Achziv Cemeteries: Buried Treasure from Israel’s Phoenician Neighbor

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Like so many archaeological projects, the excavation of the Phoenician tombs at Achziv was prompted by looters. In 1941, when Great Britain governed the land of Israel, the Mandatory Department of Antiquities assigned Dr. Immanuel Ben-Dor to look for tombs that the looters had missed. During the next three years, Ben-Dor uncovered dozens of Phoenician tombs. He was followed by Dr. Moshe Prausnitz, who worked here at various times in the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s and 1980s on behalf of the State of Israel’s Department of Antiquities. I first became involved when Moshe and I conducted a joint excavation in 1984.

I was immediately intrigued with the site on the Mediterranean coast of northern Israel—and not only because it was beautifully located right on the seashore. The city was literally enclosed with tombs. There were cemeteries north, south and east of Achziv. On the west was the sea.

I continued to excavate at Achziv at various times in the 1990s and into the new century under the auspices of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The last two seasons (in 2002 and 2004) were sponsored mainly by BAR through the generosity of Samuel D. Turner, Esq. The results were spectacular.

The city itself still waits to be excavated. But its cemeteries are so abundant and so rich that they have much to teach us about the city’s culture.

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The Phoenicians are really an offshoot of the Canaanites. Pushed north and west by the Arameans, Israelites and Philistines in about 1000 B.C.E., the Phoenicians developed a seafaring culture that would dominate the Mediterranean basin as far as modern Spain.

Their major cities on the Mediterranean coast north of Israel were Arwad in modern Syria and Byblos, Beirut, Sidon and Tyre in modern Lebanon. The Book of Ezekiel preserves an early poem that addresses Tyre as a hub of world trade in the beginning of the First Temple period: “O you who dwell at the gateway of the sea, who trade with the people on many coastlands” (Ezekiel 27:3).

Other Phoenician cities extended from the area of modern Haifa in the south to Syria in the north, among them the port city of Achziv in northern Israel, about 20 miles south of Tyre.

Not surprisingly, we can learn a lot about the Phoenician way of life from the Phoenician way of death.

The cemeteries enclosing the tell of Achziv were used continuously from the tenth to the sixth centuries B.C.E., the entire First Temple period, and beyond. Some tombs were dug below ground in sandstone ridges and built of ashlars, that is, nicely cut rectangular blocks of stone. The burial chamber in these tombs was about 6 by 9 feet and approximately 5 feet high. A small square entrance was on the smaller side accessed by a square shaft that descended to a depth of almost 4 feet. Sometimes a step in the shaft made going down easier.

Somewhat-later tombs (beginning toward the end of the tenth century B.C.E.) were rock-cut instead of built with ashlars. In an intermediate period they were partly built and partly rock-cut. But they were all family tombs meant for anywhere from a few people to dozens of family members.

These early-tenth-century tombs had a hole in the roofing slabs (or a hole created by removing one of the roofing slabs). Liquids were poured through these holes to “feed” the dead. This was much easier and more convenient than having to remove the heavy slab that blocked the entrance to the tomb chamber to get access to the interior of the tomb.

Around the ashlar-built tombs were often hearths reflecting a burial ritual. The pottery sherds near the hearths were from small bowls, jars, incense burners and oil lamps. On the roof of one of the rock-cut tombs, a rectangular stone offering table (2.1 ft x 1.8 ft x 0.92 ft) with a rectangular depression cut on its upper surface (1.48 ft x 1.42 ft x 0.13 ft) was found in situ.

Beginning in the late tenth century B.C.E., it seems that it became more common to “feed the dead” from jars that were brought into the burial chambers. No “feeding” holes appear in the ceilings of these tombs.

Burials with holes in the roof for feeding the dead have been found in earlier tombs (from the Late Bronze Age, c. 14th–13th centuries B.C.E.) at Ugarit farther north on the Mediterranean coast 037of Syria and at Enkomi in Cyprus. The custom of feeding the dead in Phoenician culture may have developed from these models. In addition to the archaeological remains at these sites, Ugarit has yielded a rich trove of literature preserved on cuneiform tablets written in a unique alphabetic cuneiform script. From these texts we learn of the necessity of feeding the dead to give their spirits peace and to prevent the spirits from causing all sorts of harm to the living.

Some of the tombs at Achziv were used over a period of 400 years and included dozens of burials. 038The deceased were laid on the floor on their backs with funerary offerings beside them. When room was needed for additional burials, the bones and funerary gifts of preceding burials were gathered into a pile in the back or corner of the tomb.

Over the centuries, we notice a desire for “privatization,” that is, some attempt to fence off the burial place of one individual in the tomb with a row of stones. At the end of the tenth century B.C.E., we find for the first time rock-cut benches along the walls. The trend toward privatization continued. By the seventh century B.C.E., in addition to the burial benches, we find sarcophagi as well as loculi (rectangular holes in the walls nearly 6 ft long and about 1.5 ft wide) where individual bodies were placed (on occasion more than one body was placed in a sarcophagus or loculus).

Jars to “feed the dead” were the basic funerary offering. Every tomb had at least one jar. The jars were probably refilled from time to time. They most likely contained oil, wine and food.

Three vessels seem to have constituted the basic set of dishes used in the ceremony conducted next to the tomb and later placed alongside the deceased 039in the tomb. These were a jug with a trefoil rim, a jug with a mushroom rim and a dipper juglet.

Other objects in the tombs often enable us to identify the deceased’s profession. Iron weapons were placed next to a warrior. These included a 2.5-foot-long sword, dozens of arrowheads, a knife, an ax and a spear.

A pair of clay statuettes of warriors on horses probably identified a cavalry officer.

A clay model of a boat and lead net weights tell us that the deceased was a fisherman.

Two pairs of bronze scales, one smaller than the other, and hematite weights, as well as fine jewelry, were placed next to a jeweler or goldsmith. The jewelry, rarely of gold, more commonly silver, attest to an extremely high level of metal-working skill. Colorful beads and a variety of semiprecious stones reflect a sense of high fashion.

Other identifications are more puzzling. Does a clay figurine playing a drum indicate the deceased 042was a drummer? Or a figurine playing a flute that the deceased was a flautist? Instead, these figurines probably portray some cultic performances.

Two tombs contained clay votive masks in the form of bulls’ heads, symbolizing the god Baal. These probably imitated the real masks of bulls’ heads worn in ceremonies in Phoenician temples. Other votive masks portrayed men’s and women’s faces.

Animal figurines of the horses and a donkey and the bulls’-head masks are characterized by a special Achziv sculpting style with affixed round eyes and a captivating smile.

Jewelry was also common in the Achziv tombs. Bronze crescent earrings and simple round bracelets and anklets were often found with the burials. Bronze fibulae indicate that the dead were buried enwrapped or clothed.

Of course considerable pottery was also found in the tombs, but strangely enough very little of it was imported, despite the deep Phoenician involvement in international trade. For some unknown reason, the Achziv residents preferred not to bring imported pottery into their tombs. This is in contrast to the jewelry and other decorative items. These imported items even included Egyptian scarabs and pendants and a range of ritual and artistic objects reflecting an Egyptian ritual influence in addition to its basic Semitic orientation. One tomb contained a figurine of a baboon sitting on a chair, most probably Hapi, the Egyptian baboon god connected to embalming and eternal life.

Extensive evidence of cremation in the seventh–sixth centuries B.C.E. comes from the southern Achziv cemetery. A group of more than 70 burials was discovered that included both trench graves (dug to a depth of about 3 ft into the soft sandstone) and round graves. In the trench graves were supine corpses. In the round graves, each about 2.5 feet in diameter, was a burial urn, sometimes two, containing cremated human bones.

These cremations raise the question of a tophet. 043This term originally referred to a place in Jerusalem’s Hinnom Valley where sons and daughters were burned in sacrifice to the pagan god Moloch or Baal, according to the Bible (2 Kings 23:10 and Jeremiah 19:5). Gradually, in archaeological circles, tophet has come to refer more generally to a site of cremation burials. Whether infant sacrifice, followed by cremation, occurred among the Phoenicians is a hotly debated question.^{a 1}

What cannot be debated is that in the northern cemetery of Achziv we found a crematorium where the dead bodies were burned. This is the only crematorium ever discovered in a Phoenician cemetery.

The Achziv crematorium is a round structure 14 feet in diameter preserved to a height of 10 feet. The walls are sharply inclined to the bottom of the structure. A well-plastered wind tunnel 11 feet long enters the crematorium through a window on the sea side of the structure, thus channeling the wind from the sea to fan the fire in the crematorium. The crematorium was built close to the ashlar tomb over a square plastered pool that might have been used for bathing and purification before the construction of the crematorium. On the floor of the pool was a smashed jug that is characteristic of the late tenth century B.C.E. (It is the archetype of the so-called mushroom jug; its round body is ornamented with concentric red and black circles and has a ring base.) This dates the crematorium to no earlier than the late tenth century B.C.E. The many pottery vessels found around the crematorium date from that time to the seventh century B.C.E. This provides our best evidence for dating the crematorium.

After the corpse, which apparently was placed on a bed of branches, was burnt, the bones were collected in an urn.

After cremation, the bones were placed in large pottery vessels (urns) and buried around the crematorium. Gradually, the cremation-burial area around the crematorium expanded and surrounded the walls of the single ashlar tomb nearby that continued to function as a regular family tomb, despite the tophet around it.

When we examined the contents of these urns, we were surprised to see that the bones had been carefully collected, including even the smallest, and that the entire skeleton could be reassembled, albeit 045shrinking to a half or two-thirds of its original size.

Most of the burial urns were kraters (jars with a wide opening). Some were local; others were imported from Cyprus.

A tombstone marking the place of burial was erected above ground over the burial urn (or urns), with a pyre lit at its foot, possibly for the preparation of a meal “shared” with the dead. Although several burials of children were found scattered among the urn burials, none showed any signs of cremation.

Some of the tombstones bore a simple circle, symbolizing the sun and representing Baal-Shamem, the chief Phoenician god. Another common symbol on the tombstones is a circle on top of a triangle or cross. This represents the figure of a woman, at times with hands spread from the side of the body. This is the symbol of Tanit/Ashtoret, the chief Phoenician goddess and Baal’s consort. Her face is a simple circle, like the representation of Baal. Her name, the “Face of Baal,” also appears on Punic tombstones from North Africa. Her symbol is known on Punic tombstones there as the “Tanit symbol” (the common appellation for Ashtoret).

All characteristic features of the tophet site of Achziv are identical in all respects to the characteristics that appear also at the tophet in Tyre. Only the crematorium structure itself has yet to be uncovered there. These are the only tophet sites known so far from the Phoenician homeland.

Is there evidence in the Achziv or Tyre cemeteries of infants who were cremated? Definitely not. In contrast to tophets at Punic sites in North 047Africa, Sicily and Sardinia, where the cremation burials were exclusively of infants, at Achziv and Tyre the cremated burials were only of adults.

In some cases in Achziv, infant burials (not cremated) inside pottery vessels were located outside the family tombs and, in one case, two burial jars containing cremations of adults were found next to a rock-cut family tomb with benches. We do not know what criteria were used for determining who would be cremated and who would not. It seems to me probable that the cremated adults were the firstborn, both male and female, who, as “firstlings,” belonged to the god. The firstborn lived a normal life among their families, but upon their death they had to undergo purification by fire on their way back to the bosom of the god. This was also the reason why their burials did not contain offerings attesting to their identity and status, as was done in regular burials, since their status in the afterlife was their very belonging to the god, which took precedence over any identity they had on earth. The children, who were pure by the fact of their tender age, did not have to undergo the process of purification by cremation and were merely buried apart from the other members of their family.

Phoenician culture exerted a noticeable influence on Israelite culture from the time of King David to the end of the First Temple period. Much of this is reflected in the Bible. Phoenician architects and Phoenician workers helped Solomon build the Temple; Hiram, king of Tyre, supplied cedars of Lebanon and gold for the Temple (1 Kings 5:15–25 [verses 1–11 in English]). The conflict between Israelite and Phoenician religion is graphically described in the contest between the prophet Elijah and the 450 prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18). Jezebel, the Phoenician daughter of the king of the Sidonians, was married to King Ahab of Israel. Her nefarious influence in Israel is recounted in both books of Kings.

The cemeteries of Achziv, however, bring a different kind of human reality to these Phoenicians who lived and died and interacted in so many ways with their Israelite neighbors to the south.

Translated from Hebrew by Edward Levin.

Like so many archaeological projects, the excavation of the Phoenician tombs at Achziv was prompted by looters. In 1941, when Great Britain governed the land of Israel, the Mandatory Department of Antiquities assigned Dr. Immanuel Ben-Dor to look for tombs that the looters had missed. During the next three years, Ben-Dor uncovered dozens of Phoenician tombs. He was followed by Dr. Moshe Prausnitz, who worked here at various times in the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s and 1980s on behalf of the State of Israel’s Department of Antiquities. I first became involved when Moshe and I conducted a joint excavation in […]