Ekron of the Philistines, Part II: Olive-Oil Suppliers to the World

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In “Ekron of the Philistines,” BAR 16:01, Trude Dothan and Seymour Gitin introduced us to the rich history of ancient Ekron (modern-day Tel Miqne)—the Philistine city described in Joshua 13:2–3 as part of “the land that yet remains” to be taken by the Israelites. The city, one of the largest Iron Age sites in Israel, lay at a strategic point on the western edge of the Inner Coastal Plain—on the frontier between Philistia and Judah.

Dothan guided us through the early history of Ekron, from the Late Bronze Age (15th–14th centuries B.C.E.) to the end of Iron Age I (about 1000 B.C.E.). She described the various nations who lived in Ekron in those centuries: First, the local Canaanites, then one of the Sea Peoples (who had migrated from the Aegean) whom we know as the Philistines.

Now Seymour Gitin takes up the tale and unfolds the ever-changing drama of Ekron from the beginning to the end of Iron Age II (about 1000 to 600 B.C.E.). These centuries saw Ekron shrink to a mere fifth of its former size, only to re-emerge as perhaps the greatest olive-oil production center in the ancient Near East. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s allow Gitin to pick up the narration …

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In the early tenth century B.C.E.,^a the great Philistine city of Ekron dramatically shrank. The major Iron Age I urban center that previously occupied the entire 50-acre tell, including both the 10-acre area we call the upper city as well as the 40-acre lower city (see plan), was destroyed. By the mid-tenth century B.C.E., the Philistines had withdrawn from the lower city and continued to occupy only the upper city. With the lower city abandoned, Ekron became a small fortified town.

This reduction in size occurred at the beginning of what archaeologists call Iron Age II, a period that extends from about 1000 B.C.E. to the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem in 586 B.C.E., a destruction that brought the First Temple period to an end.

The beginning of Iron Age II is marked by David’s conquest of Jerusalem and his ascension to the throne of all Israel. No doubt the decline in the fortunes of Ekron was related to the ascendancy of David and his son Solomon and to the fact that Israel was now able to dominate the Philistines.¹

With the death of King Solomon in about 921 B.C.E., the kingdom split in two—Israel in the north and Judah in the south, but the Philistines did not regain the power and prominence they enjoyed in Iron Age I (the premonarchic period of the Israelite Judges) until hundreds of years later. Ekron remained a small town throughout the ninth and most of the eighth centuries B.C.E., a mere pawn in the power struggle between Egypt, Assyria and Judah.² (The northern kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrians in 721 B.C.E.)

At some point, perhaps as early as the mid-tenth century B.C.E., the Ekronites built a new mudbrick city wall at the bottom of the upper city as protection. Attached to this wall was a 22-foot-wide mudbrick tower faced with large ashlars^b laid in header-and-stretcher construction, that is, alternating wide-side and narrow-side facing out. In the second half of the eighth century B.C.E., a citadel tower of boulder-sized stones was built on the summit of the upper city, and a stone-lined drain was constructed. This complex of fortifications was probably what the Neo-Assyrian kings Sargon II and Sennacherib encountered when they attacked and conquered Ekron towards the end of the eighth century B.C.E.³

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The pottery we found from the ninth and eighth centuries B.C.E. includes some forms typical of the coastal area and other forms typical of Judah—such as the late shallow cooking pot, the everted-rim bowl and the plain-rim, small holemouth jar.

From the late eighth century, we also found two l’melekh handles. L’melekh means “belonging to the king.” The name refers to a stamp impression, apparently indicating royal ownership, found on the handle of storage jars that may have held olive oil, wine or grain. Over 1,000 l’melekh handles have been found at 43 different sites in Judah, mostly dating to the end of the eighth century B.C.E. One of the stamps we found at Ekron bore the legend “belonging to the king—Hebron.” It is ascribed to stratum IIA, the period when Hezekiah, king of Judah, controlled Ekron. It was during his reign that almost all the l’melekh handles were produced.

At the very end of the eighth century B.C.E., Philistia was again invaded by the Assyrians in a campaign that also threatened Judah (see 2 Kings 18:13–15). At that time control of Ekron passed from Judah 036to the expanding Neo-Assyrian empire. It was then, under Neo-Assyrian hegemony, that Ekron expanded physically, enjoyed a period of renewed prosperity and once again became an important city-state.⁴

At the beginning of the seventh century B.C.E. (stratum IC), after the Assyrian campaigns, the old mudbrick city wall at Ekron was rebuilt, a new citadel tower was constructed and a new industrial zone for olive-oil production was established in the upper city. At the same time, in the lower city, after a hiatus of about 270 years, a fortified industrial urban center was founded directly on the early-tenth-century B.C.E. fortifications and buildings of the last phase of Iron Age I (stratum IV). In some cases, the floors of the new seventh-century B.C.E. rooms were made from the shaved-down tops of these old Iron Age I walls.

At this time, Ekron expanded even beyond the limits of the mound to include a 10-acre area northwest of the tell.

The new Ekron was a model of a well-constructed city. The town plan included a system of stepped-down terraces that served as the foundations for the city’s buildings. In this way buildings on the high ridge of the periphery of the tell were connected with buildings in the center of the city in a gradually descending slope. The effect of the stepped-down terraces all but eliminated the 10-foot difference in levels between the periphery and the center of the city. The new Ekron was also a model of a well-designed city, with four clearly defined occupation zones for fortifications, industry and ordinary domestic areas and upper-class elite districts.

New fortifications consisted of a double stone-wall system—an upper wall on the crest and a lower wall at the base, with a long line of stables for horses running between them. In the southeast corner of the tell, we found a series of stone insets/offsets connected to the upper wall; this was apparently the foundation for a huge bastion. The city gate (located in the center of the southern face of the tell) consisted of a tower and three piers, forming two chambers on each side. The gate itself was protected by a large gatehouse.⁵ This city gate has many similarities with Judahite sites like Gezer and Lachish, as well as with Philistine Ashdod.⁶

Perhaps the most interesting area of this new city was the industrial zone. It consisted of a series of buildings located in a belt around most of the tell just behind the fortification wall and also in an area off the northwest slope of the tell. In our main excavation area (field III), the industrial zone was subdivided into two major sections located on either side of a well-constructed street with a central drain and curbs.

The principal product of the new industrial zone was olive oil. The olive oil was produced in rectangular buildings subdivided into three rooms—an olive-oil production room, a storage/work room and an anteroom that opened onto the street.

In the best-preserved of these buildings, the one immediately adjacent to the city gate, the olive oil production room contained a complete olive oil manufacturing installation. It consisted—typically—of a large rectangular crushing basin and a pressing vat on each side of the crushing basin. After the olives were crushed in the basin by a roller, the pulp was put in straw baskets and stacked on top of the pressing vats. Pressure was applied to the straw baskets by means of a wooden beam, secured at one end in a niche in the wall behind the press and weighted at the other end with four stone weights that served as a lever for pressing the olive pulp. In this case, we found not only the eight perforated stone weights (for the two presses), but also pieces of carbonized wood lying between the presses and the stone weights; these were probably the remains of the wooden press-beams.⁷

The presses in this room were of two types—the “preliminary” round type and the “Ekron” square type. 038This represents two stages of technological development. The round type was ultimately replaced with the square type. The latter had a larger pressing surface and collection vat that could hold 13–26 gallons of oil, while the former could hold a mere six-and-a-half gallons.⁸ The operation and capacity of the Ekron-type press was tested by producing oil in a reconstructed model of an oil installation built at Kibbutz Revadim from discarded elements found in the fields near the tell. The results proved the validity of our assumptions and calculations.

In this oil production room we also found more than 100 restorable vessels, including a large number of juglets (one of them in bronze), 34 conical ceramic storejar lids, a limestone cosmetic palette and a Phoenician-type figurine.

The adjacent storage/work room contained 88 restorable vessels. One was a huge jar/krater with 11 handles and two holes about midway down its sides. This was used in the oil separation process. Left standing in this jar/krater for a period of time, the oil would rise to the top and the water would settle near the bottom. When unplugged, the holes would allow first the water and then the finished product, the olive oil, to be drained off into smaller vessels.

The other finds from this room included a cache of eight well-preserved, large iron agricultural tools hidden in a storejar below the floor. These tools were probably buried for safekeeping in anticipation of the Babylonian attack at the end of the seventh century B.C.E. The owner never returned to claim them.

This room also contained a unique stone niche with a four-horned altar inside it.

In the anteroom of the building were many pottery vessels associated with food preparation. This room also contained a large number of loom weights and two installations that were not used in olive-oil production. Loom weights were found throughout the industrial zone. All this suggests the existence of a secondary industry at Ekron—textile production. Olives could be pressed for only four months a year. A second industry probably existed to make efficient use of the large industrial plant during the remaining eight months of the year.

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In addition to the evidence for olive oil and textile production, each industrial building also contained at least one four-horned altar. We already mentioned the altar in the olive-oil production building.

So far we have found 103 olive-oil production units. Of these, 88 were of the more technologically advanced Ekron type. Even with only a little more than three percent of the site excavated, it is now clear that the industrial zones took up at least 20 percent of the seventh-century B.C.E. city. The production capacity of the oil installations identified to date has been estimated at 1,000 tons, or 290 thousand gallons, in a good harvest year, one-fifth of Israel’s current level of export production.⁹ Thus, in antiquity Ekron was the largest olive-oil industrial center in the ancient Near East. This mammoth industry developed because of the stability provided by the Pax Assyriaca, a period of approximately 70 years of peace, from 700 to 630 B.C.E., enforced by the Assyrian empire. The demand for such huge quantities of olive oil was created by the commercial interests of the expanding Assyrian empire.¹⁰ In effect, the formation of a new and enlarged political empire 040and economic trading areas under Assyrian hegemony created the markets for the development of a highly centralized olive-oil industry. Ekron enjoyed unique geographic, physical and political characteristics that enabled it to take advantage of this economic opportunity. It lay near the hill country where the olives were grown; but it was also close to the coast from which the olive oil could be shipped to Egypt and the Aegean. The lower city of Ekron was well suited for building a factory town; and its labor supply, municipal infrastructure and means of food production were left intact after the Neo-Assyrian invasion.¹¹ This was in marked contrast to many of the cities of Judah and Philistia that had been destroyed in the Neo-Assyrian conquest.¹² In addition, Ekron seems to have had a special relationship with Assyria. Two kings of Ekron, Padi and Ikausu, were placed on the throne of Ekron by the kings of Assyria.

Interestingly enough, Israelites may also have been prominent in Ekron at this time. Perhaps the Assyrians, in their massive movement of conquered peoples at the end of the eighth and the beginning of the seventh centuries B.C.E., sent some Israelite craftsmen to Ekron. This may explain the ten four-horned altars found at Ekron that represent a northern Israelite craft tradition.¹³

Industry and cult have a long-established and well-documented relationship in the eastern Mediterranean basin—for example, the sacred area at Kition on Cyprus contained not only a complex of temples, but also workshops for copper smelting; similarly at Athienou on Cyprus, where hundreds of votive vessels were found amid large quantities of copper nodules.¹⁴ In Israel, at Tel Dan, an oil press was found in the sacred precinct.¹⁵

But there is something different at Ekron. At Ekron, the oil was not produced exclusively for use on sacred occasions, as seems to have been the case at Tel Dan. The amount of oil produced at Ekron was so large that the bulk of it must have been exported. Moreover, Ekron did not have just a single cultic area with a single oil installation to serve it; it had a huge olive-oil industry, with many altars. The altars were apparently there for the olive-oil industry, not vice versa. The altars may have served multiple functions for the burning of incense to propitiate the gods and to deodorize the air in the industrial zone. However, as altars were an integral part of a well-planned and organized industry, they may have had a more vital function. It is possible that the altars were used by the priestly class in their administration of the olive-oil industry under royal authority. Only a strong centralized authority could have had the necessary resources and power to organize such a huge industrial facility and to develop marketing and distribution systems to absorb the high levels of production maintained at Ekron. The four-horned altars may have been both the symbol and the tool of that centralized authority.

The olive-oil industry at Ekron is also strong evidence of an important, long-term economic relationship between the Philistine Coastal Plain and Inland Judah during this period. Without such a relationship, the olive-oil industry at Ekron could not have functioned and flourished, as it obviously did.

Indeed, there is considerable additional evidence of extensive interregional contact:

Stone was the major construction material in seventh-century B.C.E. Ekron, in the fortifications, in industry and in private buildings. In addition, all the oil installations were made of stone. Mudbrick construction was used mostly for internal walls, wall shelving and roof tiles. This is in marked contrast to the construction in Ekron during the 12th and 11th centuries B.C.E., when mudbrick was the dominant construction material. The 041major source of limestone nearest to Ekron is the low hills of the Shephelah of Judah, just across the border from Ekron¹⁶ Mudbrick was used at Ekron in Iron Age I because it was immediately available in quantity and the technique for using it was part of the cultural tradition of the Mediterranean coast. In Iron Age I, Ekron and the Shephelah sites were in conflict, and therefore stone for constructing fortifications would not have been sold to an enemy Philistine city; moreover, at that time the Philistines might not have mastered the construction techniques and building know-how involved in stone construction. In the seventh century B.C.E., the situation was far different. Long-term peaceful interaction between Ekron and its Judahite neighbors allowed stone and its construction technology to cross the border, together with stonecutters and building experts.

Four inscribed, dome-shaped stone shekel and bekah^c weights found at Ekron also indicate economic contact between coastal and inland areas.¹⁷ The weights are characteristic of Judah, but they have also been found at several sites in Philistia. Epigraphic evidence also reflects relations between Judah and Philistia. We found six words in paleo-Hebrew or Phoenician letters on storejars at Ekron.¹⁸

International relationships may also be seen in the rich assemblage of small objects of ivory, faience and shell amulets and figurines, many from Egypt or produced under Egyptian influence. These include an inscribed limestone sistrum (a musical instrument) and a scarab of the XXVIth Egyptian dynasty. As we shall see, at the end of the seventh century B.C.E. Philistia passed to Egyptian control.

Having considered the fortifications, industrial zones of occupation and the impact of industrialization on the growth of Ekron in the seventh century B.C.E., let us briefly examine the elite and the domestic zones at Ekron. In both zones, the buildings differed from the tripart building plan of the industrial zone. In the domestic area, located north of the industrial zone, we find courtyards and floors containing installations and pottery associated with domestic activities. The elite zone, in the center of the lower city (field IV), contained a large complex of four buildings with 13 rooms (A–M). This was the only zone in which fine wares and luxury goods were found, for example, Assyrian goblets (rooms C and F) and East Greek skyphoi (two-handled cups) (room E), and two large caches of silver jewelry (rooms B and E). That cultic activity also occurred here is indicated by two small portable four-horned altars found in one of the rooms (room E), and the chalices with relief leaf decoration found in three rooms (rooms C, H and J).

Thus Ekron, during the first two-thirds of the seventh century B.C.E. (stratum IC), achieved the zenith of its growth and economic development. In the last third of the seventh century B.C.E., the city continued to prosper although at a somewhat diminished level (stratum IB). This later phase, while continuing the general plan of stratum IC, showed some architectural changes: for example, the city gate entrance was narrowed and new floors were 042superimposed in several buildings. Most importantly, there was evidence in stratum IB for a diminution in olive-oil production as some oil installation equipment of stratum IC was discarded. For example, one huge olive crushing basin and press were buried in a pit beneath a stratum IB olive-oil installation. Also numerous perforated stone weights from stratum IC were reused in the walls of stratum IB buildings. These phenomena can be associated with the end of Assyrian rule and the reinstatement of Egyptian hegemony in Philistia. This occurred in about 630 B.C.E., the date that we believe divides stratum IC from IB.¹⁹ The reduction in olive-oil production probably occurred as a result of the change in political authority, resulting in a loss of Assyrian and Assyrian-controlled Phoenician markets and their extensive distribution system.

At the end of the century, Ekron was again destroyed—probably in 603 B.C. as part of Nebuchadnezzar’s campaign to conquer Philistia.²⁰ This date is supported by an abundance of whole ceramic forms from stratum IB sealed by 3 feet of destruction debris. These forms are known to have first appeared in the last quarter of the seventh century B.C.E.²¹ The next phase of occupation, stratum IA, reflects a random, unfortified settlement in the lower city which we date to the early sixth century B.C.E. It contained at least one structure similar to an “Assyrian” open courtyard building.²² Then the city was abandoned until the Roman period. Evidence for the Roman, Byzantine and Islamic periods was found only in a small, mound-shaped area at the northern end of the lower city.

Clearly, Ekron was a Philistine city in Iron Age I—1200–1000 B.C.E. But what about the major seventh-century B.C.E. city we have just described in such detail? Was there an ethnic continuum, a “Philistine” presence in the Coastal Plain for the 600 years of Iron Age II? If so, how similar or different were the Philistines of the seventh century B.C.E. from the Sea Peoples who settled the site in the 12th century B.C.E.? What cultural traits persisted through centuries of intensive exposure to Canaanites, Israelites, Judahites, Assyrians and Egyptians? At this stage of our research, we can only note that both the non-Biblical and Biblical texts consider the Coastal Plain to be occupied by Philistines. Moreover, the material culture of Ekron in the seventh century B.C.E. belongs primarily to the Philistine coastal tradition. Over 80 percent of the ceramic materials can be characterized as coastal; only seven percent is Judahite; nine percent is common to the entire southern part of Canaan; and only one-half of one percent represents northern ceramic forms.²³

The current excavations at Tel Miqne have brought us to the following conclusions: The site was settled before the founding of Philistine Ekron at the beginning of the Iron Age. The urban center of Ekron evolved through a four-stage process of growth, contraction, regeneration and partial abandonment, reflecting its changing role as a border city on the frontier separating Philistia and Judah. The material culture of the Philistine coastal tradition was maintained throughout Ekron’s 600-year tradition.²⁴

In the 1990 excavation season, we hope to delve further into these questions. We, also hope further to address problems of town planning, the process of urbanization, the relationship of industry and cult and the nature of interregional contacts at Ekron. Our plan is to widen the exposure in all zones of occupation and to start by once again excavating the last remains of the Philistines, sealed beneath the seventh-century B.C.E. destruction. All able-bodied volunteers are invited to join us in the quest for answers.

In “Ekron of the Philistines,” BAR 16:01, Trude Dothan and Seymour Gitin introduced us to the rich history of ancient Ekron (modern-day Tel Miqne)—the Philistine city described in Joshua 13:2–3 as part of “the land that yet remains” to be taken by the Israelites. The city, one of the largest Iron Age sites in Israel, lay at a strategic point on the western edge of the Inner Coastal Plain—on the frontier between Philistia and Judah. Dothan guided us through the early history of Ekron, from the Late Bronze Age (15th–14th centuries B.C.E.) to the end of Iron Age I […]