Mary's Well

[1] Found just below the Greek Orthodox Church of St Gabriel in modern-day Nazareth, dedicated to the Annunciation, the well was until recently fed by an aqueduct connected to a spring, and served for centuries as a local watering hole for the Palestinian villagers.

The earliest written source[dubious – discuss] mentioning to a well or spring being the site of the Annunciation comes from the Protoevangelium of James, a non-canonical gospel dating to the 2nd century.

Excavations by Yardenna Alexandre and Butrus Hanna of the Israel Antiquities Authority in 1997-98, sponsored by the Nazareth Municipality and the Government Tourist Corporation, discovered a series of underground water systems and suggested that the site today known as Mary's Well served as Nazareth's main water supply from as early as Byzantine times.

[11][12] William Rae Wilson describes "a well of the Virgin, which supplied the inhabitants of Nazareth with water" in his book, Travels in Egypt and the Holy Land (1824).

[ ] It suggested a strange current of ideas to overhear pert damsels using the name of Miriam (Mary), in jest and laughter at the fountain of Nazareth"[15]

Mary's Well in 1839, by David Roberts , from The Holy Land, Syria, Idumea, Arabia, Egypt, and Nubia
A structure of white stone containing an arch is seen in a plaza of similar stone. Two short trees are shown in the foreground.
Mary's Well in Nazareth, 2005.
Painting imagining how the well might have looked in the 1st century AD ( Vasily Dmitrievich Polenov ).
Titus Tobler 's 1868 map of Nazareth: top right is the "Greek Church" (spring underneath); at bottom-center is the "Latin monastery" (today surrounding the rebuilt Basilica of the Annunciation )
Well of St. Mary, by Felix Bonfils , ca 1880
Women at Fountain of the Virgin, Nazareth, 1891 [ 14 ]
Postcard of Mary's Well, by Karimeh Abbud , ca 1925.