4. The fortress of Masada was the site of a massacre and a mass suicide
The Sicarii were a sect of Jewish Zealots who opposed both Roman rule and the established Jewish government, making them hostile to both sides during the Great Jewish Revolt in 66 CE. The Sicarii seized the Roman fortress at Masada, which had been built as a mountain bastion by Herod the Great and was garrisoned by Roman troops at the outset of the revolt. The Sicarii massacred the garrison to a man, though the number of troops who fell is unknown. The Sicarii then used the fortress as a base for raiding, and as the Roman-Jewish war went on Jewish refugees fleeing the Romans took sanctuary within its walls. In 72 CE the fortress contained about 960 people when it was besieged by Romans.
After a siege of about three months, during which siege works were built for the Romans by Jewish prisoners of war, the Romans were prepared to launch a final assault on the fortress. When they entered the city through the use of a siege ramp built by the Jewish slaves, the Romans discovered that the refugees within had been slaughtered by the Sicarii, who then killed each other after setting most of the buildings within the fortifications afire. Josephus reported that the killings had been done through the drawing of lots in order to circumvent the Jewish proscription against suicide, and that only the last survivor had actually killed himself, the rest had been homicides. Recent archaeological studies have indicated that the account of Josephus was inaccurate and incomplete, and the mass killings at Masada are questioned by modern scholars.