King Herod the Great most likely died in 4 BCE after a long, agonizing illness that modern researchers think involved chronic kidney disease complicated by a severe genital infection, rather than by execution or in battle. Ancient historian Josephus describes his final days as marked by intense pain, putrefying disease, and even a failed suicide attempt shortly before he finally succumbed.

Quick Scoop

  • Time and place: Herod the Great died in Jericho around 4 BCE, near the end of a troubled, increasingly paranoid reign over Judea.
  • Natural causes, not murder: Classical sources and modern scholarship agree he died of natural causes after a prolonged illness, not by assassination or formal execution.
  • Brutal symptoms: Josephus reports horrifying symptoms—severe pain, ulceration, intestinal and respiratory problems, intense itching, and gangrenous decay—that made his last days infamous in later tradition.

What likely killed him?

Modern doctors have re‑examined Josephus’s symptom list and tried to match it with known diseases. The leading medical reconstruction is:

  • Chronic kidney disease: Many of his symptoms (swelling, breathing problems, systemic decline) fit long‑standing kidney failure.
  • Fournier’s gangrene (genital infection): The described genital gangrene and “putrefying” condition align with a rare, aggressive infection now called Fournier’s gangrene, thought to have developed on top of his kidney disease.

Other specialists have suggested related scenarios, such as parasitic infection (schistosomiasis) leading to chronic renal failure and genital destruction, all consistent with a slow, agonizing deterioration rather than a single sudden event.

How did his final days unfold?

Josephus paints a dramatic picture of a king mentally and physically collapsing under his illness and political fears.

  • Despair and a failed suicide: In extreme pain, Herod reportedly tried to stab himself but was stopped by a relative, surviving only briefly afterward.
  • A grim last order: Fearing no one would mourn him, he ordered leading men of Judea gathered in a hippodrome with instructions that they be killed upon his death so that there would be nationwide weeping; his relatives refused to carry this out once he died.

He altered his will multiple times in these final months, executed his son Antipater, and then died only a few days later, bringing his turbulent reign to an end.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.