Philippe Bohstrom reports in Haaretz on the discovery of a large royal structure immediately adjacent to the Solomonic city gate.

A palatial building dating to the era of King Solomon 3000 years ago has been discovered in the royal city of Gezer, though there is no evidence which of the Israelite kings lived there, if any.
The monumental building dates to the 10th century BCE, the era associated with King Solomon, who is famed for bringing wealth and stability to the newly-united kingdom of Israel and Judah. The American archaeological team also found a layer featuring Philistine pottery, lending credence to the biblical account of them living in the city until being vanquished by King David.
The complex features a large central courtyard, like contemporary palace-like buildings found throughout the southern Levant, including at Hatzor and Megiddo. Though there’s no telling who ruled from there, if anybody did, the edifice is significantly larger than the size of ordinary houses of the time, excavation co-director Prof. Steve Ortiz, representing the Tandy Museum of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary of Fort Worth, Texas, told Haaretz. Among the features not found in usual domestic structures is ashlar masonry – large rectangular-shaped monolithic hewn stones – in the corners of rooms, Ortiz said.
[…]
The main feature is two parallel long rooms, or courtyards, surrounded on all sides by various rooms, numbering at least 15. The palace has two entrances from the east and west. The entrance from the west also connects this building to the monumental six-chambered gate associated by most scholars with Solomon. This entrance is more robustly built than the rest of the building: The walls are constructed with two to three rows of stones wide, built of roughly dressed field stones somewhat smaller in size than those used in the rest of the building.

The article contains photos and more background about the historical importance of Gezer along with a little bit of the reasoning for dating this stratum to the 10th, and not 9th, century.

HT: Joseph Lauer

Gezer aerial from west, ws073114058b
Gezer from the west, showing area of palace excavations
Photo by Bill Schlegel
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A high school student found a ballista ball from the Bar Kochba Revolt during recent excavations of Beitar.

Excavators working at Abel Beth Maacah discovered one of the earliest silver hoards ever found.

There’s more information about the excavation of the chariot race mosaic in Cyprus.

To make the looting of Syrian artifacts more difficult, the US State Department announced emergency import restrictions.

“Oxford University researchers say that trees which grew during intense radiation bursts in the past have ‘time-markers’ in their tree-rings that could help archaeologists date events from thousands of years ago.”

Wayne Stiles explains how the Herodium testifies to God’s sovereignty.


The New York Times is no fan of the Ben-Hur remake.

The Associates for Biblical Research are beginning to recruit for their first season of excavations at Shiloh next summer.

Leon Mauldin posts on the end of wicked Queen Athaliah and shares a photo of a model of Jerusalem at the Bible Lands Museum.

If you wanted to know a little more about Enoch’s journey through the world (referenced in
Thursday’s survey results), Paleojudaica explains.

The new NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible is being released on Tuesday. It looks impressive, and you can flip through the entire books of Genesis and Matthew online to see for yourself.

Hundreds of photos, maps, and charts accompany study notes edited by John Walton (OT) and Craig
Keener (NT). The promotional website also includes videos and infographics.

HT: Agade, Ted Weis, Joseph Lauer

Old City aerial at night from southwest, ws052016101
Our most re-tweeted photo of the week was this aerial photo taken by Bill Schlegel of Jerusalem from the southwest. The Citadel of David is in the foreground and the Mount of Olives is in the distance.
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A first-century AD synagogue has been discovered in eastern lower Galilee at Tel Rekhesh (Tell el-Mukharkhash). The synagogue was apparently in use until the village was abandoned during the Bar Kochba Revolt. Ynet News has the story:

Last Tuesday, an excavation team discovered, just ten centimeters below the peak’s surface, a synagogue from the first century AD. The find contained a huge and impressive room nine meters high and eight meters wide with walls lined with benches made of limestone blocks. Diggers also discovered one of the two foundational pillars supporting the synagogue’s roof.
[…]
“This is the first synagogue of its kind in the Galilee villages,” Dr. Aviam explained. “In Migdal, for example, there is a synagogue but that is a big city. Here we are talking about a magnificent agricultural area about four Dunam [1 acre] in size where buildings are decorated with frescoes and stucco articles. Jewish families lived in the estate but due to the fact that the nearest synagogue was four kilometers away (a distance deemed too far from a community according to Jewish law) the owner of the estate built the synagogue for himself and for the dozens of workers in his employment.”
[…]
Dr. Aviam told Ynet that the remains of objects were found which could definitely be dated back to the first century AD. Prior to the recent discovery, archaeologists already suspected the presence of a Jewish community on the peak.
Indeed, one of the main reasons that the researchers were able to extrapolate that the estate belonged to a Jewish community was the absence of big bones or remains. Indeed, pig was a staple part of a community’s diet in which Jews did not reside.
Further proof that Tel Recheš was an old Jewish community was the existence of many stone utensils. According to Jewish law, stone utensils cannot become impure, unlike other tool such as metal and glass. The preferred material of choice for cooking among Jews toward the end of the Second Temple era was stone.

As the article notes, Tel Rekhesh is not easily accessible to visitors. The 11-acre site is located about 5 miles (8 km) southeast of Mount Tabor and about 7.5 miles (12 km) southwest of the Sea of Galilee. Yohanan Aharoni identified it as biblical Anaharath (Josh 19:19), a city also mentioned in the records of Thutmose III, Amenhotep II, as well as in the Amarna Letters.

HT: Joseph Lauer

Tel Rekhesh from west, adr1306295291
Tel Rekhesh from the west
Photo by A.D. Riddle
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Earlier this morning, Hebrew University sent out this press release with photos:

In a historic find, a large fragment of an Egyptian statue measuring 45 X 40 centimeters, made of lime-stone, was discovered. In the course of the current season of excavations at Tel-Hazor, north of the Sea of Galilee in Israel. Only the lower part of the statue survived, depicting the crouching feet of a male figure, seated on a square base on which a few lines in the Egyptian hieroglyphic script are inscribed.
The archaeologists estimate that the complete statue would equal the size of a fully-grown man. At present only a preliminary reading of the inscriptions has been attempted, and the title and name of the Egyptian official who originally owned the statue, are not yet entirely clear.
The statue was originally placed either in the official’s tomb or in a temple – most probably a temple of the Egyptian god Ptah – and most of the texts inscribed on the statue’s base include words of praise to the official who may have served and most probably practiced his duties in the region of Memphis, the primary cult center of the god Ptah. They also include the customary Egyptian funerary formula ensuring eternal supply of offerings for the statue’s owner.

The monumental Egyptian statute of a high official from the Middle Kingdom in Egypt, found in the administrative palace at Hazor, north of the Sea of Galilee in Israel. (Photo credit: Shlomit Bechar)
The three volunteer excavators who found the statue, from left to right: Valentin Sama-Rojo from Spain, Bryan Kovach from the United States, and Elanji Swart from South Africa. (Photo credit: Shlomit Bechar)

This statue, found this year, together with the sphinx fragment of the Egyptian king Mycerinus (who ruled Egypt in the 25th century B.C.E.) discovered at the site by the research team three years ago, are the only monumental Egyptian statues found so far in second millennium contexts in the entire Levant.
The discovery of these two statues in the same building currently being excavated by the research team, indicates the special importance of the building (probably the administrative palace of the ruler of the city), as well as that of the entire city of Hazor.
[…]
In the course of close to 30 years of excavation, fragments of 18 different Egyptian statues, both royal and private, dedicated to Egyptian kings and officials, including two sphinxes, were discovered at Hazor. Most of these statues were found in layers dated to the Late Bronze Age (15th-13th centuries B.C.E.) – corresponding to the New Kingdom in Egypt. This is the largest number of Egyptian statues found so far in any site in the Land of Israel, although there is no indication that Hazor was one of the Egyptian strongholds in Southern Canaan nor of the presence of an Egyptian official at Hazor during the Late Bronze Age.
Interestingly, most Egyptian statues found at Hazor so far date to Egypt’s “Middle Kingdom” (19th-18th centuries B.C.E), a time when Hazor did not yet exist. It thus seems that the statues were sent by an Egyptian king in the “New Kingdom” as official gifts to the king of Hazor, or as dedications to a local temple (regardless of their being already “antiques”). This is not surprising considering the special status of the king of Hazor who was the most important king in Southern Canaan at the time. The extraordinary importance of Hazor in the 15th-13th centuries B.C.E. is indicated also by the Biblical reference to Hazor as “the head of all those kingdoms” (Joshua 11:10).
All the statues at the site were found broken to pieces and scattered over a large area. Clear signs of mutilation indicate that most of them were deliberately and violently smashed, most probably in the course of the city’s final conquest and destruction sometime in the 13th century B.C.E. The deliberate mutilation of statues of kings and dignitaries accompanying the conquest of towns, is a well-known practice in ancient times (I Samuel 5:1-4; Isaiah 11:9) as well as in our time.

The full press release is here, and the story is being covered by the Jerusalem Post and other outlets.

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Forty-five shipwrecks, many dating back to ancient times, have been discovered off a Greek archipelago that is one of the Mediterranean’s richest underwater archaeological sites.”

A large and Roman mosaic has been discovered in Larnaca, Cyprus. A short video shows the excavation.

“A large number of expansive rock tombs which could constitute part of the world’s largest necropolis have been discovered during work carried out by the Şanlıurfa Municipality around the historic Urfa Castle in southeastern Turkey.”

“Excavation teams at an ancient site [Side] in the southern province of Antalya are struggling to find sponsors after it emerged that the site contains an ancient brothel.”

The Lion of Babylon is not faring well in part because of the visitors that keep climbing on its back.

The oldest writing found on papyrus is now on display in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

Scholars believe that have identified an ancient security system that protected the pharaoh’s burial chamber in one of the pyramids of Giza.

Philippi is in the latest group of sites to be named a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Some British MPs are proposing the return of the Elgin Marbles to smooth Britain’s departure from the EU.

Two Hellenistic marble sculptures from the Pergamon Museum in Berlin will remain on loan for the next two years at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The ancient Mamertine Prison in Rome will soon be open after three years for restoration and excavation.

After a $73 million renovation, Yale will soon be re-opening the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library.

“Dendrochronological and radiocarbon research by an international team led by Cornell archaeologist Sturt Manning has established an absolute timeline for the archaeological, historical and environmental record in Mesopotamia from the early second millennium B.C.”

Ben Witherington III has more than 20 posts on his recent trip to Turkey. Highlights include visits to the Miletus Museum, the Izmir Museum, and the Zeugma Museum (which has a splendid mosaic).

New book out from Eisenbrauns: “Did I Not Bring Israel Out of Egypt?” Biblical, Archaeological, and Egyptological Perspectives on the Exodus Narratives, edited by James K. Hoffmeier, Alan R. Millard, and Gary A. Rendsburg.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Ted Weis, Charles Savelle, Explorator, Daniel Wright

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The archaeological co-directors provide a summary of this summer’s work at Tel Ein Jezreel.

Archaeologists working at Bethsaida have found some monumental towers guarding the approach ramp to the city gate.

Haaretz (premium) reports on the latest discoveries in the Mount Zion excavation, including a bathtub and a cup with a priestly inscription. Joel Kramer’s drone photo gives a good perspective.

Wayne Stiles reflects this week on lessons to be learned from Jeremiah’s hometown of Anathoth.

For the first time, researchers have succeeded in sequencing the genome of ancient barley grains found in a cave near Masada.

An update on the renovations of Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity includes photos of newly restored mosaics.

IAA inspectors raided a shop in the Old City of Jerusalem suspected to be selling antiquities without a license.

Invitations are now open for a 2017 conference entitled “The Anglo-German Exploration of the Holy Land, 1865-1915.”

Eric Mitchell has begun a series on biblical archaeology for the Christian Examiner.

An article in Forbes asks how augmented reality will affect archaeological sites.

With a recent grant, plans are moving forward in the creation of the Digital Library of the Middle East.

Gordon Govier speaks this week with Cynthia Shafer-Elliott about “Daily Life in Ancient Israel” on the Book and the Spade (part 1, part 2).

Some Leon Uris favorites are on sale for Kindle now: Exodus, Mila 18, QB VII, and others.

HT: Agade, Joseph Lauer, Ted Weis, Charles Savelle, Explorator, Daniel Wright

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