Events

Report from Jerusalem #38, 1st January 2012

Elephants Out –  Homo Sapiens In

It is being claimed that the disappearance of elephants from the Levant led to the emergence of Homo Sapiens replacing the more primitive Homo Erectus some 400,000 years ago. The claim is based on work by researchers from Tel Aviv University, including archaeologists and anthropologists, at the Qesem Cave at Gesher Bnot Ya’akov, a ford north of the Sea of Galilee, where the teeth of the Levantine Acheulo-Yabrudian species of Homo Sapiens were found recently.

The theory is that Homo Erectus lived in association with the local elephants, using them as sources of meat and fat, and when the large creatures died out a new breed of humans evolved to be able to hunt faster and smaller animals and sustain their necessary level of consumable fats. This, said the scientists from Tel Aviv University, “was the evolutionary drive behind the emergence in the Middle Pleistocene Era of the lighter, more agile, cognitively capable hominin”. The researchers were not able to say whether the new species evolved in Africa and migrated to the Levant, or whether the remains found at the Qesem Cave were those of a local species.

Carvings in Floor of Silwan Dwelling, Jerusalem

In the remains of a house dated to the late Iron Age, three V-shaped carvings were found cut into the limestone bedrock floor. The arms of each V are about 40cm long and 5cm deep and the point of the V is accentuated by a slight widening into a miniature triangle. The excavator, Prof. Ronny Reich of Haifa University, thought the signs were unique but later discovered that similar carvings had been recorded in another nearby house during the abortive Parker Mission of a century ago. As the markings were enigmatic, the excavators put the details on Facebook to ask for suggestions and were overwhelmed by the response, but out of thousands of replies no credible ideas were received. It appears that the floor cuts may have been used to secure the feet of a piece of weaving apparatus. However, as the room was previously filled with rubble to act as a support for a defensive wall believed to have been constructed in the time of King Jehoash (842-802 BCE), the cuts may have served as a base for a framework used to reinforce the rubble fill.

Mughrabi Bridge to Temple Mount, Again

The City Engineer continues to insist that the present temporary bridge is unsafe and a potential fire-risk, but sharp protests from the Waqf and other Islamic bodies, objecting to any change to the “status quo”, have made it virtually impossible to replace it without causing anti-Israel violence throughout the Arab world. The solution has been to treat the timber structure with a fire-retardant substance and to have a fire-truck on permanent standby nearby.

Byzantine Bath-House in Judaean Hills

The Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) revealed that an ancient bath-house of c.400 CE has been uncovered at Moshav Tarum, about 25 km west of Jerusalem, near Beit Shemesh. It was found during work on a new water supply line to Jerusalem. The main room is cruciform in plan and heated by a fine hypocaust floor with about thirty squat stone pillars, and fed by a heating channel from a nearby boiler house. The find was open for viewing for a few days and it is not clear if plans will be made for permanent access.

Archaeological Finds Vandalised in the Afula Area

Several archaeological sites in the vicinity of Afula, in the Lower Galilee, have been vandalised and precious remains destroyed. At Khirbet Amudim the contents of a locked steel container were destroyed, including First-Temple pottery and later artefacts. This has set back the work of several rescue digs in the area that were being conducted by the IAA in advance of new road building. The culprits appear to be ultra-orthodox elements that roam the archaeological sites and object to the occasional but necessary moving of ancient graves and the removal of bones for examination and respectful reburial. Police are investigating and plan to bring charges.

Second Temple Token a Seal of Purity

Eli Shukron of the IAA continues to make important discoveries in the area of the channel that leads to the base of Robinson’s Arch by the Western Wall in Jerusalem. The latest find to be announced is a small button-sized (1 cm) clay seal that came up in sifting the dirt from the north side of the Siloam Pool, where 30 coins have already been recovered. The seal or token is inscribed with the Aramaic formula “d-k-a  l-H” which is translated as “Pure to God”. The token is dated to the late Second Temple period, perhaps fifty years before the destruction of 70 CE. The use of similar seals or tokens is recorded in the Mishnah, where it describes how a person wishing to purchase a libation would pay one official, receive a token from him and pass it on to another official who would hand him the appropriate drink offering (Shekalim 5:4). The find was hailed by Mrs. Limor Livnat, the Israeli Minister of Culture and Sport, as showing the connection of the Jewish People to Jerusalem and the Temple Mount.

Stop Press, ‘Geniza’ Find in Afghanistan

Rumours are surfacing of the discovery of a cache of early medieval Jewish documents in Arabic, Judeo-Arabic and early Persian at Samangan Province on the Silk Road. The 150 fragments, which seem to be a kind of ‘geniza’ of unwanted scrolls, are in the hands of dealers, and Jewish institutions are hoping to purchase them, but details are still very sketchy.

Stephen Gabriel Rosenberg

W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem


Report from Jerusalem #37, 6th December 2011

Arabic Inscription of the Crusader Period

An inscription in Arabic bearing the name of the Crusader ruler Frederick II and dated 1229 was recently discovered on a grey marble slab on the wall of a building in Tel Aviv, probably fixed there many years ago. According to Prof. Moshe Sharon of the Hebrew University who deciphered it, this was the only Crusader inscription ever found in Arabic and probably came from the citadel that Frederick built in Jaffa, and on which he describes himself as King of Jerusalem. He hailed from Sicily and was the leader of the Sixth Crusade of 1228-1229. It is known that he was fluent in Arabic, his court was attended by many Muslim scholars and ambassadors and for that he was excommunicated by Pope Gregory IX. He was friendly with the Egyptian Sultan and won from him an armistice that made him King of Jerusalem without a fight. The titles of the inscription are readable in the Arabic but the remaining text has not survived. It is not yet clear where and when the slab will be exhibited to the public.

Palestine Authority (PA) Recognised by UNESCO: Impact on Archaeology

As a result of the recognition of the PA as a member state by UNESCO on October 31st, the PA is applying to UNESCO for grants to cover repair work to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, and in particular for the sum of $12 million for essential repairs to the roof. The historic building of the Byzantine period is in urgent need of repairs which have not been carried out for many years by the three Christian denominations that administer it.

On another tack, the PA, now a member of UNESCO, has threatened to sue Israel for stealing and destroying Arab and Muslim antiquities. The renovation of the Mughrabi Bridge in Jerusalem is on hold until the PA’s intentions are clarified and (it is to be hoped), resolved.

Date Palm Grown from Seed Discovered at Masada

A seed uncovered in the 1960s at Masada, later planted in a secret location by scientists, has now sprouted and grown to an eight-foot high date palm. It has recently been replanted at Kibbutz Ketura in Arava, southern Israel. From a rare species it is hoped it will henceforth produce fruit for food and medicinal purposes.

When the sapling was 15 months old the original seed was shown by C.14 investigation at the University of Zurich to be from the period of the Roman siege of Masada in 73 CE. This species of palm was identified with Judaea and depicted on Roman coins as a symbol of the defeat of the Great Rebellion of 66-70 CE.

Coins Found Below Base of Outer Temple Wall

Further excavations by Eli Shukron of the IAA and Prof. Ronnie Reich of Haifa University inside the drainage channel at the foot of Robinson’s Arch have uncovered part of the base of the western Herodian retaining wall to the Jerusalem Temple and exposed coins that are dated to the Roman Governor Valerius Gratus of 15-16 CE. As this is some twenty years after the death of Herod the Great, it demonstrates that this part of the wall was built after his death, according to Prof. Reich.

The coins were found in a mikveh (ritual bath) that was part of a residential area that had been destroyed to make way for the massive retaining wall to be founded on bedrock. The coins indicate that this western part of the wall was probably built later than the one on the eastern and southern sides and was planned by Herod but only constructed by his grandson Herod Antipas.

This discovery caused a minor sensation among scholars in the press, but it has always been known that Herod, who started the Temple reconstruction in 22 BCE, never saw it completed at his death in 4 BCE. The work was not totally finished until about 60 CE and then, tragically, the completed Temple stood for only ten years before it was destroyed by the Romans.

The Gospel Trail North of Lake Kinneret

Last week the  Minister of Tourism Stas Misezhnikov officially opened the Gospel Trail along the north side of the Lake of Kinneret in the Galilee, which will run for 63 kms (39 miles) from north of Tiberias on the west side of the lake eventually to Kursi on the opposite east bank. The Trail will pass through most of the important Christian sites along the banks, such as Magdala, Tabgha, Capernaum and Bethsaida. Prepared by the Ministry of Tourism and the Jewish National Fund, the Trail consists of comfortable stone footpaths, sun and rain shelters and parking areas. The plan is to include hostels and hotels for the many Christian pilgrims that are expected to visit the area, which is sacred to the memory of Jesus, who spent much time in the fishing villages along the lake after he was evicted from Nazareth.

Archaeological excavations along the route have been conducted over many years by the Franciscan Fathers of Capernaum and the IAA and a joint application was made over the last few years to UNESCO to have the area designated as a site of Historic Interest.  The application has so far not succeeded as the management of the Trail has not yet been fully organized between the many different ownerships involved.

Stephen Gabriel Rosenberg

W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem

 

Report from Jerusalem #36, 6th November 2011

Dead Sea Scrolls On-Line

As mentioned previously, the Scrolls were to be brought on line in a joint project organized by the Israel Museum and Google, and five of the most complete scrolls went on-line at the end of September.  By 5th October, there had been over a million viewers from 213 countries, speaking 236 different languages, including all the Arab countries neighbouring Israel, except for Syria.  Nearly half-a-million viewers originated from the US. The site is named http://dss.collections.imj.org.il, and the high resolution photographs are considered to show more detail than can be seen by the naked eye.  Chief among the scrolls available is the great Isaiah scroll, which is shown in original and translated into English line-by-line, and can be searched by specific phrases and verses in that language. A Chinese translation is in preparation as Biblical studies are very popular in China.

Ancient Assembly-Line at Qesem Cave

In early October, archaeologists Prof. Avi Gopher, Dr. Ron Barkai and Dr. Ron Shimelmitz, of Tel Aviv University, announced that they had uncovered thousands of cutting blades in the Qesem Caves near Tel Aviv, which they date to the lower Paleolithic age of 400,000 to 200,000 BCE.  Such blades had previously been associated with the emergence of homo sapiens about 35,000 years ago, but it now appears that they were produced at a much earlier date and in great numbers where the conditions were favourable.    The blades were produced in the cave on a kind of production line arranged for selection of  the raw material, choice of cutting implements, and the finished product, that being a flint with one sharp edge and one dull edge for easy handling.  The cave is attributed to the Amudian culture, and shows use of daily fire and a division of space for specific tasks and functions.  The blades were used mainly for butchering animals, whose hides were taken to another spot for processing into skins for several purposes.

Revised Siting of “King’s Garden” in German Colony

The King’s Garden, mentioned in the Song of Songs (4:16; 5:1) has traditionally been located in the area south of Silwan (as mentioned in Nehemiah 3:15) and tradition also has it that Solomon wrote the scroll of Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) there, but now Professors Oded Lipschitz and Nadav Na’aman of Tel Aviv University have said it is to be found in the Emek Refaim valley, at what is today the north end of the German Colony of Jerusalem, between the old Railway Station and Liberty Bell Gardens.

Their argument is that the present excavations at Ramat Rahel, to the south of Jerusalem, conducted by Lipschitz and the University of Heidelberg, show that there was an important government tax centre for vegetable produce in the 8th century BCE at a site on level ground  between Ramat Rahel and the City of David, which would place it around the Emek Refaim street that runs through the centre of the German Colony.

They claim that this area was the Valley of Shaveh (the “level” valley), also called the King’s Valley, where the King of Sodom met Abraham (Gen. 14:17).  If they are right, then Emek Refaim, famous today for its cafés, boutiques and two vegetable stores, will have acquired a reputable history going back three thousand years and more.

Heritage Site in Safed

Trial excavations at the Kahal Centre in mid-Safed, in the Galilee, conducted by Livnot Lehibanot, a private NGO, under the supervision of the Israel Antiquities Authority, have revealed a number of late medieval dwellings, a bakery, a ritual bathhouse, cisterns and courtyards.  It is intended to extend the site and prepare it for public viewing to give a picture of Jewish life in the city in the sixteenth century, when it was the premier Kabbalistic centre of the world.  To this end, the government is allocating funds to the tune of four million shekels (about £700,000) to complete the work and prepare it for opening to the public within the next five years.

Stephen Gabriel Rosenberg,

W.F.Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem

 

Report from Jerusalem #35, 22nd September 2011

Two-Horned Altar from Tell-Es-Safi

The site of Tell es-Safi is considered to be the Philistine city of Gath and work had been going on there for many seasons, under the direction of Prof. Aren Maier of Bar-Ilan University. A recent find has been a large stone altar with two squarish horns. It was found within the ruins of a large building of the lower city that was destroyed by Hazael of Aram in the 9th century BCE. The altar is made of a single piece of stone, which is unique for its size, according to Prof. Maier. The dimensions are 50cm by 50cm by one metre high, which is equivalent to the cubit by cubit by 2 cubits high of the wooden incense altar of the Mishkan, as described in Exod. 30:1. Although one side is broken, Prof. Maier claims that the altar only had the two horns on the one side, not the usual four, and the reasons for this are obscure, though it may have been a Philistine characteristic. Another important find of the season was a jar with an inscription, which seems to have been in a Philistine version of Hebrew, but is as yet undeciphered.

Damascus Gate Restored

The most ornate of the Jerusalem Gates, the Damascus Gate or Sha’ar Shechem, has been fully cleaned and restored after four years of work on the ancient walls of the city.  The restoration work included the reconstitution of the projecting external guardbox that was cantilevered over the main arched entry, and served as a sentry box for one soldier to monitor all who entered from the north. It was destroyed during the 1967 war and was finally restored and unveiled last month. The gate is highly elaborate and was commissioned by Suleiman the Magnificent from the famous Islamic architect Sinan Minmar (1489-1578) of Constantinople in the mid-sixteenth century CE. Sinan was also the architect of the Sulemaniye Mosque, the second largest in Istanbul, whose huge dome rests on four massive pillars. The Damascus gate is planned with a double chicane which in plan is like the Hebrew letter Lamed, with two right angle turns. In elevation it sports 22 or more stepped finials, and it is founded on an earlier Roman gate from the time of Hadrian. According to Avi Mashiah, the architect of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) who supervised the work, this gate is the most beautiful one of the wall and therefore it has been amply recorded in drawings and photographs which enabled the restoration to be completed accurately. The work was carried out in carefully planned stages so that the many small-scale Arab merchants, who lined the walls of the gate, were able to continue trading without interruption.

Kenyon Institute: Move into Non-Archaeological Fields of Study

The Kenyon Institute, formerly the British School of Archaeology, in the Sheikh Jarrah area of East Jerusalem, has just announced a new series of lectures on Palestinian politics. The lecture for last week was entitled “The Question of Palestinian Representation in Historical Context and the State Recognition Initiative”, and was given by Dr. Abdel Razzeq Takriti of St Edmund Hall, Oxford. The Centre is also starting a series of classes in spoken Arabic, to run over the next three months.

From the point of view of the archaeological community of Jerusalem and the wider world, it would be most unfortunate if the Kenyon Institute, run by the Centre for British Research in the Levant, abandons the concern for archaeological subjects for which it was originally founded.

Continuos Occupation at Yavne-Yam

The ancient port of Yavne-Yam, that lies on the Mediterranean coast between Jaffa and Ashdod, recently gave up its latest secrets.  A complex of a fortress and a bath-house of the late Islamic period were excavated last season by a team from Tel Aviv University headed by Prof. Moshe Fischer. He pointed out that this latest find confirmed the use of the port city from the Middle Bronze Age period up to medieval times, and showed that the Islamic population continued the Roman practice of providing lavish bathing premises alongside their main public buildings. The latest finds, not yet published, indicate that the port was occupied continuously for a period of over three thousand years.

The Underground Passage from Robinson’s Arch to Siloam Pool

Work by Prof. Ronnie Reich of Haifa University and Eli Shukron of the IAA has continued on this amazing underground passageway and the sewer that ran below it, where a Roman sword and a tiny golden bell were found recently. The excavators have now been able to continue their exploration right up to the Herodian retaining wall of the Temple Mount (the Haram es-Sharif) and have uncovered the stepped foundations that underlie the massive ashlars of the wall, near to its maximum height of over 40 metres at the south-west corner, where it rises from the bedrock of the Tyropaean Valley. The discovery of the base of the wall attracted enormous interest and the site was visited by the Mayor of Jerusalem and other important dignitaries and politicians, who were reported to have been seen weeping at the wonder of the exposed foundations of the retaining wall to what is, for Jews, their holiest site. It is hoped that the site can be prepared for public viewing in the near future. It will certainly be interesting to see how Herod’s engineers coped with the problem of founding their huge walls on the naturally irregular bedrock of the mountain.

Corpus of Graffiti  Inscriptions

Over the years individual explorers have come across graffiti scratched into cave walls and other rough surfaces in many different places and languages. It is now the intention to publish all the known and readable ones that have been found in Israel over many years by several different scholars.  Prof. Jonathan Price of Tel Aviv Classics Department says the study of these casual writings has been neglected so far but their importance has now been recognised and the Corpus will be of great interest to historians.  The graffiti so far known are dated from the 4th century BCE, the early Hellenistic period, to the early Islamic age of 7th century CE and the Corpus is likely to contain 13,000 items in over ten languages. Some examples are the Greek name “Christo” found on limestone walls in the Judean hills, the Jewish family name “Sh-ph-n” (“rabbit”) found in a first century CE burial cave, and the name “Yonatan” in another burial cave. Many scrawls were found in the extended caves used by the Jewish population to hide from the Romans during the Jewish Revolts of 66 and 135 CE. some of which have still to be deciphered.

Stephen G. Rosenberg

W.F. Albright Institute, Jerusalem

 

Report from Jerusalem #34, 22nd August

Boundary stone found in Lower Galilee

A local visitor to the small community of Timrat, which lies a few kilometres west of Nazareth, happened to come across a large stone inscribed in black with the three Hebrew letters reading “Shabbat”. Mordechai Aviam, head of Archaeology at the nearby Kinneret College, has suggested that this was a marker for the Shabbat boundary around the village, marking the extent allowed for walking beyond the village on the Sabbath in the Mishnaic period.  The letters are large and clear and extend over a length of half a metre.   Boundary markers have been discovered at other locations but are inscribed in Greek and, according to Aviam, this is the first one to be found in Hebrew.  The stone is dated to the Roman/Byzantine period when the village would have been inhabited, and volunteer teams are now being sent to the area to search for more examples.

Ancient Shechem to be opened to the Public

A team from Holland and the Palestinian Authority has been working since 1997 at Tel Balata, the site of the ancient city of Shechem, and they plan to open the site to the public next year. It is hoped that the remains uncovered, and in some cases reconstructed by the Drew-McCormick Expedition directed by G.E.Wright in the early 1960s, will soon be available to be seen by visitors. Tel Balata, just east of modern Nablus, has been the site of a Palestinian refugee camp and in the last few years has become a centre of  old car sales and a dumping ground for second-hand and stolen vehicles. All this is being cleared away by the present expedition, supported by a team from UNESCO, and it is hoped that the site can be presented next year in a form useful to scholars and attractive to tourists.

Jerusalem sewage ditch yields up more treasures

From the waste water channel that runs from the Temple Mount to the Siloam Pool, in which the small golden bell was recently found, a Roman sword with part of an attached belt and a small inscribed stone were recently uncovered in the silt by Eli Shukron, working for the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). The sword had a two-foot iron blade and is a military type that Shukron believes may have been stolen from the Roman garrison by a rebel Jew and then abandoned in the escape passage. The inscribed stone, from the same period, of the Roman destruction of the City in 70 CE, shows a menorah of five branches on a triple leg base. It is a fairly rough rendition and unclear why only five branches are shown though it may be that the artist did not want to reproduce the exact form of the menorah, since that might have been considered sacrilegious outside the Temple. The sword was found fused to its leather scabbard, badly decayed but with two ring buckles that had attached it to a soldier’s belt.

Phasaelis City Uncovered

At a site 20 km. north of Jericho, Hananiah Hizmi, working for the Archaeological Department of the Authority for Judaea and Samaria, is uncovering the 15 acres of a town planned by Herod the Great and started in the year 8 BCE, according to Josephus. It was the last of Herod’s great projects (he died in 4 BCE) and was being built as an agricultural complex in the name of his brother Phasael.  In this desert area, water was a problem and Herod’s engineers managed to bring it in by a thousand-metre long ground-level aqueduct from the springs now called Petzael. The site had been covered by Palestinian and Bedouin shacks and, as alternative accommodation has been provided, the huts have been cleared and the remains of the city uncovered. They include a water basin of 40m by 30m and 6m deep which was used to store the spring water and distribute it to adjoining fields. So far only two months of work have been spent on site and it is clear that much more time needs to be expended, as it is hoped to uncover all the residential and public buildings of this “new town” in the desert. If the remains come up as expected, this will be another example of a Herodian miracle, the building of a viable community in desert surroundings. The site continued in occupation for some time, as the excavators found the remains of a Byzantine Church with a mosaic floor. Today the name is preserved as the location goes under the title of El Fasayil and there is a small Jewish village at the springs called Petzael.

Bathhouse Hercules  in the Jezre’el Valley

In preparation for the building of a railway connection between Bet Shean and Haifa (partly for the benefit of Jordanian access to that port), a rescue dig at Horvat Tarbanet, west of Afula, has uncovered a  bright white marble torso and two fragments  that are clearly part of a statue of the Greek hero Hercules.  It is headless and portrays a highly muscular body with a lion’s pelt draped over the left arm (the animal’s head is visible), similar to the well-known Hercules Farnese statue of the Roman period.  The find was made by Walid Atrash of the IAA, who claims it to be of exceptional artistic quality. The torso, which stands about half-a-metre high was found by a bathhouse pool that had two rows of benches and a water-pumping system. The statue probably stood in a niche by the pool. It is dated to the late Roman period and it has been suggested that it was later deliberately smashed – hence the fragments – by iconoclasts in Byzantine or Islamic times.

Stephen Gabriel Rosenberg,

W.F.Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem