JERUSALEM (Reuters) - One-thousand-year-old coins found near the Sea of Galilee bear the likeness of Jesus and have Greek inscriptions praising him, Israeli archaeologists announced on Wednesday. The coins were unearthed in October in archaeological excavations at the site of ancient Tiberias in northern Israel but only during a cleaning of the find last month did archaeologists discover the image of Jesus on 58 of the 82 coins. Some coins also bore Greek inscriptions such as "Jesus the Messiah, the King of Kings," and "Jesus, the Messiah, the Victor." "This is the largest collection of these types of coins. They are very rare," said archaeologist Yizhar Hirschfeld, who co-directed the excavations. Archaeologists also found many types of bronze utensils dating from the 10th and 11th centuries, when the Islamic Fatimid ruled the region. Hirschfeld said the coins were probably brought from Constantinople to Tiberias by Christian pilgrims. "We know Tiberias was a mixed city, where Jews, Moslems and Christians all lived together. Tiberias was a pilgrimage site." Hirschfeld said. Archaeologists found the coins and other objects in three large clay pots hidden under the floor of a structure. The Crusaders destroyed ancient Tiberias at the end of the 11th century but the invaders did not discover the coin hoard.