The Biblical Archaeologist - Vol.40, N.1

46 Pages·1977·8.91 MB·English

by  American Schools of Oriental Research

ISSN: 0006-0895
OF
BIBLICAL
ARCHEOLOGIST
MARCH1 977 VOLUM4E0 NUMBERI
'?rs ~
:h rs
Ane-F a
-04* rir r ~p"~fr;j14 ' ??
~i C -~"~l;r; "All*
1?2, E,
14
iL?
The Beth Shemesh Cave
Published with the financial assistance of Biblical Archeologist is published quarterly
(March, May, September, December) by the
ZION RESEARCH FOUNDATION American Schools of Oriental Research in
Boston, Massachusetts cooperation with Scholars Press. Its purpose is
to provide the general reader with an accurate
A nonsectarian Protestant foundation scholarly yet easily understandable account of
for the study of the Bible archeological discoveries, and their bearing on
and the history of the Christian Church twheel cobmibeli cbaul t hsehroitualgde . bUe nascocloicmitpedan imeds s.b ya rae
stamped, self-addressed envelope. Address all
editorial correspondence to Biblical
Archeologist, 1053 LSA Building, University
of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109. Address
business correspondence to Scholars Press,
P.O. Box 5207, Missoula, MT 59806.
Copyright @ 1977 AXmerican Schools of
Oriental Research. Annual Subscription:
$10.00. Current single issues: $2.50. Printed in
the United States of America, Printing
Department, University of Montana,
Missoula, MT 59812.
?!
/
! . Editor:
David Noel Freedman, University of
Michigan
Editorial Committee:
Frank M. Cross., Harvard University
Edward F. Campbell, Jr., McCormick
Theological Seminary
John S. Holladay, Jr., University of Toronto
H. Darrell Lance, Colgate-Rochester Divinity
School
-6 ~ :
,(cid:127)
' " -.- ',"" ,%
Credits:
Cover photograph courtesy of Itzhak Amit.
All illustrations in "Along Jerusalem's Walls,"
Detail from Cover courtesy of Magen Broshi. Drawings for "The
Birth of Bureaucracy"a nd "The Third Wall of
Stalagmite from the Beth Shemesh cave pictured on the Agrippa I," and maps for "The Third Wall of
front cover. A fit setting for Coleridge's "Kubla Khan," AFagrrgipop. aP Ih"o atnodg r"aTphhes N inu z"i ETbhlea "Rb eyn aVsacleenrciee M of.
this cave was blasted into view in 1967, when a routine Iron Age Arad," courtesy of Jackson
charge in the Hartuv rock quarry opened a door onto Campbell. Photographs in "Oil from the
stalactites, stalagmites, and travertinef ormations unique Presses of Tirat-Yehuda"a nd "The Musicians
in the Mediterrenean region. Surely the most beautiful of Ashdod," by courtesy of the Israel
cave in Israel, and a place of wonder anywhere, it is now Department of Antiquities and Museums.
Drawing and photograph of the Nuzi map
unfortunately closed to visitors. Installations are originally appeared in Excavations at Nuzi,
currently being constructed for the mutual protection of Vol. 3, Harvard Semitic Series, 10
the public and the cavern, and to permit controlled visits. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1935).
rOF%
BIBLICAL
ARCHEOLOGIST
Magen Broshi 11 ALONG JERUSALEM'S WALLS
Emmet W. Hamrick 18 THE THIRD WALL OF AGRIPPA I
Clyde Curry Smith 24 THE BIRTH OF BUREAUCRACY
IN BRIEF
Ruth Hestrina nd Zeev Yeivin 29 OIL FROMT HE PRESSESO F
TIRAT- YEHUDA
Nadezhda Freedman 32 THEN UZI EBLA
Jackson Campbell 34 THE RENASCENCE OF IRON AGE ARAD
Moshe Dothan 38 THE MUSICIANS OF ASHDOD
LETTER TO THE READERS 2 BOOK REVIEWS 40
NEWS FROM THE FIELD 5 COLOPHON 44
AIA REPORT 8
A LETTER TO THE READERS
It is safe to say that as recently as a year and a half revealed that they were written in Sumerian cuneiform
ago, Ebla, the name of an ancient city in Northern Syria, script, and that two languages are represented on them:
was known only to a handful of people in the world, Sumerian itself, as expected, and a Semitic dialect the
specialists in the arcane disciplines of Sumero-Akkadian exact classification of which with its specific affinities and
languages and literature,a nd archeologists of the Bronze characteristics remains to be determined. Thanks,
Age in the Near East. Now it has become a household however, to the presence of a multiplicity of bilingual
word not only in the Near East where the discoveries were lexical texts containing extensive word-lists (the
made, but in Europe and America and the Far East, in equivalent of a modern two-language vocabulary or
fact wherever newspapers and magazines are printed. pocket dictionary) and previous experience on the part of
What has happened in this brief span of time to catapult scholars with both Sumerian and Semitic texts of roughly
Tell Mardikh (the name of the modern village and the the same period, as well as the efficiency and acumen of
mound where Ebla once stood and lived) into the the epigrapher, the tablets have already yielded
limelight? Beginning in the digging season of 1974, and substantial information about the life and times of
continuing through last Fall, there has been a series of ancient Ebla. Since at the date of this writing, no single
sensational finds of thousands and thousands of tablet has yet been published with photographs,
cuneiform tablets (perhaps2 0,000 in all so far, but with an transcription, translation, and comments, all conclusions
excellent promise of many more to come), dating from must be reckoned tentative, and all positions provisional,
approximately the middle of the 3rd millennium B.C.E. pending confirmation or correction, or abandonment in
There is a debate between the excavator, Paolo Matthiae, this fluid early period of analysis and speculation.
who dates the finds between 2400 and 2250 B.C.E.,a nd the Nevertheless, on the basis of available evidence, it seems
epigrapher, Giovanni Pettinato (both are Professors in reasonable to propose that the period of Ebla's greatest
the Department of Near Eastern Studies at the University prosperity and prestige was during the Early Dynastic
of Rome), who prefers an earlierd ate, around 2500 B.C.E. Age of the Sumerian city-states in the first half of the 3rd
This was no accidental discovery in the sense that so many millennium B.C.E. (until about 2500 B.C.E.).
great finds of the past were made by people with no The tablets, most of which are economic in
training or experience who either were looking for character, record transactions of the state with
something else, or not for anything at all, when they came corresponding entities throughout the Near East and
upon some priceless treasureo f antiquity. It is well known show that Ebla had established commercial and
that a couple of goatherds stumbled on the first of the diplomatic relations with other city-states everywhere in
Dead Sea scrolls while chasing errant animals, and a the Fertile Crescent, and beyond. Approximately 5,000
camel-driver digging for nitrate-rich soil near a cemetery place-names have been retrieved from the texts by
found the Nag Hammadi manuscripts; peasants plowing Professor Pettinato and his assistants, most of which were
a field at Ras Shamrah (= ancient Ugarit) came upon the unknown to scholars previously, but a remarkable
first of the famous tablets in Canaanite cuneiform. All number are familiar from other contemporary sources, or
credit is due to the head of the archeological mission to from later literature. Since Ebla is situated well to the west
Tell Mardikh for his planning and persistence. It was only of the Euphrates river and was oriented in its trade
after ten seasons of careful digging in the Middle Bronze toward the west and south, there is an impressive
Age levels at Tell Mardikh that the Early Bronze Age correspondence with such place-names preserved in the
strata were reached, and the great discovery was made. Bible as Hazor, Megiddo, Byblos, Sidon, Akko, Dor,
Equal credit is due to the deciphererf or his extraordinary Ashdod, Gaza, and Jerusalem, which are mentioned in
diligence in reading and transcribing the texts, and his texts reporting the shipment of goods (mainly textiles)
remarkable willingness to share the results of his work, and the receipt of payment in money (gold and silver were
even at preliminarys tages, with his colleagues around the the preferred media of exchange) and kind (metals,
world. grains, and animals are listed).
While the decipherment, translation, and Personal names also abound in the texts, and are
interpretation of these difficult texts pose many of practicallye very type known in the Near East from that
significant problems, preliminary study of the tablets has and other periods. Out of a large number, some are
2 MARCH 1977
linguistically very similar to corresponding biblical kingdom about fifty miles south of Ebla).
names: in no case can it be shown that we are dealing with Among the texts are some dealing with the
the same person, and in practically all cases the opposite administration of the city, which was divided into two
can be demonstrated without doubt. Some of the names main districts: the acropolis or upper city, where the king
are: Abram, Israel, Ishmael, Michael, Micaiah, Esau, and leading officials had their residence, and the lower
Saul, David. The spelling is given in the traditional form city, which filled most of the territory of this enormous
here; the spelling and pronunciation varied somewhat in city (by ancient standards: the area within the massive
the Ebla tablets, as they do in Biblical Hebrew, but the earthen-rampart walls was 56 hectares, or about 140
equivalence of the names is generally acknowledged. One acres). These in turn were divided into four quadrants,
of the most striking correspondences is between the name each with a local governor (in one period at least, that of
of the great king of Ebla, Ebrium, which is semantically Ebrium, all of the governors were royal princes).
and linguistically equivalent to the name Eber in Genesis Other texts deal with the complex and elaborate
10:26 (and other places), who is one of the ancestors of rituals of worship, and give lists of the prescribed
Abram (= Abraham); the name Eber gives rise to the sacrifices, beginning with the royal family (the king comes
gentilic form Ibri (= Hebrew, the general term for first, then the crown prince, followed by the principal
Abraham and his descendants). The correlation is queen, and other princes). Other religious texts are
intriguing, although there is no evidence from the tablets mythological in nature, mentioning prominent gods of
linking the two persons or, to be sure, from the Bible. the Sumerian and West Semitic pantheons. The chief god
As already indicated, the archive consists mainly of Ebla was Dagan, well known in different incarnations
of economic texts, as is true of most of the great hoards from the Bible and other sources from various places and
uncovered in the past: collections of similar or greater periods (e.g., the story of Dagon, the chief god of the
magnitude have turned up at a number of cities, like Philistine city of Ashdod, recorded in 1 Samuel 5). Texts
Nippur (Old Babylonian) and Mari (Amorite), dealing with the Creation story and the Flood have also
illuminating different and generally later periods of been reported.
civilization in the Near East. What makes the Ebla Many of the non-economic documents are so-
collection especially valuable is that it is by far the largest called school texts, which were prepared by students as
for such an early date, and will shed much light on a very part of their training. As was true universally, a large
obscure era of human civilization (namely the rise of scribal school was associated with the palace, where
urban culture in the early centuries of the 3rd apprentices were trained for years in the intricacies of the
millennium). The hundreds of thousands of tablets Sumerian writing system. Some tablets are exercises in
already unearthed from many sites have proved a rich which the student simply copied or reproduced from
trove for economic and social historians of antiquity, and memory the signs (there are several thousand in the
the new materials from Ebla should contribute their Sumerian sign-list) prepared by the master. The
abundant share to such research. Already it is clear that transition from student to master scribe was a long and
the life of the city was built around its flourishing tedious process and the tablets written by students show
economy, that the administration both civil and religious that progress was not always easy or unilinear. Such
was deeply involved in business activity, and that tablets were often graded and corrected (and criticized) by
diplomacy and international politics were largely the teachers; it took a lot of practice to make perfect. But
extensions of commercial relations. Clauses regulating by and large, the tablets are elegantly written, and
trade and business are prominent in the preserved treaties beautifully preserved.
between Ebla and other city-states; the king and his In the tablets so far read and reported, there are
princes were as much merchants as administrators or civil many references to contemporary events, and the kings
and religious leaders. and other participants in them. Some of these
The remaining tablets (perhaps 2,000 in number) correlations are very important for the reconstruction of
belong to a variety of types and categories. These are the chronology and history of the early 3rd millennium.
more difficult to decipher and will requirei ntensive study One of the most significant is the appearance of the name
before definitive information can be obtained. of the king of Assur on the treaty between Assur and Ebla
Nevertheless, a preliminary survey of their contents is in the time of King Ebrium. In the heyday of the Assyrian
possible, that is, of the relatively few that have been read empire (first half of the Ist millennium), great king-lists
and reported. Since these are palace documents (the great were prepared which traced the history of Assur back to
bulk of the tablets was found in a room in the great its beginnings. The earliest kings were simply names,
courtyard adjoining the palace), the king and the royal without regnal years or dynastic connections. The first
family naturally dominate much of the material. Thus seventeen are described as "kings who lived in tents,"
there are royal edicts and correspondence with suggesting "a prehistoric period" to most scholars. Many
subordinates in the civil and military branches of of the earliest were regarded as legendary or imaginary
government. There is diplomatic communication with ancestral figures (whose names symbolized later
foreign rulers (e.g., a plea for help from the king of Ebla to component groups in the kingdom). The first of these
the king of Hamazi in Elam), and more than one treaty kings was named Tudiya, and about him nothing else was
with other city-states, including Ashur (the capital of the known. That happens to be the name of the king
later Assyrian kingdom), and Hama (a neighboring mentioned in the treaty (spelled Du-ud-i-ya at Ebla, but
BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST 3
the equation is highly probable if not certain, since no in abeyance until a great deal more information is
distinction is made between d and t in the orthography). available from the tablets. In the meantime, it is enough to
So it appears that the very first king of the Assyrian be astounded and expectant.
tradition has emerged from the mists of legend and dim Ebla, having been discovered as an important
memory onto the pages of history. We have an important newsmaker from the ancient past, is not likely to be lost
synchronism, and when a firm date can be established for again in the foreseeable future. There is every reason to
the dynasty of Ebla we will have one for the beginnings of believe that there will be a constant stream of sensational
the kingdom of Assur. Similar pleasant surprises are data from that site and from its tablets, as the latter are
doubtless in store for historians as the contents of the deciphered and published. So far the truth has
tablets are made known. outstripped the rumors, and the facts are more impressive
One extraordinary piece of information already than the speculations. An almost blank chapter in the
has reached the public through an announcement at the history of Syria-Palestine is being filled in rapidly, and a
general meeting of the Society of Biblical Literaturea nd significant stimulus has been given to man's study of his
the American Schools of Oriental Research in St. Louis past. The picture of Ebla with its elaborate hierarchical
on 29 October 1976, when Professors Matthiae and administration, and apparently bloated bureaucracy
Pettinato spoke to a huge gathering at the Stouffer (11,000 civil servants at the palace in a population of
Riverfront Towers Hotel (thanks to a grant from the 260,000), not to speak of an academic elite, may remind us
National Endowment for the Humanities to the uncomfortably of many of our own problems, but at least
University of Michigan for this purpose). It was revealed we can take consolation from the fact that they are not
that on one tablet listing many cities with which Ebla had new, and that mankind, if it has not coped with them
commercial relations, the five Cities of the Plain appear in successfuly, at least has survived.
precisely the same order as in the Book of Genesis, 14:2 The discoveries at Ebla have already stirred up
and 8. These cities are well known to tradition, especially enough controversy and conflict in the scholarly world to
the first two: Sodom and Gomorrah; the others are fill the journals with debates over the date of the tablets,
Admah, Zeboiim, and Bela (which is also called Zoar). and the classification of the Semitic languages, among
According to biblical tradition, these cities were other matters, for the balance of the century. Whethert he
flourishing at the time that Abraham and his nephew Lot tablets belong to Early Bronze Age II (or III: from 2800 to
came to the Holy Land, and settled there. In fact, Lot, 2500 B.C.E.) or Early Bronze Age IV A (2400 to 2250
given a choice, selected Sodom as his permanent home B.C.E.), or whether the language of Ebla is to be classified
(see chaps. 12-19 of the Book of Genesis for the story). as Northwest Semitic or East Semitic may be of interest
The outcome is well known: Lot barely escaped with his only to antiquarian specialists, but the possible
life and immediate family when the cities were destroyed connection between the Ebla tablets and the biblical
in a violent catastrophe, understood by the biblical traditions bids fair to reignite the simmering battle
writers to be an act of divine retribution for the between conservatives and liberals over the historical
misbehavior of the inhabitants, especially of Sodom and accuracy of the biblical narratives.
Gomorrah. The uncanny correspondence between the names
While the cities lived on in tradition as outstanding of the five Cities of the Plain in the Bible and on Tablet
examples of the consequences of wickedness, no trace of No. 1860 from Ebla (actually there is a sixth correlation,
any of them has ever been found, and until the discoveries since the alternate name of Bela given in Genesis 14:2 is
at Ebla no mention of them has been noted in any source Zoar; the equivalent name is given in another Ebla tablet
of early times outside of the Bible. Now for the first time with the specificaton that it belongs to the district or
they are listed in an ordinary economic tablet from Ebla, territory of Bela) suggests not only that the former rests
and it is clear that this is the period when the Cities of the on a firm historical substratum, but that some of the
Plain were flourishing emporia, like Ebla itself. Behind patriarchal traditions go back to events and
the tradition in the Bible about those cities there is now circumstances of the 3rd millennium B.C.E., a very long
established fact. During the period of Ebla's prosperity, stretch in anyone's chronology (the most popular date for
these cities also flourished, and were active trading the patriarchs even among conservatives has been the
partners of the colossus to the north. The narrative in Middle Bronze Age, during the first half of the 2nd
Genesis describes the somewhat later situation, when the millennium, and some have pushed the dates down into
cities were subject to the authority of the kings of the east, the Late Bronze Age, during the third quarter of that
rebelled, were defeated, and were subsequently destroyed. millennium). This is particularly mind-boggling if we
Just when these later events occurred is not altogether think in terms of the oral transmission of these
clear, but there is collateral evidence to indicate that it was reminiscences over such a long period. Right now, the
not very long after the period reflected in the Ebla tablets, most attractive date for Abraham offered by scholars
that is, in the 3rd millennium B.C.Ea. nd perhaps as early (though on the low side) is that of the "hyper-modern"
as the end of Early Bronze Age III (about 2400). In turn exegete and biblical commentator, Archbishop James
this would indicate a date in the middle of the 3rd Ussher (1581- 1656), whose chronology was found in most
millennium for Abraham, much earlier than previous editions of the King James Bible, and whose date for the
views on the subject. Further speculation should be held creation of the world is the well-known 4004 B.c.
4 MARCH 1977
Kibbutz Tirat Zvi in the Beth-shean Valley is
proving a repository of Roman remains: two years ago a
tourist with a mine detector stumbled on a rare bronze
head of Hadrian, the emperor who laid Jerusalem waste
in the 2nd century C.E. The other day two miles from
where the head had lain a Latin inscription to Hadrian
was found. It is 6 m. long and 1.20 m. high and may have
NEWS FROM THE FIELD been part of a triumphal arch erected when the emperor
visited this outpost of the empire. Appropriately, the
inscription was found under the ancient Roman road
from Beth-shean to Jericho, not far from a recently
uncovered Roman Legion camp.
The peripatetic Romans have surfaced again, this
time in northern France, thanks to the worst drought in a
hundred years. Last summer turned that area into a
virtual desert, permitting archeologists in small planes to
distinguish in the desiccated croplands patterns of ancient
The Animal Kingdom settlement never observed before.
Like heat on invisible ink, the drought brought to
A rare species of karakul sheep that used to roam light traces of huge ancient farms, often with buildings
freely in biblical Israel is being restored to the land. Three more than 400 feet long. Julius Caesar called them
pregnant ewes and a ram have been shipped from aedificiae, and the remains recently photographed reveal
Pennsylvania to the Jerusalem Biblical Zoo.
that 2,000 years ago agriculture was big business. These
The snake, however, continues his resident
great complexes completely reverse the traditional view
rounds. The magazine Land and Nature offers a brief that northern Gaul was simply a vast woods dotted with
rundown on six venomous types known to the Negev and occasional villages. In an area 16 miles long and 12 miles
Sinai: the black desert cobra, which feeds on green toads wide, 31 Roman estates are visible, but not a single town.
but apparently seeks human company; the En-gedi mole There was also an outdoor theater some distance away,
viper, which is thin and black and deceptively phlegmatic; half the size of a football stadium, evidence perhaps of an
the carpet viper, which camouflages itself so successfully abortive effort to establish a town, or simply an
that it is virtually indistinguishable from its surroundings entertainment center for the wealthy burghers.
(but it is a diligent biter, moves rapidly, and strikes All the estates conformed with Roman building
speedily); Field's horned viper, with tiny horns above its precepts and were equipped with lavish baths and central
eyes and brown stripes on its yellow body; the sand viper, heating, altogether more luxurious than the chateaux of
which dwells in and takes its color from the sand, has the French nobility in the 17th and 18th centuries of our
heavy scales and a wide flat head; and the pigmy sand era. They were clearly agricultural centers built to exploit
viper, yellow to orange in color, with two rows of brown the riches of the conquered country.
spots down its back, rough scales, and a blunt, heart-
shaped head. Rule of thumb: non-poisonous= shiny,
colored; poisonous =colored, rough-scaled, ridged on the Taanach Workshop
back scales, or, if black, less than 1.20 m. long.
Under the direction of Prof. Albert Glock, the
No longer poisonous, if indeed it ever was, but a
Taanach Workshop at the Albright Institute in Jerusalem
fitting addendum to ophidian lore, is the news of the continues its fieldwork in ceramic ethnography. In order
discovery in the Jerusalem hills of an 80- to 100-million-
to determine the techniques of the Taanach potters, Dr.
year-old fossil snake. A marine variety, it is the first ever
Owen Rye has been investigating the current methods of
to be found in Israel, is rare throughout the world, and is local male potters and Dr. John Landgraft hose of women
notable besides for its excellently preserved skull. Its body
is not so well preserved,a pparently, since its length--1.5- potters. Dr. Rye, a ceramic technologist working on
2 m. -can only be estimated. Taanach pottery from the Bronze Age, returned to
Jerusalem in March from Australia and Pakistan.
.The Interdisciplinary Archeological Seminar,
Lost and Found another project of the Taanach Workshop, has had
several guests since its inception last fall. Profs. Robert
The lower part of a funerary altar, whose Latin Maddin and Tamara Wheeler of the University of
inscription bears the name of XIIth Legion officer Julius Pennsylvania and Prof. Emeritus Rachel Maxwell-
Magnus, turned up in Caesarea in 1947 and was taken to Hyslop of the Institute of Archaeology, London, came
the Rockefeller Museum in Jerusalem. Almost exactly together to analyze the metallurgical process employed in
thirty years later the upper part was discovered in the the Taanach artifacts. Dr. Patricia Smith discussed
Caesarea Museum and shipped to the Rockefeller to join osteology and Prof. Y. Karmon the contributions of
its better (or bottom) half. geographical research to archeology.
BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST 5
Jottings from Jordan Prometheus Bound and a four-spouted lamp. Space
In 1955, bulldozers at the Amman Airport limits a further account of the multiplicity of objects,
uncovered a mysterious square building crammed with buildings, walls, and pavements, but the January 1977
Late Bronze artifacts. Eleven years later the entire (No. 8) Newsletter is devoted in its entirety to a full
structure was excavated, disclosing human bones, which illustrated description both of findings and conclusions.
strengthened the theory of Basil Hennessy, the dig's
director, that the building had been a temple where child On Papyrus, On Clay
sacrifice was practiced. So far from accepted was his
opinion, however, that in 1976, when the subject of Recent information about documents in ancient
conserving the so-called temple site came up, further Hebrew includes the imminent publication of the so-
excavation seemed indicated. Under the supervision of called Temple Scroll, the latest of the Dead Sea cache.
Larry Herr, a 10-day salvage dig was conducted, ending Yigael Yadin and his team, with the help of infrared and
on Aug. 27, and yielding a few interesting facts: The reverse photography, have finally deciphered it and
plentiful artifacts found in 1955 existed only in the report that it examines Essene Halakah and uses ordinary
immediate vicinity of the building, suggesting that there script to record the name of God instead of the distinctive
had been no settlement nearby; two parallel rows of small variety usually employed. This further suggests that the
rocks, many charred, were separated by a 3x3 m. space, Temple Scroll represents a direct divine revelation.
just about the size of an altar; of the many bone fragments The 12th-century B.C.E. tablet from Isbet Sarte,
collected, 95% were human and all showed signs of reported here in September, was not only a miraculous
burning, although the animal fragments bore no such discovery but a miraculous recovery. Aaron Demsky,
evidence. The excavators returned to Hennessy's theory who, with Moshe Kochavi, is about to publish the
of a cult place for child sacrifice. Analysis, however, findings, says that while one of the excavators, Arieh
scotched that one: these were adult, not children's bones. Bornstein, was peering into a storage pit in the tell he
The new interpretation, logical in view of the Late Bronze noticed a sherd on which there seemed to be writing. He
settlement that had recently been unearthed at Amman, pointed out the faint traces to others, but no one believed
was that this was a mortuary complex, set apart because him. Bornstein was undeterred, retrieved the sherd
cremation and burial took place there. Thus the stone anyway, and took it to Kochavi, the dig's director.
piles might have been the pyre, the nearby building the Whatever was incised on the sherd was so fine and so
ceremonial center and possibly the repository for indistinct that Kochavi himself could not be sure whether
valuable tomb furnishings. The round stone in the middle he was looking at scratches or writing. He conceived the
of the structure, rather than an altar as Hennessy idea of getting some American volunteers at the tell, who
suggested, might have been an incense stand, a stronger knew not one letter of Hebrew or any other Semitic
possibility, since evidence of burning was slight. language, to copy what they saw; incredibly they
Whatever its original function, the building is now being produced an early Hebrew or Canaanite alphabet. Now
restored, and its ancient artifacts will be on display in the that the sherd has been cleaned the alphabet is easy to
airport lounge. perceive, but as for the rest of the writing (there are five
The far more ambitious excavation at Tell lines or columns in all), neither the excavators nor the
Hesban, 16 miles southwest of Amman, ended its fifth epigraphers are sure at this time whether there is a
season on Aug. 11, with most of its goals achieved. The message on the tablet or whether it was used by a long-
earliest stratum dates to Iron I (ca. 1200-1000 B.C.E.)a nd ago student for practicing his hand at the different
yielded many sherds, ceramic loom-weights, and an characters. In any case, it is an important link in the
uninscribeds eal. In the Iron I I-Persian period stratum the history of alphabetic writing and ranks among the oldest
largest reservoir (datable to that time) on Jordan's east Hebrew inscriptions.
bank was cleared, possibly to be identified, if Hesbin is
biblical Heshbon, with the "pools by the gate of Bath-
Marine Museum
rabbim" (Cant 7:4; 7:5 in the Hebrew).
There are two Hellenistic strata, the later At 200 Rehov Allenby, appropriately situated in
associated with the Maccabees; among other reported the port city of Haifa, is the National Maritime Museum,
finds was a perfectly preserved Hellenistic lamp. Of the which traces the development of seagoing transportation
finds from the Early Roman period the most impressive in the Mediterranean. On display are models of sailing
architecturallyw as the almost 20 feet of stone tower, part and oared ships, sea charts, ancient drawings of ports and
of the foundation of which penetrated the Iron Age fill to oceans, antique navigational aids, and maritime-related
reach bedrock. From the Late Roman period an imposing archeological finds. Reliefs, tomb paintings, and other
stairway was unearthed, which undoubtedly leads toward ancient art provided the data for the detailed
an important public structure at the summit of the reconstructions of the vessels.
acropolis. This may have been the temple appearing on Models include a fast-moving Greek ship in use
the Elagabalus coin, of which two examples have been around 500 B.c., which had room for 60 or more long-
found at Hesban. oarsmen on deck and the same number of short-oarsmen
With the Early Byzantinep eriod discoveries began below; a Ist-century B.C.J udean warship; a Roman grain
to proliferate, among them an ivory plaque depicting ship bound from Alexandria to Ostia; a 2nd-century A.D.
6 MARCH 1977
Sidonian merchantman; Crusader ships, Viking ships, map of the Holy Land, by Abraham bar Yaacov,
and models of the Israeli fleet. Amsterdam, 1697; a "Map of the Worldly and Heavenly
The well-lighted and clearly-labeled artifacts Nile," from the Egyptian Book of the Dead, XIX; the
vividly conjure up a maritime world long past: at either world according to Homer and to the geographer
end of the ship, an ankh, the symbol of life, and an eye Hecateus of Miletus at the time of Herodotus, ca. 500
protect an Old Kingdom Egyptian vessel of 2500 B.c.; a B.C., and a map from the time of Eratosthenes of
sedan chair provides transport for a soul on an Egyptian Alexandria, 200 B.c.
funerary ship of 2000 B.c.; duck heads ornament the ends One of the regular monthly displays was devoted
of a Philistine ship of 1200 B.c.; and a Phoenician to pottery vessels, anchors, coins, figurines, jewelry, and
"Hippos" vessel of the 8th century B.C.s ports the carved other objects recovered by underwatera rcheologists from
head of a horse and the tail of a fish. nearby coastal waters. Copies of a number of the artifacts
Among the charts are maps from historical are among the items on sale at the museum's souvenir
periods down to modern times, including the first Hebrew shop.
PRELIMINARY
. ,'I/. EXCAVATION
\ i\
' I'? rI
REPORTS
I
/
" Tell el-Hesi, Sardis,
Bdb edh-Dhr^dc,M eiron, Carthage
rr rlf ) ' (1? "
I
edited by
e '. David Noel Freedman
". \\4
,,
Annual of the American Schools
,, 1. , of Oriental Research
Vol. 43
OFV~ T
Scholars Press
Available Spring 1978
Order No. 100443
Published by Scholars Press
BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST 7
particular interest were the burned-wood carvings, the
remains of side panel decorations of a table, a chair, the
cylinder seal impressions, and parts of figures in various
materials. Among the animal and human figures in
beautifully carved openwork were a bearded man wearing
a flounced mantle and a curious turban and holding an
axe, lions fighting bulls, and warriors in battle with
swords. A bull with the head of a bearded man was
worked entirely in beaten gold over wood. Professor
Matthiae stressed the artistic and chronological
AIA REPORT implications of the cylinder seal impressions on clay
bullae, three of which bear the names of their owners,
high officials in the reign of the last king of Ebla. There
are seals with bull-men and bulls, a nude hero with a lion's
head, raising an inverted lion by the hind legs, a female
figure with goat horns, and a kneeling atlantid figure with
a guilloche belt, his hands lifted to a circulard esign of two
lion and two human heads. The discovery of several
The 78th general meeting of the Archaeological sheets of gold confirmed the assumption of the original
Institute of America, held in New York City, December richness of the small finds.
28-30, 1976, attracted some 2,000 members, a 10% Ebla clearly dominated the AIA meeting, and
increase over the attendance in 1975 and 20% over that in Professor Matthiae's lecture was summarized the next
1974. This record attendance may be due in part to the day on the front page of the New York Times.
lure of the Big Apple, particularly during the Christmas Pursuing the implications of the discovery of
season, but largely to the program's two outstanding ancient Ebla, Dr. William Dever pointed out that with the
events: Paolo Matthiae's lecture at the Grace Rainey destruction of the urban center of ancient Ebla in Syria,
Rogers Auditorium of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, ca. 2300 B.C., new settlements appeared on the upper
and Christos Doumas' presentation after the banquet at Euphrates, characterized by EB IV-MB I pottery, while
the Waldorf Astoria. farther south in Palestine a complete disruption of town
Professor Matthiae, director of the Italian life seems to have taken place, with a wide distribution of
Archaeological Mission to Syria and excavator of Tell open village-sites on the fringes of the country,
Mardikh, drew about 800 afficionados to his illustrated particularly in southern Transjordan and in the Negev-
exposition of "The Royal Palace and State Archives of Sinai. Dever suggested that these marginal settlements
Ebla: New Light on the Ancient Near East in the Third might be connected with semi-nomadic pastoralists from
Millennium." In the excitement over the epigraphical Syria, possibly the Amorites known from Mesopotamian
finds at Ebla, the other archeological discoveries had texts, ca. 2300-1700 B.C.
received scant attention; to these Professor Matthiae The choice of Professor Christos Doumas as
devoted his paper. The excavations uncovered the speaker after the banquet was felicitous. The high quality
remains of a large courtyard enclosed only by a north and of his presentation, "Works and Days in Bronze Age
an east facade, the south and west sides having been Greece," amply compensated for the low quality of the
eroded with the slope of the tell. The walls were exorbitantly priced dinner. Professor Doumas, successor
constructed of mud brick over stone foundations. At the to the late Professor Marinatos as director of excavations
juncture of these two walls is a large tower housing a at Thera, intends to limit further excavation in order to
magnificent ceremonial stairway with four ramps. concentrate on the analysis, classification, and evaluation
Wooden planks, inlaid with limestone and shell, of which of the numerous buildings and vast quantity of material
only impressions remain, decorated the steps. Under the already uncovered but stored away without critical
north portico of the courtyard is a podium of unbaked assessment or interpretation. In his opinion, the
bricks covered with white plaster, thought to have been a excavations at Acrotiri have already been so widely
platform for the king and the reason for calling the area extended that no purpose is served by further digging
the "audiencec ourt." Along the east wall of the court are until the finds already amassed are thoroughly studied.
three rooms under a portico, in two of which 15,000 His beautiful slides might tempt more than one viewer to
tablets were discovered in 1975. The audience court is the island of Santorini.
outside the actual palace confines, only a small portion of A valuable innovation at the meeting was a section
which has been excavated so far. The palace has been on "Science in Archeology," which was well attended
dated to the period from 2400 to 2250 B.c., the time of its even though highly technical and should certainly become
final destruction, which is attributed to Naram-Sin, a permanent feature of future programs. Most of the
grandson of Sargon the Great. papers concerned dating methods: amino-acid dating by
Among the numerous slides shown were pieces of racimization, which can be applied to bone matter of any
"painted simple ware," goblets, small jars, beautifully age but is most useful with materials less than two million
painted juglets with braid motives, and cooking pots. Of years old; the Uranium Series Disequilibrium Dating of
8 MARCH 1977