King David's Palace was recovered by archaeologists in the Judean Shepelah, according to Science Daily. It was one of two royal buildings discovered last year, part of a fortified city in Judah dating back to the time of King David and identified with the biblical city of Shaarayim.
The find, which included royal storerooms, was made in a joint effort by Hebrew University and the Israel Antiquities Authority at Khirbet Qeiyafa. They are the two largest buildings known to exist in the tenth century under the Kingdom of Judah.
The excavation was conducted over the course of seven years.
"Khirbet Qeiyafa is the best example exposed to date of a fortified city from the time of King David," Yossi Garfinkel, an archaeologist at Hebrew University, said.
Archaeologists traced the construction of the site to the time period using carbon dating.
The southern part of the palace was revealed to be the top of the city. A wall encloses the palace, including an entrance where one would descend to the southern gate of the city, opposite the Valley of Elah.
Installations were found in rooms around the palace's perimeter. They included evidence of a metal industry, special pottery vessels and fragments of alabaster vessels imported from Egypt.
The palace is located in the center of the site and in a position to control all of the houses lower in the city. It has a great view of the rest of the city, including the Mediterranean Sea and the Hebron Mountains, as well as Jerusalem.
"The time of David was the first time that a large portion of this area was united by one monarch," Garfinkel said. It was not a peaceful era."
The palace was largely destroyed in a fire 1,400 years later when a fortified farmhouse was built there in the Byzantine period.
Israel Finkelstein, an archaeologist at Tel Aviv University, agreed that Khirbet Qeiyafa is an "elaborate" and "well-fortified" tenth century B.C. site, but said that it's possible that the site could have been built by Philistines, Canaanites or other people in the area.
Researchers are divided over whether biblical stories can be verified by physical remains.
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