Herodian

Herodian is a mountain fortress built by the king Herod about 2000 years ago. He actually dumped tons and tons of dirt on the top of an existing mountain to make it taller and flat on the top. Towers were built on the top, and other structures such as a bath house and sauna.
The inside of the mountain was hollowed out to create storage areas.

It is like a rabbit's warren inside, with all kinds of twisting pathways and cavern-like rooms.

Huge cisterns were dug, to store water which was brought from many miles away, as there is no natural water source nearby.
Here is a view of one of them. A servant would have come down the steps with a pitcher, and dipped it in to the water.

Herod was fond of entertaining the Roman officers who were in Israel at that time. He made a sauna for them, and even
created a swimming pool. Here is a picture of what remains of the pool. You can still see where a fountain would have been
in the middle. Imagine the feats of engineering it must have taken to bring enough water from afar to fill this large of a pool!