Archaeologists working south of Jerusalem discovered a major royal administrative center from the time of Ahaz or Hezekiah. 180 inscribed jar handles provide insights into the organization of agricultural production.
Today is Yom Kippur, and Noga Ayali-Darshan explains “the scapegoat ritual and its ancient Near Eastern parallels.”
“A helmet found in the ruins of the famous Roman city wiped out by a volcano eruption a few years after the destruction of Jerusalem depicts a palm tree, a symbol of Judea.”
“An exhibition of archaeological finds from Gaza has gone on display in Geneva this week.”
Alex Winston writes about the importance of Mount Scopus throughout history.
Friends of ASOR Webinar on Oct 23: “‘And the shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s beam’ (I Sam 17:6-7): Weaponry, Weaving, and Broken Similes in the Duel between David and Goliath,” by Laura Mazow (registration is free but required)
New release: Community Archaeology in Israel/Palestine, edited by Raz Kletter, Liora Kolska Horwitz, and Emanuel Pfoh (Equinox, $55-$115)
Expedition Bible’s latest video is about Bethel. In this 25-minute video, Joel Kramer visits Burj Beitin, the location of a Byzantine church.
In the Biblical World podcast, “Chris and Kyle continue their series on the book of Judges, looking at the Ephraimite conquest of Bethel in Judges 1:22-26. They cover problems in the archaeology of Bethel, and they discuss the identity of the “Hittites” in this same passage.”
The feature-length documentary, “Following the Footsteps,” is now streaming on Amazon Prime and YouTube (free). Those who want to go deeper can take advantage of Bob Rognlien’s The Most Extraordinary Life and a video study guide (available here).
HT: Agade, Craig Dunning, Gordon Franz, Paleojudaica
3 thoughts on “Weekend Roundup, Part 1”
Dear Dr. Bolen, Thank you as always for your informative information! Concerning the important LMLK jar handles and personal seal jar handles recently found in Jerusalem, as you know they have nothing to do with tribute to Sennacherib or an Assyrian administration. The jars were made by Judahites for Judahites and belonged to the Judahite king, King Hezekiah. There has never been a LMLK handle or personal seal handle found in Sennacherib’s capital Nineveh. The jars were made, all of them, before the 701B.C. invasion by Sennacherib in preparation for the invasion. The personal seal of Nera (son of ) Shebna was found right next to the Hebron two winged sun disk seal which is incorrectly considered a late type of LMLK seal By Dr. Oded Lipschits and others. It is the most abundant LMLK seal found on jar handles. Since the immediate continued use of LMLK jars has now been found at Beth Shemesh and Jerusalem, the remaining surviving LMLK jars produced before 701B.C. were used at these sites because they were readily available. Thank you again for everything that you do! Sincerely yours, Michael
Thank you, Michael!
Dear Dr. Bolen, You are most welcome! I finally found last night a publication of some of the jar handles found at Arnona. It is from Atiqot 110 March, 2023, published by the Israel Antiquities Authority. The article is titled “A New Assemblage of ‘Private’ Stamped Jar Handles from the Mordot Arnona Excavations”, Jerusalem (pp. 1–22) by
Neria Sapir, Nathan Ben-Ari, Ido Koch and Oded Lipschits. In the article, the authors concentrate on the eleven personal seals’ handles found on LMLK jars at Arnona, which they call “private” instead of personal. Again, they emphasize the pre-701 B.C. date of the jar handles and provide nice colored photographs of each “private” handle. Amazingly only the seal of Nahum (son of) Abdi comes from an absolute pre-701 B.C. sealed archaeological context. Eight others come from an Iron Age context of 650 B.C. and before which the authors say were found in fills from a 701 B.C. context. However, there are two personal seal handles that were found in much later strata. One is from the Hellenistic period and one is from the Hasmonean period. These two handles can only have come from LMLK jars that had survived the invasion of Sennacherib and were reused after 701 B.C. because they were already made and readily available. Thank you as always for everything that you do! Sincerely yours, Michael