Israel Archaeological News - General

[Resource Manager]

Mapping Israel One Foot at a Time

 

The Israel Antiquities Authority seeks to precisely map every historical and archaeological site west of the Jordan. The project, which began in 1964, is due to end - if at all - in a few decades.

 

By Nir Hasson | Sep.30, 2012 | 7:45 AM

 

"At 4:30 A.M. every Friday, archaeologist Adam Zertal leaves his home at Kibbutz Ein Shemer, drives to Megiddo Junction, picks up volunteers and continues into Samaria in the West Bank. They reach their destination and begin walking - their eyes peeled to the ground. They scour the soil until 4 P.M.

 

The search began in 1978 near Beit She'an. One wadi after another, hill after hill, they have slowly walked southward. Today, 34 years later, they have almost reached Jericho.

 

"It could be said there isn't a meter we haven't covered," says Prof. Zertal, who walks using crutches, a remnant of an injury from the 1973 Yom Kippur War. "Walking is my rehabilitation. I walk slowly with crutches. The younger guys go much faster."

 

This is how the national archaeological survey, one of Israel's longest-running scientific projects, is being carried out. The aim is to clamber down every ravine, scale every hill and walk through every furrow in the country."

 

Continued

 

IAA Survey

 

Ht: KG - for the reminder

[Resource Manager]

What Happened to Solomon’s Palace in Jerusalem?

 

Posted on October 1, 2012 by Leen Ritmeyer

 

Certain images in the Image Library have been particularly popular with both teachers and publishers. Among these is the drawing of the development of the Temple Mount throughout the ages:

 

http://www.ritmeyer.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/jlm_herod_tm_dev_d01-copy.jpg

 

Often downloaded together with this is an image which shows a series of reconstruction drawings of the Temple Mount in the different historical periods:

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Experience a Day on a Dig

 

Posted on October 3, 2012 by Leen Ritmeyer

 

"Readers may be interested to follow the ‘Popular Archaeology’ website which has an article on the daily routine of an archaeological dig in Jerusalem. The website also has a video of the renewed Ophel excavations, which began in 1975."

 

Source

[Resource Manager]

This Week in History: 1st Jew in Patriarchs' Cave

 

By TAMARA ZIEVE

 

10/07/2012 15:03

 

In 1968, Shin Bet official's daughter snuck through a narrow hole into the Cave of the Patriarchs.

 

"On October 9, 1968 a thirteen-year-old girl made history, as she squeezed through a narrow hole into the underground chambers of the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, which the Jews had been forbidden to enter for 700 years under Mamluk, Ottoman, British and Jordanian rule. Jews were only allowed access to the staircase at the southeast of the site, initially only up to the fifth step and later increased to the seventh.

 

According to many accounts, Michal Arbel, daughter of Yehuda Arbel, then head of the Shin Bet in the Jerusalem District and after the Six Day War also of the West Bank, was the first Jew to enter the historic cave in 700 years.

 

According to the Machpela site website, however, Chief Rabbi of the Army, Rabbi Shlomo Goren preceded her, entering the gates of the site immediately after Israel's occupation of the West Bank in 1967.

 

In any case, Arbel made important discoveries regarding the layout of the cave, when she delved into the depths of the edifice entering the Isaac Hall; legend told that whoever descended into this area would not emerge alive. Arbel's slender frame allowed her to squeeze through the opening into the cave, where she found the tunnel that connects the two apertures in the Isaac Hall."

 

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[Resource Manager]

Further reading on:

 

Stone Age Artifacts Excavated at Ein Zippori Archaeological Site in Israel

 

October 09, 2012

 

"A treasure of impressive prehistoric finds was exposed during the course of archaeological excavations the Israel Antiquities Authority conducted this past year on behalf of Israel’s National Roads Company prior to the widening of a highway. The excavations encompass a large area covering a distance of c. 800 m, on both sides of the road."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

October 11, 2012

 

Israeli Archaeologist Digs for Truth at Sobibor Death Camp

 

by aron heller, associated press

 

"When Israeli archaeologist Yoram Haimi decided to investigate his family’s unknown Holocaust history, he turned to the skill he knew best: He began to dig.

 

After learning that two of his uncles were murdered in the Sobibor death camp, he embarked on a landmark excavation project that is shining new light on the workings of one of the most notorious Nazi killing machines, including pinpointing the location of the gas chambers where hundreds of thousands were killed.

 

Sobibor, in eastern Poland, marks perhaps the most vivid example of the Final Solution, the Nazi plot to wipe out European Jewry. Unlike other camps that had at least a facade of being prison or labor camps, Sobibor and the neighboring camps of Belzec and Treblinka were designed specifically for exterminating Jews. Victims were transported there in cattle cars and gassed to death almost immediately.

 

But researching Sobibor has been difficult. After an October 1943 uprising at the camp, the Nazis shut it down and leveled it to the ground, replanting over it to cover their tracks."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Road from Time of Earliest Christian Apostles Uncovered at Bethsaida

 

Mon, Oct 15, 2012

 

"Sitting and kneeling among a scattering of stones large and small, a small group of archaeologists, students and volunteers gradually dug and scraped their way down to reveal the remains of what was likely a paved road that was used by some of the earliest Christian apostles. They were digging at a site just 2 km from the northeast shore of the Sea of Galilee in Israel. Leading the group was Dr. Nicolae Roddy of Creighton University, Omaha, Nebraska. They were focusing on features recently revealed in an area labeled "Area C" of the excavation site plan. He and his excavation colleagues were assigned to carefully uncover and explore an area that contained finds of the Roman period of ancient Bethsaida, the fishing town that was, according to the Biblical account, the home of the New Testament Christian apostles Peter, Andrew and Phillip, and likely James and John as well."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Dog's Fall Led to Archaeological Discovery

 

Ancient wine presses found in Jerusalem thanks to a man who walked his dog.

 

By Gil Ronen

 

First Publish: 10/30/2012, 2:56 PM

 

"Ancient wine presses have been found in Jerusalem – and will soon be part of a new park – thanks to a resident of Ramot who walked his dog several years ago. The dog fell into a hole and had to be rescued. It later turned out that there are more holes in the vicinity, and that a meaningful archaeological discovery had been made."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Popular Archaeology

 

September 2012, Cover Stories, Daily News

 

Egyptian Deity Pendant, Herodian Structure Fragment Found in Jerusalem Dig

 

Tue, Oct 30, 2012

 

Finds were recovered while excavating a Byzantine tower in the Ophel area of Jerusalem.

 

"While deep within excavations of an ancient Byzantine tower structure in the Ophel area of Jerusalem, a team of archaeologists, students and volunteers recently unearthed two important finds representing ancient times that were centuries apart.

 

The first, only about one inch in length, was a small white necklace pendant made from faience (see video below). Originally green, the pendant was a figurine depicting the ancient Egyptian god Bes, a deity worshipped as a fertility god and protector of families and households, and in particular, of mothers, children and childbirth. The find is rare in that it is the first and only artifact of its kind, that of Bes, ever found in Jerusalem. Other Bes finds have been found throughout Egypt."

 

Continued

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nYqsWLkaBo

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1O5jhtc5dk

[Resource Manager]

Bloomberg News

 

Murder Mystery Surrounds Skeletons in Ancient Israel Well

 

By Alisa Odenheimer on November 08, 2012

 

"Archaeologists are facing a possible murder mystery after discovering two 8,500-year-old human skeletons at the bottom of a rare Stone-Age well used by the first farmers in Israel’s Jezreel Valley.

 

The skeletal remains belonged to a woman aged about 19 and an older man, according to archaeologists who announced the discovery today in an e-mailed release. The well dates back to the Neolithic period, they said."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Popular Archaeology

 

Ancient Scribe Penned Manuscripts Linking Dead Sea Scrolls with Manuscripts Found at Masada in Israel

 

Wed, Nov 07, 2012

 

Finding contradicts the notion that the Dead Sea Scrolls found near Qumran were part of a non-sectarian general Jewish library.

 

"Israeli paleographer Ada Yardeni has recently identified 50 Dead Sea scrolls found near Qumran in Israel as having been penned by the same scribe, a scribe who also penned scrolls that have been found at the Herodian mountain-top fortress of Masada, where Jewish rebel zealots made their last suicidal stand against the Romans in 73 A.D."

 

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[Resource Manager]

Reference:

 

Qumran & the Dead Sea Scrolls

 

Owen Jarus, LiveScience Contributor

 

Date: 06 November 2012 Time: 05:01 PM ET

 

"The site of Khirbet Qumran (a modern Arabic name) is located in the West Bank, near the northern edge of the Dead Sea, and is the place where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in nearby caves.

 

The first settlement was created during the Iron Age, but was abandoned about 2,600 years ago, long before the scrolls were made.

 

Archaeological work indicates that a second settlement existed between roughly 100 B.C. and A.D. 68, when it was captured by the Roman army and destroyed in a fire. The heat was so intense that modern-day archaeologists have found glass vessels “melted down” by it. It is in this settlement that many scholars believe at least some of the Dead Sea Scrolls were written before being hidden away.

 

Discovery of the scrolls

 

Explorers first came across Qumran in the 19th century, and the site took on new importance with the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Published: Nov 13th, 2012 Archaeology | By Enrico de Lazaro

 

Ancient Temple Dating Back to 1100 BC Found in Israel

 

A team of archaeologists from Tel Aviv University has unearthed ruins of a 3,100-year-old temple at the site of Tel Beth-Shemesh.

 

"Tel Beth-Shemesh is an important biblical site located near the modern town of Beth-Shemesh about 20 km west of Jerusalem. According to archaeologists, the name Tel Beth-Shemesh (House of the Sun) is suggestive of the deity that was worshipped by the Canaanite inhabitants of the town. The Bible mentions the settlement in the description of the northern border of the Tribe of Judah and as a Levitical city. The town is also listed in Solomon’s second administrative district.

 

The newly discovered temple complex is comprised of an elevated, massive circular stone structure and an intricately constructed building characterized by a row of three flat, large round stones."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Further on:

 

September 2012, Cover Stories, Daily News

 

10th Century B.C.E. Egyptian Scarab, Ritual Baths Unearthed in Jerusalem Excavation

 

By Popular Archaeology Staff

 

Sat, Nov 10, 2012

 

"Archaeologists discovered an Egyptian scarab dated to the 10th century B.C.E. during ongoing excavations in the Ophel area just south of the Jewish Temple Mount (or Islamic Haram-Ash Sharif)."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Macquarie University Excavates in Israel - Tel Azekah

 

November 12, 2012

 

"Macquarie University has joined Tel Aviv University, Heidelberg University and a consortium of other institutions in the joint scientific inquiry of Tel Azekah – one of the great archaeological sites of ancient Israel.

 

Andrew Pleffer – PhD candidate and Area Assistant Supervisor and Dr Gil Davis – Program Director have filed this report:

 

The project is designed to integrate archaeological fieldwork and historical knowledge derived from the Bible and inscriptions. It will shed light on this important fortress city in the Judahite Lowland Region (Shephelah) in the second and first millennia BCE."

 

Continued

 

H/t: PaleoJudaica.com

[Resource Manager]

Was the Pool near the Gihon Spring in the City of David fortified?

 

Posted on November 15, 2012 by Leen Ritmeyer

 

"During a visit to the City of David last week, I noticed that the Pool next to the Gihon Spring is being opened up for viewing. Scaffolding has been put inside the pool, apparently in preparation for the casting of a permanent concrete ceiling. The rocky southern edge of the pool is clearly visible, but there no remains of any wall built on that side could be detected.

 

In the initial reports it was claimed that a tower surrounded this pool. A reconstruction drawing on the site shows the Pool Tower to the left of the Spring Tower, a defensive tower built over the Gihon Spring. Both towers were accessed via a fortified passageway:":

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Biblical Archaeology Review

 

Where Were the Old Testament Kings of Ancient Jerusalem Buried?

 

Archaeologist Jeff Zorn reinvestigates an old theory

 

Biblical Archaeology Society Staff • 11/26/2012

 

"Jeffrey Zorn presents some of Raymond Weill’s early-20th-century plans from his Jerusalem excavations in “Is T1 David’s Tomb?” in the November/December 2012 BAR. Take a closer look at Weill’s detailed drawings in the Bible History Daily exclusive “King David’s Tomb–A Closer Look.” Zoom in on pictures from the magazine, and get a fresh look at additional web-exclusive photographs, plans and drawings.

 

Nearly a century ago, French archaeologist Raymond Weill excavated what he identified to be tombs in Jerusalem’s City of David—perhaps the royal necropolis of the earliest Old Testament kings. Some scholars have since disputed this claim, but a new examination of the evidence by archaeologist Jeff Zorn suggests that Weill might well have been right."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Public release date: 28-Nov-2012

 

University of Rhode Island

 

URI, IAA archaeologists discover shipwrecks, ancient harbor on coast of Israel

 

"KINGSTON, R.I. – November 28, 2012 – A team of archaeologists from the University of Rhode Island, the Israel Antiquities Authority, and the University of Louisville have discovered the remains of a fleet of early-19th century ships and ancient harbor structures from the Hellenistic period (third to first century B.C.) at the city of Akko, one of the major ancient ports of the eastern Mediterranean. The findings shed light on a period of history that is little known and point to how and where additional remains may be found.

 

The discoveries were presented on November 15 and 17 in Chicago at the annual meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research by URI assistant professors Bridget Buxton and William Krieger on behalf of the Israel Coast Exploration project.

 

According to Buxton, three of the four well-preserved shipwrecks found off the coast south of Akko were first detected using a sub-bottom profiler in 2011. Later, storms stripped off several meters of inshore sediments and temporarily revealed the wrecks, as well as an additional large vessel. The wrecks are now reburied.

 

During the brief time the shipwrecks were exposed, the Israel Antiquities Authority investigated one of them: a 32 meter vessel which still preserved its brass gudgeon (rudder socket) and many small artifacts, such as plates, a candlestick, and even a cooking pot with bones in it. Laboratory analyses completed this summer by the IAA revealed that the ship's wood came from Turkey. The team believes these ships may have belonged to the Egyptian navy under Admiral Osman Nurredin Bey, whose ships were severely damaged in his attempt to capture Akko in the Egyptian-Ottoman War of 1831. The town eventually fell to Egyptian land forces under Ibrahim Pasha in 1832."

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Popular Archaeology

 

September 2012, Cover Stories, Daily News

 

Extensive New First Temple Period Remains Unearthed in Jerusalem

 

Fri, Nov 30, 2012

 

Findings include what could be the largest haul yet of pottery fragments from the time of Jerusalem's First Temple.

 

"Archaeologists, students and volunteers have unearthed archaeological remains that will shed additional light on the occupation of ancient Jerusalem's royal precinct of the time of the Israelite and Judahite kings, going back to the 10th century BCE.

 

Under the direction of Eilat Mazar of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, painstaking excavation by a team of archaeologists, including a group from the Herbert W. Armstrong College in the U.S., has revealed extensive architectural elements, including floor layers and walls, that suggest at least one very large structure of yet-to-be-determined function. This, after weeks of excavating through layers containing artifacts, architectural elements and other features representing later periods of occupation, including those of the Byzantine and Second Temple (Herodian) periods."

 

Continued

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhNcM7F8z-Y

[Resource Manager]

Bethsaida Road Traveled By Jesus and Disciples Uncovered Near Sea of Galilee

 

November 30, 2012 | Filed under: Featured,Science,World | By: Editor

 

Archaeologists have uncovered what they believe is a road that was traveled by Jesus and the disciples in the ancient town of Bethsaida.

 

"In conducting a dig near the Northeastern shore of the Sea of Galilee in Israel, which was originally meant to serve as a mission to find artifacts from the Roman period, archaeologists came across a distinctive discovery.

 

“We uncovered a paved street from the time of Jesus’s disciples, which runs westward through the residential area from the corner of the Fisherman’s House down toward the Jordan valley,” Nicolae Roddy of Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska, one of the leaders of the dig, told the publication Popular Archaeology. “I tell people that Andrew, Peter and Phillip almost certainly walked on it because they would have had to have gone out of their way to avoid it!”"

 

Continued

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVCLhH8zzvQ

 

Hat Tip: BiblePlaces Blog

[Resource Manager]

Digging Deep: Archaeology for Everyone

 

From ancient Egyptian scarabs to lost British pennies, the Antiquities Authority has a million artifacts in storerooms that are bursting at the seams. Here’s where to see some of the most intriguing

 

By AVIVA AND SHMUEL BAR-AM

 

December 1, 2012, 6:26 am

 

"Shaul Gefen grew up in a miniscule apartment in Dorot, the first kibbutz to be founded in the Negev. On one side of the only sink in the one-and-a-half-room dwelling stood a box of caustic soda for cleaning metal; on the other, a container with paraffin oil for restoration. Both items belonged to his father, Yekutiel, who like many others of his generation was obsessed with the past and spent his free time combing the nearby fields, tels, and wadis for artifacts left behind by long-ago Negev settlers.

 

As a child, Gefen often tagged along with his dad — but not because he was interested in archeology. It was the joy of picking things up off the ground and seeing the look on his father’s face when they turned out to be special, he says. “Once I brought him what I thought was a tiny bead,” relates Gefen. “My father was thrilled, and told me I had discovered a scarab — an ancient Egyptian amulet decorated with a beetle.”

 

Today, in addition to his other kibbutz duties, Gefen is in charge of Dorot’s marvelous archeological exhibit. Like dozens of other little-known archeological exhibits scattered throughout Israel, Dorot’s is free to all comers.

 

Scattered throughout Israel are dozens of archeological exhibits, indoor and outdoor, that anyone can visit at no charge. Each has its own particular charm, history and landscape, and all display their artifacts courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority. That’s because every relic found in this country that is more than 312 years old (dating back to before 1700) belongs to the State."

 

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H/t: BiblePlaces Blog

[Resource Manager]

Virtual Walking Tour of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem

 

Posted on December 7, 2012 by Leen Ritmeyer

 

Although it has been online for a while, this Virtual Walking Tour of the Temple Mount remains fascinating to watch. It has been produced by the Saudi Aramco World.

 

Haram al-Sharif, as the Temple Mount is known in Arabic, is the third holiest site for Muslims. On this artificial platform, that was extended by Herod the Great, stands the Dome of Rock, the Al-Aqsa and 40+ other smaller structures.

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

Israeli Separation Wall Threatens Battir's Ancient Terraces

 

Israeli environmentalists and even the state parks authority are backing Palestinian villagers' attempts to preserve landscape that is expected to be declared world heritage site by Unesco

 

Harriet Sherwood in Jerusalem

 

The Guardian, Tuesday 11 December 2012 16.42 GMT

 

"The future of an ancient agricultural landscape, incorporating extensive stone-walled terraces and a unique natural irrigation system, could be decided on Wednesday when a petition against the planned route of Israel's vast concrete and steel separation barrier is heard by the high court.

 

The terraces of the Palestinian village of Battir, near Bethlehem, are expected to be declared a world heritage site by Unesco, the United Nations' cultural body, in the coming months.

 

But, Friends of the Earth, which filed the petition, says Israel's decision to construct the West Bank barrier through a valley running between the terraces threatens to inflict irreversible harm to the landscape."

 

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[Resource Manager]

Jerusalem Model at Ben Gurion Airport

 

Posted on December 11, 2012 by Leen Ritmeyer

 

"Alexander Schick, director of the Qumran and Bible Exhibition, alerted me to the fact that a new model of Jerusalem as it was about 2000 years ago has been placed inside the Arrival Hall at Ben Gurion Airport, Israel’s main international airport. It is a smaller wooden version of the well-known model of Jerusalem of the Second Temple period that used to be located at the Holyland Hotel, but has been moved a few years ago to the Israel Museum. It was designed in the 1960′s by the late Prof. Michael Avi-Yonah.

 

This new model appears to have been designed by the Israel Museum to attract people to go and visit this famous museum in Jerusalem. It is well worth a visit!"

 

Continued

[Resource Manager]

The Antonia Fortress in Jerusalem

 

Posted on December 12, 2012 by Leen Ritmeyer

 

"Renovation work is being carried out in the north of the Temple Mount. Large blue drapes cover part of the Antonia Rockscarp and razor-sharp barbed wire has closed off the area.

 

By the looks of it, the building on top of the rockscarp is undergoing much needed restoration. Here stands the madrasa (Islamic religious school) of al-Jawiliyya that was built in the Mamluk period, between 1315 and 1320. Inside this building is a large vaulted semi-enclosed area opening up to a courtyard which has adjacent rooms that look out over the Temple Mount area."

 

Continued