdly during the period of medieval Crusader occupation, and finally in modern times. Between these periods the area became overgrown as local woodland regenerated, evidencing phases of low human occupation.
During excavations evidence was discovered of Palaeolithic human and hominid activity. Most notably, excavation led to the discovery of the Venus of Berekhat Ram, a pebble allegedly worked by Homo erectus. The artefact has been claimed to be the oldest known example of representational art in the world.
Legends
According to The Talmud, Sanhedrin 108a, Brekhat Ram is one of three underground springs, along with Hamat Gader in the southeastern Golan Heights and Hamat Tiberias, that opened up in the Flood of Noah and didn't close up again after the flood.
In a local Druze legend the lake is the "eye" of the "sheikh's wife", the name for a hill nearby. Mount Hermon (in Arabic Jabal al-Shaykh, "Mountain of the Sheikh"), referred to as the sheikh himself, is supposed to have been separated from the "wife", whereupon her eye filled with tears.