Prehistory In 1989, remains of a
hunter-gatherer site were found under the water at the southern end. Remains of mud huts were found in
Ohalo. Nahal Ein Gev, located about east of the lake, contains a village from the late
Natufian period. The site is considered one of the first permanent human settlements in the world from a time predating the
Neolithic Revolution.
Early Iron Age According to Sugimoto (2015), the Iron Age IB (1150–1000 BCE) cities in the northeastern region of the Sea of Galilee likely reflect the activities of the Kingdom of
Geshur, mentioned in the Bible. Also, the later Iron Age IIA–B cities here are linked with the southern expansion of the
Aram-Damascus kingdom. Among these Galilean cities are Tel Dover, Tel 'En Gev, Tel Hadar, Tel Bethsaida, and Tel Kinrot.
Hellenistic and Roman periods The Sea of Galilee lies on the ancient
Via Maris, which linked
Egypt with the northern empires. The
Greeks,
Hasmoneans, and
Romans founded flourishing towns and settlements on the lake including
Hippos and
Tiberias. Contemporary Roman–Jewish historian
Flavius Josephus was so impressed by the area that he wrote, "One may call this place the ambition of Nature"; he also reports a thriving fishing industry at this time, with 230 boats regularly working in the lake. Archaeologists discovered one such boat, nicknamed the
Jesus Boat, in 1986. , in the Sea of Galilee, by
Raphael In the New Testament, much of the
ministry of Jesus occurs on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. In those days, there was a continuous ribbon development of settlements and villages around the lake and plenty of trade and ferrying by boat. The
Synoptic Gospels of
Mark 1:14–20),
Matthew 4:18–22), and
Luke 5:1–11) describe how Jesus recruited four of his
apostles from the shores of the Kinneret: the fishermen
Simon and his brother
Andrew and the brothers
John and
James. One of Jesus' famous teaching episodes, the
Sermon on the Mount, is supposed to have been given on a hill overlooking the Kinneret. Many of his miracles are also said to have occurred here including
his walking on water,
calming the storm, the disciples and the
miraculous catch of fish, and his
feeding five thousand people (in
Tabgha). In John's Gospel the sea provides the setting for Jesus' third
post-resurrection appearance to his disciples (
John 21). In 135 CE,
Bar Kokhba's revolt was put down which was part of the
Jewish–Roman wars. The Romans responded by banning all Jews from
Jerusalem. The center of Jewish culture and learning shifted to the region of Galilee and the Kinneret, particularly Tiberias. It was in this region that the
Jerusalem Talmud was compiled.
Middle Ages The Sea of Galilee's importance declined when the
Byzantine Empire lost control, and the area came under the control of the
Umayyad Caliphate and subsequent Islamic empires. The palace of
Minya was built by the lake during the reign of
al-Walid I (705–715 CE). Apart from Tiberias, the major towns and cities in the area were gradually abandoned. In 1187, Sultan
Saladin defeated the armies of the
Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem at the
Battle of Hattin, largely because he was able to cut the Crusaders off from the valuable fresh water of the Sea of Galilee. The lake had little importance within the early
Ottoman Empire. Tiberias did see a significant revival of its Jewish community in the 16th century but had gradually declined until the city was
destroyed in 1660. In the early 18th century, Tiberias was rebuilt by
Daher al-Umar, becoming the center of his rule over Galilee, and seeing also a revival of its Jewish community.
Early 20th century In 1908, Jewish pioneers established the
Kinneret Farm at the same time as and next to Moshavat Kinneret in the immediate vicinity of the lake. The farm trained Jewish immigrants in modern farming. One group of youth from the training farm established
Kvutzat
Degania in 1909–1910, popularly considered as the first
kibbutz, another group founded
Kvutzat Kinneret in 1913, and yet another the first proper kibbutz,
Ein Harod, in 1921, the same year when the first
moshav,
Nahalal, was established by a group trained at the farm. The Jewish settlements around Kinneret Farm are considered the cradle of the kibbutz culture of early
Zionism; Kvutzat Kinneret is the birthplace of
Naomi Shemer, buried at the Kinneret Cemetery next to
Rachel—two prominent national poets. In 1917, the British defeated Ottoman Turkish forces and took control of
Palestine, while France took control of Syria. In the carve-up of the Ottoman territories between Britain and France, it was agreed that Britain would retain control of Palestine while France would control Syria. This required the allies to fix the border between the
Mandatory Palestine and the
French Mandate of Syria. The boundary was defined in broad terms by the
Franco-British Boundary Agreement of December 1920, which drew it across the middle of the lake. However, the commission established by the 1920 treaty redrew the boundary. The High Commissioner of Palestine,
Herbert Samuel, had sought full control of the Sea of Galilee. The negotiations led to the inclusion into the Palestine territory of the whole Sea of Galilee, both sides of the
River Jordan,
Lake Hula, Dan spring, and part of the
Yarmouk. The final border approved in 1923 followed a 10-meter wide strip along the lake's northeastern shore, cutting Mandatory Syria (
State of Damascus) off from the lake. Geographer Gideon Biger suggests that the three factors determining the position of these boundaries were (1) "biblical-historical", (2) Zionist pressure to include as many water resources as possible in Mandatory Palestine, and (3) the human and physical landscape. The British and French Agreement provided that existing rights over the use of the waters of the River Jordan by the inhabitants of Syria would be maintained; the government of Syria would have the right to erect a new pier at
Semakh on Lake Tiberias or jointly use the existing pier; persons or goods passing between the landing-stage on the Lake of Tiberias and Semakh would not be subject to customs regulations, and the Syrian government would have access to the said landing-stage; the inhabitants of Syria and Lebanon would have the same fishing and navigation rights on Lakes Huleh, Tiberias and River Jordan, while the government of Palestine would be responsible for policing of lakes.
State of Israel On 15 May 1948, Syria invaded the recently founded state of Israel, capturing territory along the Sea of Galilee. Under the 1949
armistice agreement between Israel and Syria, Syria occupied the northeast shoreline of the Sea of Galilee. The agreement stated that the armistice line was "not to be interpreted as having any relation whatsoever to ultimate territorial arrangements." Syria remained in possession of the lake's northeast shoreline until the 1967
Arab-Israeli war. In the 1950s, Israel formulated a plan to link the Kinneret with the rest of the country's water infrastructure via the
National Water Carrier, in order to supply the water demand of the growing country. The carrier was completed in 1964. The Israeli plan, which the
Arab League opposed while endorsing its own
plan to divert the headwaters of the Jordan River, sparked political and sometimes even armed
confrontations over the Jordan basin. In October 2025, Israel began pumping desalinated water into the Sea of Galilee, in a world first. ==Geology==