Strata

008

We Have A Winner

But No Picture

Never since archaeology began has the seal of an Israelite king been seen. Sometimes, on a seal or a bulla, the name of someone mentioned in the Bible appears; sometimes, a high official from the Israelite royal court is inscribed; sometimes, the king who the servant serves is mentioned. But never the seal belonging to the king himself—until now.

In our July/August 1996 issue (Strata, BAR 22:05) we announced that for the first time we would be able to see such a seal—or such a seal impression; that is, a small lump of clay impressed with a seal, called a bulla. The name of the king would be revealed in a paper to be read at the Annual Meeting in New Orleans this past November. Who would the king be? And who would make the revelation—an American scholar, an Israeli scholar or some other nationality? And did the artifact come from a controlled excavation or did it surface on the antiquities market? The first person who correctly answered these three questions, we said, would be the winner of our “Big Contest” and win “fabulous prizes.”

The winning answers are as follows:

The name of the king is Ahaz, who ruled Judah for two decades from 735 to 715 B.C.

The announcement was made by Robert Deutsch, an Israeli graduate student who is about to publish the bulla in his master’s thesis at Tel Aviv University. For several years, Deutsch has been publishing inscriptions from the collection of Shlomo Moussaieff of London,^a and this is one of stars of the collection.

The tiny (less than half-inch-wide) piece of clay impressed with the seal reads on two lines, “Ahaz (son of) Jotham King of Judah.” Thus, it contains the names of not one but two kings, Ahaz and his father Jotham, who ruled from about 750 to 731 B.C. (overlaps result from co-regencies, a practice that started with Uzziah—Ahaz’s grandfather—who contracted leprosy, and continued to the reign of Manasseh).

Ahaz, unfortunately, is not a king who is much to be admired. He introduced all sorts of pagan practices into Judah. “He sacrificed and made offerings on the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree” (2 Kings 16:4). “He even made his son pass through fire, according to the abominable practices of the nations” (2 Kings 16:3). When Judah was attacked, the prophet Isaiah offered Ahaz divine help, but Ahaz chose instead an alliance with the Assyrian monarch Tiglath-Pileser III, whose assistance Ahaz purchased with treasure from the Temple of the Lord, as well as from his own palace (2 Kings 16:7–8). The tribute of Ahaz to the Assyrian monarch is also mentioned in a cuneiform inscription of Tiglath-Pileser’s. Ahaz even replaced the Temple altar that Solomon had built with an altar fashioned after one he saw in Damascus (2 Kings 16:10–16).

The seal of Ahaz impressed in the bulla is what scholars call aniconic—it has nothing on it except the letters and a plain border surrounding the letters. The letters are surrounded by two circles.

Except for the words on the seal, it is in no regard unusual. Indeed, it is quite plain. One wonders why a king would have such a plain seal. The answer is that this was very probably not his ceremonial seal. This seal was used to seal common, routine documents.

Of course in any inscription that surfaces on the antiquities market, one wonders immediately if it is a fake. In this case its authenticity is established by crystals that penetrated the surface of the clay, even in the crevices of some of the letters. So far as is known, this sign of age cannot be faked. In addition, the letters themselves give every indication of authenticity to the expert eye.

Did we get a winner to the contest? The answers came in from around the world. But no one in America could do it. The Middle East also came up empty; Latin America did zilch. Great Britain was anything but. Don’t even ask about Asia. Only Elfriede Thurnherr, of Steinhausen, Switzerland, correctly answered the three questions. At first we thought she might have had some inside information, but she told us it was just plain luck. So, congratulations to Ms. Thurnherr for hitting the proverbial nail on the proverbial head. Our two-volume folio edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls photos (published at $200) and certificates for five gift subscriptions are at this moment winging their way to the Alps.

Oh yes, you’d like to see the bulla. Mr. Deutsch said no pictures, however—not until it appears in his own publication. Mr. Moussaieff acquiesed, somewhat reluctantly.

009

Publish, Don’t Perish

Philanthropists Underwrite Programs For Publications

“Money is available” for publication of final excavation reports, says Philip J. King, director of the newly established Shelby White-Leon Levy Program for Archaeological Publications.

Over a third of a million dollars is already in hand, according to King, and that is only the beginning. At least a million dollars will be available if qualified applicants submit requests. Normally, grants will be made for $30,000 per year for up to three years for the publication director, plus additional funds for assistants, travel, drawing of pottery and plans, and other similar out-of-pocket costs.

To qualify for a grant, the publication director must devote full time to the project and the result must be a “publishable final report.” Applicants must hold a doctorate or be a doctoral candidate (provided the doctoral candidate can spend full time on the research).

Funds are available for major excavations, either in-progress or terminated long ago, provided materials are still available on the basis of which to write a final report. Sites may be anywhere in the Levant or the Aegean. Time periods may be any time between the Neolithic and the Medieval.

Leon Levy and his wife Shelby White are major supporters of archaeology in the Near East. In addition to their underwriting the current long-term excavation of Ashkelon, under the direction of Harvard Professor Lawrence Stager, Mr. Levy and Ms. White have provided a million dollars to restore the Islamic palaces south of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

Director King, a Catholic priest and former two-term president of the American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR), is the only person to have served as president not only of ASOR but also of the Society of Biblical Literature and the Catholic Biblical Association. He is the author of a history of ASOR, as well as several volumes on archaeology as providing a context for the prophetic books of Jeremiah, Amos, Hosea and Micah. He is also the author of the extensive entry on Jerusalem in the Anchor Bible Dictionary. He is currently co-authoring with Professor Stager a social history of ancient Israel.

The Program Committee, which will determine the awards, includes Stager, James Ottaway, Dolly Goulandris, James Wiseman and Martha Joukowsky. Wiseman and Joukowsky are both past presidents of the Archaeological Institute of America.

For further information regarding publication grants, contact The Shelby White-Leon Levy Program for Archaeological Publications, Harvard University, The Semitic Museum, 6 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138; telephone 617–495-9317; fax 617–496-8904; e-mail amappa@fas.harvard.edu.

The Dead Sea Scrolls After 50 Years

Jerusalem Gala Features Exhibits And Lectures

They’ve gone from being hailed as “the manuscript discovery of the century” (by William F. Albright) to becoming the cause of “the academic scandal par excellence of the twentieth century” (in the words of Oxford don Geza Vermes) to heading David Letterman’s nightly Top Ten list (the Top Ten Secrets of the Dead Sea Scrolls).

Fifty years after their discovery, the Dead Sea Scrolls will be the focus of a major international conference at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem on July 20–25, 1997. Organizers hope it will appeal to both scholarly and popular audiences. Also involved in the planning are the Israel Antiquities Authority, Hebrew University and the Israel Exploration Society.

The world’s leading experts on the Scrolls will participate in the sessions. Scholarly talks already announced include: “The Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible at Qumran,” “The Sciences and the Dead Sea Scrolls” and “Writing in Second Temple Times.” BAR editor Hershel Shanks will speak on “Learning from the Dead Sea Scrolls Publication Experience.”

Sessions for the general public include “The Dead Sea Scrolls in Modern Scholarship;” “Qumran and the Background of Christianity;” a tour with a scholar of the Shrine of the Book, where the longer scrolls are housed; and presentations of computer-assisted research on the Scrolls. Special exhibits will include “Conservation and Preservation of the Dead Sea Scrolls” at the Israel Antiquities Authority, “The Dead Sea Scrolls in Print and in Audio-Visual Form” at the Israel Museum and “A Day at Qumran” at the Shrine of the Book. Field trips are also planned.

Interested in taking part? Join the Biblical Archaeology Society’s Israel/Jordan tour this summer. Participants, among many exciting activities, will also attend the Scrolls conference. Call 1-800-221-4644; fax 202-364-2636 or e-mail bibarch@clark.net.

010

Separated at Birth?

Don’t Mix Up the Scholar with the 2,600-Year-Old Relic

We recently received a note of thanks from Tel Aviv University professor Itzhaq Beit-Arieh, whose article on Edomite encroachment into Judah appeared in the November/December 1996 issue (see “Edomites Advance into Judah,” BAR 22:06). The university’s notecard features a gold-embossed drawing of the 2,600-year-old clay flute-player figurine that graced our cover. It looked eerily familiar, and not only because we had just published it. And then it hit us—the figurine looks just like Beit-Arieh! Had the Edomites, in a fit of prescience, carved their flute player to resemble the man who would, millennia later, teach the world of their culture? Or has Beit-Arieh, after so many years of studying the Edomites, come to resemble his subject’s lovely artifact, the way some couples begin to look like each other after many years of marriage?

Evidence of the Great Flood?

The Fountains Of The Great Deep Burst Forth

The Bible tells of it; the ancient Mesopotamian epic of Gilgamesh tells of it: a terrible deluge left the whole world under water. But have scientists found evidence of it?

A research team headed by William B.F. Ryan and Walter C. Pittman, geologists with Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, reports that 7,500 years ago sea levels rose dramatically and salt water cascaded through the narrow Bosporos strait into the Black Sea, which was then a freshwater lake. Using seismic evidence, sediment cores and freshwater fossils, the geologists have traced the shores of the old lake, according to a report in the New York Times. The scientists determined that the Black Sea’s water levels rose about 500 feet, perhaps in only a matter of months. The quickly rising waters then submerged over 60,000 square miles of land.

Scholars have long noticed similarities between the Biblical flood story and an earlier flood story in the Gilgamesh epic (probably written down in the early second millennium B.C.). In both stories, for example, a dove and raven are sent from a ship after seven-day intervals. The similarities may suggest either that Noah’s story was modeled after Gilgamesh or that both stories derive from something else; they may even preserve memories of an actual event.

If the Black Sea deluge was that event, the memories stretched back some 3,500 years. Nonetheless, Ryan and Pittman make some tantalizing suggestions. They observe that the western and northern coasts of the Black Sea supported some of the West’s earliest agricultural communities. Only around 7,500 years ago did settled agricultural communities begin to appear in central Europe, Anatolia and Mesopotamia.

Were revolutionary agricultural techniques brought to these areas by peoples forced by the flood to vacate the Black Sea coast? And did these migrants bring with them vivid memories of what was perceived as a worldwide deluge?

012

James Bennett Pritchard, 1909–1997

James Bennett Pritchard, 87, professor emeritus of religious studies at the University of Pennsylvania and an archaeologist for more than 40 years, died January 1.

Pritchard spent five seasons between 1956 and 1962, directing excavations at ancient Gibeon. Here he discovered the city’s water system and 31 storage jar handles inscribed with the name “Gibeon” (gb‘n). Pritchard was the first to identify the location of Gibeon, a town mentioned dozens of times in Scripture. This was perhaps his greatest find.

Pritchard began his archaeological career using $285 of his own money to take part in the 1934 season at ancient Bethel (modern Beitin) where William F. Albright was director and where John Bright and G. Ernest Wright, who themselves were to become leading figures in the field, also participated. From Bethel Pritchard went on to participate in several other digs, including ancient Dibon (modern Dhiban) and Second Temple period Jericho (Tulul Abu el-Alayiq), where he uncovered the Winter Palace of King Herod, who had his brother-in-law Aristobulus murdered there.

While curator of Biblical archaeology at Penn’s University Museum (1964–1967), Pritchard conducted excavations at Tell es-Sa‘idiyeh in Jordan.

James Pritchard claimed his “career was in ruins,” his way of referring to the work of a field archaeologist. One of the most remarkable aspects of his career is the fact that he published all of his excavations—not a common-place state of affairs in the world of archaeology. Pritchard also wrote popular accounts of his excavations, as well as preliminary reports and final reports.

Pritchard has been—and will continue to be—best known as the editor of Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament (ANET) published by Princeton University Press. After the Second World War Pritchard conceived the idea of publishing a collection of texts in English translation and persuaded his colleagues around the country to prepare new translations of Sumerian, Akkadian, Egyptian, Hittite, Ugaritic, Phoenician, Hebrew, Aramaic and South-Arabian texts. No one was interested in publishing it, however.

Pritchard then thought of adding the sub-title “Relating to the Old Testament” and including an index of Biblical references. This opened up a potential market that included theological schools and seminaries, and prompted Princeton to take a chance on the work. ANET went on to become one of the best-selling books ever published by the press, and generated a companion volume, The Ancient Near East in Pictures.

James Pritchard was a quiet, reserved man. It took some time to get to know him, but gaining his friendship was well worth the effort. The University of Pennsylvania established an endowed chair in his honor, the James B. Pritchard Chair for Biblical Archaeology and Related Fields.

014

Riddle of the Sphinx

Experts Differ Over Restoration Needs

The new riddle of the Sphinx is, how long will it last? It could lose its head in 200 years according to Kyoto University professor Chikaosa Tanimoto. Since 1992 Tanimoto and his research team have visited the Sphinx more than 40 times and observed that pollution and erosion shave up to 0.2 inches of stone from the Sphinx’s chest every year, weakening the neck. When a chunk of its right shoulder fell off in 1988, the then-antiquities chief lost his job. Egypt’s current chief antiquities inspector, Zahi Hawas, does not believe the Sphinx is in danger, however. “These claims made by the Japanese are nonsense,” he says. “Some experts seek fame and want to use the Sphinx to get it.”

Tanimoto is not the first to notice the damage caused by pollution and erosion. According to Reiner Stadelmann, director of the German Archaeological Institute in Cairo, “All the experts agree that something should be done, but not immediately.” Stadelmann and Hawas downplay Tanimoto’s prediction because they feel he lacks the expertise to back up his claim, having only spent two seasons at the Sphinx. Hawas concedes that the Sphinx has a weak chest but says restoration projects already underway are drawing out harmful salts and have stopped the flaking. But no one will know for sure until the 22nd century whether Tanimoto is right and heads are going to roll.

Home Sweet Home Page

Digging The Web

Do you want to find out about excavations in Israel—fast? Now there’s a World Wide Web page just for you, administered by the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The address is http://www.israel.org/archdigs.html#25

The page lists basic information on 17 digs and, in most cases, provides direct e-mail links to dig administrators. Several of the larger excavations maintain their own home page on the Web, which can also be reached directly from the dig listing. The page is updated occasionally, so be sure to check back. A more extensive listing of excavations, complete with a historical overview of each dig, can be found in our previous issue (“Any Time, Any Place: A Dig for Every Interest,” BAR 23:01). If you don’t have a copy, our courteous and speedy operators can be reached at 1-800-221-4644.

The More Things Don’t Not Change

Out With BA, In With NEA (Maybe)

In our previous issue’s Strata section (see “The More Things Don’t Change,” Strata, BAR 23:01), we reported on the reader survey conducted by Biblical Archaeologist, published by the professional organization the American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR), on whether it should ditch its moniker, which it has used for half a century, for a new name. The response was unambiguous: 84 percent said they either agreed or strongly agreed that “Biblical Archaeologist is a great name and should be maintained.” Ten percent even threatened to cancel their subscriptions if the name was altered.

Faced with such an overwhelming sentiment, the ASOR board of trustees did the only thing it could do: It decided to ignore BA’s readers and voted to change the name anyway. The board opted for Near Eastern Archaeologist but is waiting for a report from editor David Hopkins this spring before officially making the change. The new name, Hopkins tells us, will be introduced in the first issue of 1998.

Israeli Archaeologists Out Of Work

Ax Falls At IAA

Hundreds of Israeli archaeologists are hanging up their picks and spades this year. With the ultra-Orthodox wielding more power than ever in the Netanyahu/Likud governing coalition, the government spending allowance for the Antiquities Authority has been slashed again. The 1997 budget from the government is less than half of the 1995 budget—from $35 million two years ago down to $16 million, reflecting the animosity between the religious faction, who object to the excavation of graves, and the archaeological community.

An Associated Press report quotes Antiquities Authority director Amir Drori as saying, “We are missing a chance to use the best natural resource we have—our heritage.”

Tourist ministry spokeswoman Orly Doron replied, “We don’t need any new archaeological digs to attract tourists.”

010

Mark Your Calendar

Exhibitions

Alexander The Great—The Exhibition

Through March 31, 1997

“Will he leave me no lands to conquer?” the young Alexander is said to have cried upon hearing of one of his father’s victories. He needn’t have worried. After succeeding his father, Philip II, as ruler of Macedonia, Alexander conquered and unified the Mediterranean world, Persia, India and Egypt in a mere 13 years. More than 500 works of art borrowed from museums around the world—including mosaics, frescoes, statues, coins, jewelry, terra-cotta figurines, miniatures, rare illuminated Persian manuscripts and some of the original weapons used by the Macedonian army in battle—pay tribute to Alexander’s legendary exploits. Fourteen galleries recreate Alexander’s Macedonia and the lands of his campaigns. This will be the exhibit’s only American venue.

Splendors Of Ancient Egypt

Through March 30, 1997

Coffins; mummy masks; statues of goddesses, gods and pharaohs; limestone paintings; jewelry and funerary stele reliefs are among the over 200 objects used to recreate pyramid tombs and chambers and to tell the story of life, political power and religious belief in ancient Egypt.

Preserving Ancient Statues From Jordan

Through April 6, 1997

Trace the journey of some of the world’s oldest human statues from their discovery in Jordan 14 years ago through their conservation at the Smithsonian. The five 012statues consist of three double-headed and two single-headed figures. (See “Take Me to Your Leader,” Strata, BAR 22:05).

The Getty Kouros

Ongoing

For many years this Greek marble statue of a nude male youth was removed from public view while art historians and scientists hotly debated its authenticity. An international colloquium of experts met in Greece to discuss its many unique features and determine whether it dates from 530 B.C. or is a modern fake. This exhibit reveals the result of that meeting and a glimpse of the many analyses the statue was put through.

Ivories From The Ancient Near East

Ongoing

Ivory from elephants, walruses and hippotamuses was carved and traded throughout the Near East, Egypt and Greece. Nine exquisitely carved examples of this prized commodity, from Samaria and Nimrud, illustrate its different uses.

Seminar

The Virtual Dig: Computers And The Pursuit Of The Past

March 22, 1997

Witness on-screen excavations of sites and walk through or fly over reconstructions of ancient cities at the University of Pennsylvania’s symposium on “virtual” archaeology. A technology fair follows the presentations. Call (215) 898-4890 for more information.

Association Of Ancient Historians Annual Meeting

May 2–4, 1997

Curious about human sacrifice, women and property, and the “invention of tradition”? Contact Chris Wells, department of classical studies, Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, by snail mail—the zip is 78212-7200—or e-mail—cwells@trinity.edu—for more information.

008

What Is It?

A. Weather vane

B. Tongue depressor

C. Pestle

D. Toy gun

E. Ornamental ax

012

What It Is, Is …

E. Ornamental ax.

This late third-millennium B.C. ax—with its blunt, rounded blade and curving handle—measures approximately 10.5 inches.

First discovered in southwestern Iran, at the Elamite city of Susa, objects of this type were believed to be Elamite. However, further excavations revealed that the objects came from Bactria (modern northern Afghanistan) and spread through the region by trade. This particular copper or bronze ax came from either eastern Iran or Bactria.

We Have A Winner

But No Picture

Never since archaeology began has the seal of an Israelite king been seen. Sometimes, on a seal or a bulla, the name of someone mentioned in the Bible appears; sometimes, a high official from the Israelite royal court is inscribed; sometimes, the king who the servant serves is mentioned. But never the seal belonging to the king himself—until now.