Where Exactly Was Khirbet Qeiyafa’s Ostracon Discovered? (Photos)

This post is in response to a comment left by Michael Grisanti on my post from January 12th. That entry featured some excellent aerial photographs of Khirbet Qeiyafa at the end of the 2011 dig season, particularly of Area C along the southern portion of the site.

Michael asked where the Qeiyafa ostracon was discovered. It was found in the 2008 dig season in a room near the Area B gate, on the western side of the site facing Tel Azekah.

Khirbet Qeiyafa at the end of 2011, with Area B marked along the western side. The Qeiyafa ostracon was unearthed just to the north (left) of the gate. Photo courtesy of the Khirbet Qeiyafa excavation.

A closer view of Areas B and D at Khirbet Qeiyafa. Area D is everything to the south (right) of the gate. The yellow arrow indicates the spot in Area B where the ostracon was discovered, two rooms north of the gate. Photo courtesy of the Khirbet Qeiyafa excavation.

The ostracon was excavated in the morning of July 15, 2008. It came from a level dated to Iron IIA, around the early 10th century B.C. When the ink inscription was recognized that afternoon arrangements were immediately made to transport the ostracon to the Hebrew University’s lab in Jerusalem for cleaning and analysis. Dr. Haggai Misgav, the epigrapher who first analyzed the inscription, determined it to be Hebrew written in what he initially called a “Proto-Canaanite” script. A number of letters are fully faded, making translation very difficult. (Here are posts dating back to the ostracon’s discovery, a short video of an initial analysis, Misgav’s initial translation, and an alternative translation that depends heavily on reconstructed letters.) Scholars are still divided on the translation of the inscription.

Area B (from the bottom to the gate area) at Khirbet Qeiyafa, looking south. The arrow marks the spot where the ostracon was found in 2008. Photo courtesy of the Khirbet Qeiyafa excavation.

The view out of the Area B (western) gate of Qeiyafa, with Tel Azekah prominent in the background. The ostracon was discovered in a room adjoining the second casemate to the right, just outside of this photo. Photo by Luke Chandler.

For some reason I do not have a good close-up photo of the actual room. Hopefully the photos I’ve posted here will help anyone visiting the site to identify where the ostracon was discovered.

Earliest Fragment of Romans Discovered?

A papyrus fragment with text from Romans 9 and 10 has been dated just this week to the mid-2nd century. If the date hold up, it is the oldest known fragment of Romans and one of the oldest extant copies of the New Testament text.

Guess where this rare fragment is? It’s in a collection belonging to Steve Green, the President of Hobby Lobby.

CNN has a short video report with Green that shows the fragment plus a couple of other interesting biblical manuscripts in his collection. Green explains more about the papyrus in the video.

HT: PaleoJudaica, Peter Williams at the Evangelical Textual Criticism Blog

New Photos of Khirbet Qeiyafa After 2011 Dig Season

New aerial photos of Khirbet Qeiyafa have been posted on its official web site. They show excellent, up-to-date views of the excavated areas.

Khirbet Qeiyafa after the 2011 excavation season. From left to right: Area B (western gate), Area D (abutting Area B), Area A (center/summit of site) and Area C (southern gate, facing Elah valley). Photo courtesy of the Khirbet Qeiyafa excavation.

A closer view of Area C. The casemate city wall is clearly visible with the abutting houses. The four-chambered gate had been closed and reconstructed in the Hellenistic period. 5 casemates above the gate is the foundation of a tower with a small stable adjoining. The 2 casemates above the tower are a two-building compound with a shared entrance. The top room of this compound yielded cultic finds featured on this blog a few posts back. Photo courtesy of the Khirbet Qeiyafa excavation.

My square from 2011 is the bottom room and casemate on the right in the above photo. It is part of a larger Iron Age building that will be more fully excavated in the 2012 season. The bottom-left of the excavated area was a quarry that appears to have produced stones for the fortifications. Workers quarried large stones and rolled them downhill to be used in construction of the city walls.

View all of the photos here.

Has a new stash of old Jewish texts been discovered?

Word is out that some very old Jewish texts, including copies of scripture, have been found in an Afghanistan cave along the Silk Road. The discovery reportedly includes passages from Isaiah, an unknown history of the kingdom of Judea (the Maccabees?) a funerary dirge for an unnamed individual, and writings from a Jewish sage who died in the mid-10th century A.D.

You can read about it in the Jerusalem Post.

“We know today about a couple of findings,” Haggai Ben- Shammai, professor emeritus of Arabic language and literature at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, was quoted as saying. “In all, in my opinion, there are about 150 fragments. It may be the tip of the iceberg.”

If this information is correct, the earliest possible date for these copies would likely be the latter half of the 10th century A.D., assuming all of the scrolls are around the same age.

The Silk Road was a trade route that connected the Middle East and western world with China. Merchants, including Jewish businessmen, used it for centuries. One of its most famous travelers was a guy named Marco Polo, who introduced the Far East to Europeans at the beginnings of the Italian Renaissance.

These particular texts were reportedly moved from Afghanistan to Pakistan and then sold to a variety of antiquities dealers. If these fragments and/or scrolls can be examined and verified by scholars, they may provide a wealth of fresh information.

Exciting contemplation: What else is still out there, hidden in some desert and awaiting discovery?

2011 in review

What a year with many great discoveries! I’ve been blessed with more readers than expected even though I can’t devote as much time to this blog as I would like. When my graduate work wraps up I’ll hopefully have more time to invest.

Have a very Happy New Year!   – Luke

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 17,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 6 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Report: New Finds from 1st & 2nd Temple Periods on Slope of Temple Mount

An upcoming report details new finds from as far back as the 10th-9th centuries B.C. in a salvage excavation on the eastern slope of the Temple Mount. Workers uncovered these pits along the Kidron Valley in 2009 and turned the excavation/processing over to the Temple Mount Sifting Project.

A briefing on the forthcoming report describes the following finds:

• Pottery from Iron IIA and IIB, and the 2nd century B.C. through 1st century A.D. (Iron IIA is essentially David and Solomon in the biblical timeline. Iron IIB is most of the Divided Kingdom period)
• Six clay bullae/sealings and one bone seal. Some were in Egyptian style and seemed to date to the 9^th-8^th centuries BCE. One bulla included the inscription “[גֺ]בעןֺ/לֺמלך”  (“Gibeon for the king”) and could be dated to the 8^th or early 7^th century BCE. The bulla is from a unique group called “fiscal bullae” which sealed tax commodities sent to the King of Judah. The bulla is discussed in depth in Gabriel Barkay’s article in this volume.
• Fragments of jar handles with potter’s marks
• Dozens of clay figurine fragments
• A bone figurine fragment which represent a very high level carving of a man’s face.
• A terracotta figurine fragment of an arm and a palm with a club. We presume this was probably a figurine of Hercules holding a club.

These finds span both 1st and 2nd Temple periods. Finds from Iron IIA indicate something significant was happening on the mountain in the biblical time of David/Solomon.

The appearance of pottery from the early phases of the Iron Age II was surprising due to the scarcity of such remains in Jerusalem, especially outside the City of David. The reason for such scarcity is that the vast majority of the archaeological finds usually come from destruction layers which mark the end of a period. For this reason finding pottery from all periods of the Iron Age II strengthens the assumption that we are dealing with a refuse aggregates and not regular occupation deposits…

One more interesting tidbit from the briefing about…

…a few biblical references that imply the existence of a garbage dump at Kidron valley near the Temple Mount (see 1 Kings 15:11-14; 2 Kings 23:4-12; 2 Chronicles 29:15; 2 Chronicles 30:14;  Jeremiah 31:40). These accounts and the existence of such a refuse pit near the stream of the Kidron Valley at its western bank and its special finds may indicate that the refuse in the pit we have recovered originates from the Temple Mount.

From PaleoJudaica, who received it from Joseph Lauer.

New Find: Clay Seal from 1st Century Jewish Temple (with Inscription)

Recent digs next to Jerusalem’s Temple Mount have uncovered a small inscribed clay seal that seems to have been involved with worship at the 1st-century (New Testament-era)  Temple. Its inscription has a shortened form of the name of God (“Yahweh”) in Aramaic.

A first of its kind find, indicative of activity in the Temple, was recently discovered: a tiny item that probably “certified” the ritual purity of an object or food in the Temple Mount compound and in the Second Temple.

The official press release from the IAA (a more permanent link here) says the seal was found in excavations near the southwestern corner of the Temple Mount. All of the excavated soil in this area was wet-sifted. (This process involves soaking and then sifting soil/debris. It’s meticulous and a bit messy, but makes it easier to identify small objects.)

According to the excavation directors on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, archaeologists Eli Shukron of the IAA and Professor Ronny Reich of the University of Haifa, “The meaning of the inscription is ‘Pure for G-d’. It seems that the inscribed object was used to mark products or objects that were brought to the Temple, and it was imperative they be ritually pure… To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that such an object or anything similar to it was discovered in an archaeological excavation and it constitutes direct archaeological evidence of the activity on the Temple Mount and the workings of the Temple during the Second Temple period.”

Ferrell Jenkins notes that this kind of seal could have been used in a situation described by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.

If you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.  (Matthew 5:23-24 ESV)

A “gift” such as an animal, grain or a libation (drink offering) would have to be certified as ritually clean in order to be presented at the Temple. Worshipers either brought their offerings to a screener who provided them with a token like this one, or possibly purchased a certified offering at a booth and received the purity token with it. The token and the offering would then be presented to the presiding priests at the altar.

Inscribed clay seal discovered next to Jerusalem's Temple Mount. The Aramaic inscription translates as, "Pure for God." (Photo courtesy of the IAA by IAA photo by Vladimir Naykhin.)

Photo courtesy of the IAA by Vladimir Naykhin

Photo courtesy of the IAA by Vladimir Naykhin.

As Jim Davila at PaleoJudaica puts in, “The fact that it happens to be announced on both Hanukkah and Christmas is, I’m sure, entirely coincidental.”

Fresh Evidence for an early Exodus? (15th century date)

An old inscription receives a fresh look that may reveal evidence for the date of the Israelite Exodus.

The biblical text indicates the Israelite exodus from Egypt took place in the fifteenth century (mid-1400′s) B.C., but some scholars argue for a date almost two centuries later based on some archaeological evidence. Late-date scholars put the Exodus in the time of Pharaoh Ramses II in the 13th century. This is the view typically found in the movies. (Seen “Prince of Egypt” lately?) Supporters of the early, 15th century date have suggested various candidates for “The” Pharaoh. The Bible does not actually name the Pharaoh of the Exodus.

Extra-biblical evidence for an exodus is fragmentary. The Egyptians omitted things in their own records that reflected weakness or defeat, so it is no surprise the Pharaohs were silent on the matter. The earliest known extra-biblical evidence of Israel is in a late-13th century inscription known as the Merneptah Stele. Merneptah was Ramses II’s son who reigned ca. 1213 – 1203 B.C. The inscription describes the naturally-glorious success of his military campaign. His list of conquered peoples includes an Israel in Canaan. The hieroglyphs indicate this Israel was not a political state, but a people. This supports the biblical chronology that a pre-monarchical ”Israel” was in Canaan, able to be recognized by Egypt in the late 13th century.

The Associates for Biblical Research has recently published an article on another Egyptian inscription, the Berlin Statue Pedestal Relief, that may indicate an even earlier mention of Israel. It dates to the 13th century – Ramses II’s time – but appears to have been copied from a 14th or 15th century inscription.

[The] source is an inscription housed in the Egyptian Museum in Berlin…

The inscription is comprised of three name rings superimposed on Western Asiatic prisoners, the rightmost of which is only partly preserved due to substantial damage… Above the heads of the prisoners is a partial band of hieroglyphs which reads “…one who is falling on his feet…” The inscription was first published in 2001 by Manfred Görg, Professor Emeritus of Old Testament Theology and Egyptology at the University of Munich…

The first two names are easily read—Ashkelon and Canaan. The name on the right, however, is less certain. Görg restored the right name as Israel and dated the inscription to the reign of Ramesses II… based on a similarity of names to those on the Merneptah Stele (ca. 1210 BC).¹ Görg also concluded, based on the spellings of the names, that they were copied from an earlier inscription from around the time of Amenhotep II (ca. 1453–1419). Israeli Egyptologist Raphael Giveon previously dated the inscription to the reign of Amenhotep III (ca. 1386–1349 BC). If these two scholars are right, this extra-Biblical Egyptian inscription would place Israel in Canaan at about the time of the Biblical date for the Conquest.

Görg and two other German scholars have re-analyzed the inscription and published their updated findings. They confirm the original conclusions.

The authors point out that the names Ashkelon and Canaan largely were written consonantally and thus are closer to Eighteenth Dynasty examples from the reigns of Tuthmosis III (ca. 1504–1450 BC) and Amenhotep II, than to those from the times of Ramesses II and Merenptah. In addition, ethnic renderings (“Canaanites”) in the inscriptions of Amenhotep II are similar to the name on the Berlin fragment, providing further evidence for an early date.

There is a question of spelling in this inscription, which amounts to “Ishrael” instead of the normal “Israel”. The article notes one scholar’s objection based on this difference but suggests possible explanations.

If this 13th century inscription reads “Israel” and was copied from an earlier text, we have  evidence that Israel was established in Canaan according to the timeline in the Bible text, well before the 13th century B.C.

On a side note… this inscription was discovered in the late 1800′s, yet researchers are gleaning fresh information from it in the early 21st century. There are literally hundreds of thousands of ancient texts sitting in museums, waiting to be properly researched and published. Only a small number of people are qualified to do this, hence the slow pace. How much fresh information is sitting in a box or on a shelf, waiting for someone to finally get to it?

(I understand the backlog these scholars face. I’ve been sitting on this story for more than a week but have been too busy to get to it.)

Questions on Khirbet Qeiyafa’s 2010 cultic room

Todd Bolen commented with a series of questions on my previous post about the Qeiyafa cultic room from 2010. Todd wrote:

1. What parallels exist for this type of incense altar? 2. Was evidence of burning found in this room? 3. Did the drain in this room serve the cultic practice? If so, how? 4. Was the standing stone found standing or was it re-erected by the excavators? In either case, what is the evidence that it was used for religious purposes? 5. What is the best explanation for the lack of figurines and engraved images? 6. Are there explanations besides a cultic one that would explain the finds in these rooms?

I can provide some answers to a few of these questions. Remaining questions will hopefully be answered in coming publications by Yossi Garfinkel and the Qeiyafa staff.

Question #1: In his 2010 ASOR presentation, Garfinkel showed photos comparing the 10th century Qeiyafa incense altar with another 10th century altar found at Tel Rehov in Israel. A photo of the Rehov is available here from the Tel Rehov official site. The Rehov altar shows images of two human females with a palm tree between them. The Judahite altar from Qeiyafa is devoid of human figures. Perhaps this is reflective of greater tolerance in the north for images in cultic practice? This question should be explored in greater detail.

Question #2: The room itself was not destroyed by fire. I am checking on evidence of cultic burning (offerings, sacrifices).

Question #3: The drain channel is in an adjacent room but an opening was built into the wall of the cultic room. You can see an aerial photo of the room/drain layout here in a .pdf version of Garfinkel’s 2010 ASOR presentation (from Qeiyafa’s official site). Scroll down to the eleventh slide, which shows a series of numbered rooms attached to the casemate wall. The cultic room is room #7. The drain channel is clearly visible in room #6 along with the drainage hole in room #7. Clearly, the drain was shared by the two rooms. I do not know the use of the drain in cultic ritual apart from the obvious disposal of residue from whatever happened inside the room.

One additional detail… 2011 excavations revealed that buildings 6 and 7 share an entry corridor from the city interior. With a shared entryway and drainage channel, these buildings had some common relationship, perhaps as a mini-compound?

Question #4 – The standing stone was indeed found in its standing position. To my knowledge no reconstruction work has been done in the cultic room.

Evidence for the stone’s religious use would include the incense altar and libation vessel found in the same room, the position of the stone on the “high place” in the room, and the offering table in front of the stone.

Interestingly, someone facing the stone would be looking north. In later periods worshipers were expected to face the temple in Jerusalem, where the Ark of the Covenant and main altar were located. (2 Chronicles 6:21) From Qeiyafa this would have been to the east-northeast. Prior to the temple the Ark of the Covenant and the primary altar were in Khiriath-jearim and Gibeon, also to the east-northeast of Qeiyafa. Is there significance in worshipers in Qeiyafa facing north, or is it simply the direction one happens to look due to the layout of the city? Did the cardinal direction of worship matter in early Judah? Do the other standing stones at Qeiyafa line up in a particular way? Perhaps something on this will be noted in publication.

I’ll post soon on other recent discoveries from Khirbet Qeiyafa.

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Correction: There is no reason to label the altar from Qeiyafa as an “incense” altar. It could have been used for various kinds of small offerings.

Garfinkel Announces New Religious Finds at Khirbet Qeiyafa (photos)

Yossi Garfinkel recently presented finds from a cultic room unearthed at Khirbet Qeiyafa in 2010. He sent me some photos for this blog just before his presentation in Jerusalem. They are shown here with his permission.

Here is my own summary of what we know of Kh. Qeiyafa at this point. It was a planned fortress city constructed around the beginning of the 10th century B.C. – the time of David’s monarchy in the Bible. It sits at the border of ancient Judah and Philistia along the Elah Valley, where David fought Goliath in 1 Samuel 17. The population at Kh. Qeiyafa appears to have been Judahite for the following reasons:

• The city’s architecture is similar to other cities in Judah. It is different than that of the nearby Philistines, or even the northern tribes of Israel.
• Five seasons of excavation have yielded virtually no pig or dog bones. Pig and dog bones are common at Philistine and Canaanite sites but rare-to-nonexistent in Israel and Judah, who considered both animals to be unclean.
• The pottery at Qeiyafa is clearly not Philistine, even though ancient Gath is just a few miles away. It bears closer resemblance to Israelite and Judahite ceramics.
• Finger impressions on storage jars at Qeiyafa may be precursors to the later LMLK stamps that marked government property in the Kingdom of Judah.
• An inscription discovered at Qeiyafa in 2008 is believed by many to be Hebrew. The inscription’s language is clearly Semitic, not the Indo-European language of the Philistines.
• The city’s unique two-gate design leads the excavators to identify it as Shaaraim (Heb. – “two gates”). Joshua 15:36 lists Shaaraim as a city of Judah. 1 Chronicles 4 mentions it as a possession of Simeon, a tribe that existed in the midst of Judah.

Here are photos of the cultic (religious) room discovered in 2010. Human and animal figurines are common in Philistine, Canaanite and even northern Israelite cultic sites, but none were found in this room. These finds may offer a window into pre-Temple religion in Judah during David’s time.

A cultic room unearthed at Kh. Qeiyafa in 2010. The room adjoins the casemate city wall. A massebah (standing stone) is visible in the elevated part of the room. A bench sits along the far wall. A drain opening is visible just to the left of the bench.

The massebah (standing stone) in the 2010 cultic room at Kh. Qeiyafa. These stones frequently represented a god, sometimes perhaps YHWH, the God of Israel. A flat stone "offering table" is visible on the right side.

This incense basalt altar was unearthed at Kh. Qeiyafa in 2010. Altars from other peoples, including the later Kingdom of Israel, are typically engraved with human or animal figures. This Kh. Qeiyafa altar shows markings that might indicate a palm tree, but human or animal images are notably absent. Garfinkel believes this reflects the prohibition on "graven images" in Israelite religious law. (Exodus 20:4-5)

This is a vessel specifically designed for libations - fermented drinks that were poured over an offering. Vessels similar to this one were displayed on the "Table of Showbread" in the Israelite Tabernacle. (Numbers 4:7) Libations were an important component of sacrificial offerings in the Law of Moses.

Details on these finds have recently been published in Hebrew in the journal Qadmoniot. An English article was sent to BASOR (Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research) but it was reportedly rejected because the reviewer stated that an aniconic cult (religion with no icons/images) is not possible for that period. We will see how things develop as more data comes in.

Speaking of more data, Garfinkel announced the discovery of two additional cultic rooms at Qeiyafa from the 2011 excavation season. Garfinkel sent me this comment on our 2011 finds:

“In the two new cultic rooms various cultic objects were found, but no human or animal figurines. They confirm the results of the 2010 excavation season. The new cultic items are still under cleaning, restoration and documentation, so they will not be presented at the lecture.”

I helped to unearth one of the cultic rooms in 2011. It was certainly rich with finds, but as Garfinkel mentions we didn’t find any figurines or engraved images. Yossi plans to publish in the near future, so we should have access to more data soon.

Judah in the 10th century B.C. is comparatively sparse for archaeologists. These finds are filling in blanks in the archaeological narrative. These finds are consistent with the textual narrative we find in the Bible.