What is the battle of Masada?
Masada was originally built as a citadel/palace atop a huge mesa near the Dead Sea. In 72 CE, the Romans had defeated a Jewish uprising against their rule, and had taken Jeruseluem. One group of resistance fighters, or zealots, had retreated to Masada to avoid capture or death. The zealots had good reason to believe they could hold out indefinitely. The cliffs were hundreds of feet high; there were cisterns of water and they had food to last a prolonged seige. Given the approaches to the top, a handful of men could literally hold off an army. After an initial attempt to take the fortress, the Romans settled down for a siege. They were not content to just wait out the surrounded jews however. They actually built a rampart up along one cliff wall, making their own pathway up against the walls of the fortress. The Romans were then able to advance a battering ram up and eventually breached the wall. With the ramp, the Romans had been able to use missile fire to keep the jews from effective
