The Babylonian Gap

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The Assyrians and Babylonians both ravaged large parts of ancient Israel, yet the archaeological evidence from the aftermath of their respective conquests tells two very different stories. Why?

In 721 B.C.E., the Assyrians brought an end to the northern kingdom of Israel. A little more than a century later, the Assyrians themselves suffered defeat at the hands of the Babylonians, who became the world’s new superpower. The Babylonians were no less bent on mayhem and destruction than the Assyrians had been: In 586 B.C.E., they burnt Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple, bringing an end to the southern kingdom of Judah and 400 years of Davidic rule.

As destroyers, the Assyrians and Babylonians had much in common. But the periods that followed their conquests could not be less alike. 046While the Assyrians left a clear imprint of their presence in Palestine, there is a strange gap after the Babylonian destruction. Call it an archaeological gap, if you wish.

The savage Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem is well documented both in the Bible (in the books of Jeremiah and Lamentations) and in the archaeological record. When Nebuchadnezzar first placed the city under siege in 597 B.C.E., the city quickly capitulated, thereby avoiding a general destruction. But in response to a revolt by Judah’s King Zedekiah, Nebuchadnezzar dispatched an army that, after an 18-month siege, captured and destroyed the city in 586 B.C.E. The evidence of this destruction is widely confirmed in Jerusalem excavations.^a

On his first swing through Judah, Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed much of Philistia—Ekron, Tel Batash, Tell Jemmeh, Ruqeish and Tel Sera‘. Particularly devastated was Ashkelon, which the Babylonians sacked in 604 B.C.E.^b

Similar evidence of Babylonian destruction can be found throughout the Beersheba Valley, in the Aravah (the valley south of the Dead Sea) and in the Jordan River valley. From south to north, we can trace the effects of Babylonian might—at Tell el-Kheleifeh on the coast of the Red Sea, at Ein Gedi on the shore of the Dead Sea, and further north at Dan, the source of the Jordan River. The same is true in excavations at major northern sites—Hazor; Megiddo, overlooking the Jezreel Valley; and Dor, on the Mediterranean coast—and in central Judah, where, in addition to Jerusalem, we may look at Ramat Rahel and Lachish, among other sites.

But the strange thing is that above the remains left by these destructions, we find no evidence of occupation until the Persian period, which began in about 538 B.C.E. For roughly half a century—from 604 B.C.E. to 538 B.C.E.—there is a complete gap in evidence suggesting 047occupation. In all that time, not a single town destroyed by the Babylonians was resettled.¹ This is true even of the old Assyrian fortresses along the Way of the Sea (the Via Maris); they were reoccupied only in the Persian period, as shown by the recently excavated fort at Rishon le-Zion.²

The only indications of a Babylonian presence in Palestine are the massive destruction levels the Babylonians left behind. These are indeed impressive, but there is nothing above them that can be attributed to the Babylonian period.

The Babylonian destruction of the major harbor towns along the Palestinian coast also ended the previously intensive import of Greek ceramics into the country. As scholar Saul Weinberg has lamented, “We are left with a gap of almost a century for which we have so little imported Greek pottery that it is of no help just when it is most needed.”³

The Babylonian period is characterized by other notable absences as well. From the period between 604 and 538 B.C.E., for example, not a single document connected with the imperial Babylonian administration of Palestine has been found. The Babylonian remains consist only of a few dozen Neo-Babylonian seals and seal impressions, some of which are imports and some of which are locally manufactured imitations. But even a superficial examination of the stratigraphic contexts of these objects shows that some date to the late seventh and very early sixth centuries B.C.E. (essentially before the Babylonian destruction), while the majority date to the Persian period. Very few can be safely attributed to the Babylonian period itself.⁴

Archaeologists have recovered three Babylonian cuneiform tablets in Palestine. Two of these tablets—one from Mikhmoret on the Sharon coast and the other from Buseireh in Edom—might have provided evidence for the renewal of international trade along two major highways, but they are dated to the Persian period rather than the Babylonian period.⁵ Only the third tablet, a dedicatory inscription from Tell en-Nasbeh in Benjamin, may perhaps belong to the Babylonian period, but even it comes from a doubtful context. Other evidence of international trade is entirely lacking.

True, a huge inscribed Babylonian rock relief has recently been traced above the Edomite city of Sela, which lies east of the Jordan on the Kings’ Highway (the ancient route leading from Mesopotamia to Arabia, Palestine and Egypt). But the text is a memorial inscription attributed to the last Babylonian monarch, Nabunaid. Inscribed during one of his campaigns in this area, it has nothing to do with the Babylonian administration of the country.⁶

Now let us compare this with the situation after the Assyrian conquest. The Assyrian period lasted 75 years—from about 715 B.C.E., when Samaria was occupied in the north, to 640 B.C.E., when the Assyrians retreated from their estates in Palestine. This is only slightly longer than the Babylonian period, which lasted about 65 years.

After their conquest, the Assyrians established several provinces in Palestine. Four stone memorial stelae erected by Assyrian kings have been recovered at Samaria, Ashdod (see photo, below), Ben-Shemen and Kakun,⁷ and Assyrian administrative tablets in cuneiform have 048been found at Sepphoris, Tell Keisan, Samaria, Gezer and Hadid. In addition, archaeologists can study the Lamashtu tablet^c that was discovered in the vicinity of Lachish.⁸ Excavations have uncovered Assyrian structures at Ayeleth ha-Shahar, Gezer, Tell Jemmeh, Tel Sera‘, Tel Haror and elsewhere, and we have already mentioned the line of fortresses that the Assyrians established along the Via Maris. Palestine also witnessed the construction of Assyrian-style gates and fortifications, even as the local four-room house was replaced by the Mesopotamian open-court house (see photo and plan).⁹ The Assyrians also influenced the region’s burial customs, as demonstrated by the clay coffins found at sites in all the territories of northern Israel under direct Assyrian control. These sites include Dor, Megiddo, Tell el-Qitaf, Dothan, Samaria, Tell el-Far’ah (north) and, recently, Jezreel.¹⁰

Assyrian palace ware and its local imitations are common features of excavations in northern Israel, as are Assyrian reliefs, stone vessels,¹¹ metal artifacts and imported seals, some of them inscribed with official titles. Moreover, glyptic art in Palestine, which had previously been based on Phoenician-Israelite archetypes, appears to have been revolutionized by Assyrian glyptic styles.¹²

In short, the archaeological record points to an enormous difference 050between the period following the Babylonian conquest and the period following the Assyrian conquest. But how can we account for this difference? Clearly it is not a result of chance. On the contrary, the difference is attributable to a difference in the policies of the two empires. While the Assyrians at first adopted a policy of destruction and deportation, this policy was soon almost entirely reversed. The Assyrians rebuilt almost every destroyed town, sending in large numbers of new people from other lands, on a scale seldom seen in the long history of Palestine. Indeed, this is a phenomenon still awaiting proper study. The rebuilding of Megiddo, Dor, Dothan and many other towns completely changed the character of the desolated country.

The Babylonians, by contrast, did nothing to reverse the damage inflicted during their initial phase of domination, when, in addition to destroying, burning and looting all the settlements they occupied, they 051also systematically deported those inhabitants of the region whom they did not kill. Unlike their Assyrian counterparts, the Babylonian authorities never built anything. Moreover, their destruction of the country’s major harbor towns along the Mediterranean coast ruined international trade relations and left the economic situation of the rest of the country, including the previous Assyrian provinces, in shambles. As a result, the people in the region were reduced to poverty.

It is interesting that in archaeological parlance there is no clearly defined period called “Babylonian.” Indeed, the Babylonian gap is implied by the time charts typically found in Bible handbooks: The destruction of Judah is followed by the Persian period, when, following the eclipse of the Babylonians by the comparatively benign Persians, the Jewish exiles were permitted to return to Palestine.

I do not mean to imply that the country was uninhabited during the period between the Babylonian destruction and the Persian period. There were undoubtedly some settlements, but the population was very small. Many towns and villages were either completely or partly destroyed. The rest were barely functioning. International trade virtually ceased. Only two regions appear to have been spared this fate—the northern part of Judah (the region of Benjamin) and probably the land of Ammon, although the latter region awaits further investigation.¹³

The rest of Palestine was largely barren.

The Assyrians and Babylonians both ravaged large parts of ancient Israel, yet the archaeological evidence from the aftermath of their respective conquests tells two very different stories. Why? In 721 B.C.E., the Assyrians brought an end to the northern kingdom of Israel. A little more than a century later, the Assyrians themselves suffered defeat at the hands of the Babylonians, who became the world’s new superpower. The Babylonians were no less bent on mayhem and destruction than the Assyrians had been: In 586 B.C.E., they burnt Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple, bringing an end to the southern kingdom of […]