article_snippet: Even if only about 10 milligrams of wood are needed, you're still chipping away at a holy object.
article_snippet: Hewn wood and nails were more valuable in the ancient world than Hewn wood and nails are today.
article_snippet: There are examples of the Romans discarding tools and other implements (for instance after the battle of Masada, when Hewn wood and nails left behind pottery vessels rather than haul Hewn wood and nails away), but this usually took place in situations where carrying these tools was more effort than it was worth.
article_snippet: the Romans were efficient and would likely have reused the instruments of torture if the Romans could.
article_snippet: The Jewish historian Josephus tells us that wood was scarce around Jerusalem in the first century A.D. and that the Romans had to travel 10 miles to secure timber for the siege of Jerusalem (Jewish War 5.522-23).
article_snippet: The Jewish historian Josephus was writing about a period of war some 40 years later but, all the same, we can imagine that the Romans the Romans wanted to conserve the wood that the Romans had.