Strata

012

Not as Simple as A-B-C

Earliest Use of Alphabet Found in Egypt

The alphabet was invented earlier than we thought. That is the initial conclusion reached by scholars studying two newly discovered inscriptions at Wadi el-Hol, in Upper (southern) Egypt.

“These may be the oldest alphabetic inscriptions ever found, dating to 1800 B.C. or earlier,” P. Kyle McCarter, Jr., a professor at Johns Hopkins University and a specialist in ancient inscriptions, told BAR. “We have to reevaluate the earliest history of the alphabet.”

The inscriptions were discovered at a site north of Luxor by John and Deborah Darnell, a professor at Yale and a Ph.D. student at the University of Chicago, respectively. The inscriptions were scratched on a rock wall alongside a military road; they were surrounded by graffiti and even snatches of Egyptian literary texts written in hieroglyphics. The site’s name, Wadi el-Hol, translates roughly to “Terror Gulch.”

The inscriptions are thought to be the work of Semites living in Egypt during the Middle Kingdom period (c. 2040–1674 B.C.). Other inscriptions found nearby, but not written in alphabetic script, refer to a person named Bebi, who called himself “general of the Asiatics.” The term “Asiatic” was applied to all foreigners in Egypt, most of whom were Semites from Canaan and other lands northeast of Egypt. Though scholars are still working on translating the alphabetic inscriptions, they have deciphered two words so far, a title of a chief and a reference to a god.

Until now, the earliest known examples of alphabetic writing have been inscriptions from Canaan and from Serabit el-Khadem, an Egyptian turquoise mining camp in west central Sinai. Those had been widely dated to about 1650 to 1550 B.C. and are written in a script called proto-Canaanite or proto-Sinaitic. McCarter now says they may be earlier. The Wadi el-Hol inscriptions are in the same script.

The new finds will alter our understanding of not only when the alphabet was invented, but also where. McCarter explained to BAR that it was long believed that Semitic peoples invented the alphabet in ancient Syro-Palestine under Egyptian influence. With the Wadi el-Hol inscriptions, he now believes the alphabet was invented by Semites while still in Egypt.

Bigger Than the O’s

BAS Society Scores in Baltimore

You know,” says Ed Gitow, president of the Biblical Archaeology Society of Northern Virginia, “literally, ‘archaeology’ means ‘knowledge of the old.’ It’s just always used for ‘digging up.’” But you don’t have to dig up physical objects to study archaeology. You can study texts, too, such as the Bible, Gitow explains. “We try to dig up the meaning that those words had at the time they were written.”

The Biblical Archaeology Society chapter organized by Gitow—known as BASONOVA—first met in October 1994. It’s grown to a 170-member group that meets monthly to hear speakers and to talk about archaeology and the Bible. Now, five years later, he’s started a new society: BAS of Maryland. It has held only three meetings, but it already has 150 paid members.

Asked how the speakers and topics are chosen, Gitow simply says, “that’s my secret.” But when pressed, he’s happy to explain.

“People are still the same,” he says. “After thousands of years, we still have the same elements of life: We need water and transportation; we have war; we have births. None of that has changed. So I just think about topics of today and then ask, How did they do it then?” Topics include naval enterprises in Biblical Israel and law and trade in the ancient world.

The meetings, which are held at different ethnic restaurants in the Baltimore area (“It’s like our own international dining club”), usually have a guest speaker. The first meeting, in October, featured Colonel James Bartholomees, the Eisenhower Professor of Strategy and Planning at the U.S. Army War College, who spoke on “Battles of the Bible: Strategies and Tactics.” In December Gitow discussed “Facts—Not Fiction—Surrounding the Birth of Jesus.” He covered such topics as birthing and delivery methods used at the time, what the Star of Bethlehem might have been, what it meant to be an espoused wife (like Mary), and who the Magi were and where they got their gifts.

On January 23, 2000, Dr. Dale C. Smith, professor of medical history at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, will discuss medicine and pharmacy in ancient Egypt. For information on joining BAS-MD or BASONOVA, contact BASONOVA, PO Box 22174, Alexandria, VA 22304; phone 703–370-7381; fax 703–370-9637.

013

Moshe Dothan (1919–1999)

Excavator of Ashdod, Hammath Tiberias, Dies

Moshe Dothan, a leading figure among the first generation of Israeli archaeologists, passed away after a long illness on September 9, 1999, a few days before his 80th birthday.

Born in Poland, Dothan immigrated to Palestine in 1939. After serving in the British army during the Second World War and in Israel’s War of Independence, he studied archaeology and historical geography at Hebrew University, in Jerusalem. His doctorate explored the transition from the Chalcolithic era to the Early Bronze Age. It was a pioneering study on remote periods and cultures that were not well understood at the time.

During the 1950s, as one of the few active field archaeologists in Israel’s nascent Department of Antiquities, Dothan conducted salvage digs and surveys throughout the country. Among them were the excavations of the Chalcolithic settlement at Hurvat Beter, west of Beersheba; the Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age site at Metzer, southeast of Caesarea; the Middle Bronze high place at Nahariya; and the Iron Age citadel of Kadesh-Barnea, in eastern Sinai.

While serving as deputy director of the antiquities department in the 1960s, Dothan excavated the Byzantine era synagogues at Hammath Tiberias, on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, which contained beautifully preserved mosaic floors. In 1962 he began a decade-long excavation at Tel Ashdod, one of the cities of the Philistine Pentapolis. Dothan was fortunate to have the able assistance of his wife, Trude, who brought her extensive knowledge of Philistine culture to the project. The discoveries at Ashdod were a breakthrough in the study of the history of the Philistines, from the settlement of these maritime people in Canaan in the 12th century B.C. to the Assyrian conquest 400 years later. For years to come, the Dothans would continue to focus on the Philistines and other Sea Peoples (seafaring tribes from the Aegean that caused massive upheaval in the eastern Mediterranean at the beginning of the 12th century B.C.). Trude went on to excavate Tel Miqne (Biblical Ekron), another city of the Philistine Pentapolis, while Moshe looked for evidence of the Sea Peoples in his excavations at Akko from 1972 to 1989. His spectacular discoveries included massive Middle Bronze Age fortifications, Sea People settlements and Phoenician remains from the Iron Age and the Persian period. The Dothans summarized their work in the popular book People of the Sea (New York: Macmillan, 1992).

In 1972 Dothan was named professor of archaeology at Haifa University. He was one of the founders of the university’s Department of Maritime Civilizations, and in 1983 he founded its archaeology department. While at Haifa, Dothan published many books and articles, including several volumes of final reports on his excavations at Hammath Tiberias and Ashdod.

Moshe Dothan belonged to a small group of Israeli archaeologists and historians who had been trained in the early 1950s by such scholars as Eliezer Sukenik (the father of Yigael Yadin) and Benjamin Mazar of Hebrew University, and who later became the backbone of Israeli archaeology. Many young Israeli archaeologists, including myself, were trained in turn at his excavations and learned from his lectures and publications. Moshe’s kind and pleasing personality, open mind and extensive knowledge made him a superb dig director, colleague and friend.

During the last ten years of his life, Moshe suffered from severe illness. Trude cared for him bravely while continuing her own research and public duties, as well as the scholarly work that had been cut short by her husband’s illness.

In addition to his wife, Dothan is survived by their sons, Dani and Uri. Their creative work in science, art and literature will be his most lasting memorial.

014

Putting Paul on the Map

Apostle’s Name Found on Cyprus Inscription

Italian archaeologists at Paphos, on the rocky, sun-drenched southwestern coast of Cyprus, say they have uncovered the earliest material evidence of Paul’s presence on the island. Until now, the apostle’s visit was known only from the New Testament, which relates that Paul, on his first missionary journey, “sailed to Cyprus,” where he crossed “the whole island as far as Paphos” (Acts 13:4–6). Local tradition dates Paul’s visit to about 45 A.D.

According to Filippo Giudice, who heads an Italian archaeological team that has operated in Paphos since 1988, the letters on a fragmentary inscription on a marble plaque may refer to Paul. The top line of the Greek inscription reads LOY, while OSTO appears below, which Giudice reconstructs as (PAU)LOY (AP)OSTO(LOY), “Paul apostle.” The inscription, found in an early Christian basilica, is thought to date to the first or second century A.D.

But the initial letter P is missing, so it may signify Saul rather than Paul. “Unfortunately, the first letters of the inscription have been lost, so we do not know if he was known then as Saulos [his Jewish name] or Paulos, the Greek form of Paulus, a Roman nickname meaning ‘small,’” Professor Giudice reported in the Milan daily Il Sole 24 Ore.

Giudice, who teaches archaeology and Greco-Roman art history at the University of Catania in Sicily, compares the find to a well-known fourth-century Latin inscription from Rome: PAULO APOSTOLO MART[YRI], which means “Paul, apostle and martyr.” “The Paphos fragmentary inscription appears remarkably similar to that appearing on the apostle’s tomb in the Basilica of St. Paul in Rome,” he said in a telephone interview.

Ancient Paphos was a sprawling coastal city that included an elegant villa where Cicero may have sojourned. Giudice’s archaeological team was assigned a section initially identified by local archaeologists as a military barracks and a related temple, dating from the Ptolemaic period (294–58 B.C.). Subsequent excavations, however, gradually revealed a larger and more important sanctuary complex. Originating in the fourth century B.C., it remained in use through the fourth century A.D. The sanctuary includes a 210-foot-long corridor, a portico and a training stadium, Giudice says.

“Epigraphic and iconographic evidence suggests there were cults to Apollo and Artemis,” he says. “Fragments of surgical tools and anatomical vases imply there may also have been a pre-Christian cult of Aesculapius, son of Apollo and the god of medicine.” In the early 1990s the excavators reached the westernmost sanctuary area, where the early Christian basilica had been built over the old sanctuary after an imperial decree abolished pagan cults in 394 A.D.

According to the Book of Acts, Paul converted Sergius Paulus, the governor of Paphos, to Christianity (Acts 13:12). A more complete conversion of Cyprus to Christianity was the work of the mystic monk St. Hilarion of Gaza (c. 291–371 A.D.), whose life and travels were recorded by the desert monk St. Jerome. As a youth, Hilarion left Palestine for Egypt and then Sicily before venturing eastward to settle and to seek conversions on Cyprus. The construction of the basilica presumably dates from the period of Hilarion’s preaching there.

However, as Giudice points out, the fragment far predates Hilarion. “On the basis of the style of the inscription, we can date the inscription from the first or second century,” he said.

“The Pafio [Paphos] fragment allows us to begin to reconstruct the map of Paul’s movements from Anatolia to Arabia, Syria, Palestine, Cyprus and then in the West to Malta, Pozzuoli and Rome, the place of his martyrdom,” Giudice said.

013

What Is It?

A. Soap dish

B. Ladle

C. Oil lamp

D. Finger bowl

014

What It Is, Is …

B. Ladle.

Although some scholars have identified this calcite vessel as a lamp, it bears no traces of burning; it is more likely that the stone bowl, dating to about 2000 B.C., was a pouring vessel. The face of a man with the horns of a bull is carved in relief on one corner of the 6-inch ladle. Black paint still clings to the hair and beard. Discovered in the royal cemetery of Ur, in southern Iraq, the ladle was probably used for libations during funerary rites or may once have held liquids that were buried with the corpse for use in the afterlife.

Not as Simple as A-B-C

Earliest Use of Alphabet Found in Egypt