Books in Brief

006

Centuries of Darkness

Peter James, in collaboration with I.J. Thorpe, Nikos Kokkinos, Robert Morkor and John Frankish

(London: Jonathan Cape, 1991; New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers Univ. Press, 1993) 434 pp., $45.00 cloth, $16.95 paper

“How can you date that event with such precision?” students frequently ask in response to my claims that “Tuthmosis III became pharaoh in 1479 B.C.” or “Israel divided into two kingdoms in 931 B.C., just after Solomon’s death.” At this point, the lecture takes a 20-minute detour on chronology and the synchronisms between Egypt, Israel and Assyria, such as the interlocking events in Judah in 701 B.C., when Sennacherib of Assyria, Hezekiah of Judah and King Tirhakah of Kush/Egypt met in a common conflict. I would go on to inform the inquisitive student that the basis for Assyrian chronology is the royal annals and the Limmu lists.^a On the Egyptian side, I would continue, king lists of pharaonic origin and lists furnished by classical writers, when coupled with astronomical and lunar data, help establish a rather precise absolute chronology.

In recent decades, significant progress has allowed historians to feel confident, even certain, about the chronological framework for many periods of Near Eastern history. Despite minor differences among scholars holding to high or low chronologies (a difference of perhaps 25 years), most believe that only some fine-tuning is necessary for defining historical periods. Consequently, historians and archaeologists generally resist a maverick who questions the generally accepted dates of the absolute chronology of any nation, be it Mesopotamia, Israel or Egypt. This reviewer understands this all too well, having drawn attention to the lack of historical evidence from Egyptian sources for using the foundation of the New Kingdom to date the end of the Middle Bronze Age in Canaan to 1550 B.C.^b Readers of BAR may recall the heated exchange between Bryant Wood and Piotr Bienkowski on the destruction of City C at Jericho.^c Bienkowski defends the traditional dating of this city to about 1550 B.C., the end of Middle Bronze IIC, while Wood argues that it was Late Bronze I (c. 1400 B.C.).

Given scholars’ aversion to changing the generally accepted view on historical reconstruction, many will feel uncomfortable with a book devoted to questioning several of the assumptions, methods and conclusions of historians of the Mediterranean and the Fertile Crescent. But this is precisely what Peter James and four collaborators, all associated with British universities, have done. While they suggest that dates may have to be adjusted down by two centuries in some areas, they are quick to distance themselves from radical revisionists like Immanuel Velikovsky, who advocated lowering Egyptian chronology by as much as eight centuries (p. xxi).

In the opening chapter, James and company survey the beginnings of serious study of chronology in the last century up to the appearance of radiocarbon dating in the 1950s. The next four chapters deal with problems in Italian and Greek archaeology and history, often drawing attention to the anomaly posed by objects that clearly confound the accepted definition of a particular cultural horizon. While acknowledging that such an object may not be in its original archaeological context—which would invalidate it as evidence—James tends to favor revising chronology.

More interesting to students of Biblical archaeology is the second half of the book, which relates to the archaeology of Israel and the Hebrew Bible. James and his colleagues recognize the importance of Egyptian history in reconstructing the history of Israel, because of important synchronisms between the two and the accepted absolute dates for Egypt’s New Kingdom and Third Intermediate Period. In a chapter entitled “Biblical Archaeology Without Egypt,” however, James wrestles with chronological 008dilemmas where Egyptian inscriptions offer no assistance.

In view of the rising skepticism of many Syro-Palestinian archaeologists and Bible scholars about the value of using the Bible as a source for historical reconstruction, this book’s approach is refreshing. We are told, for instance, that “rejection of the entire Old Testament record as a piece of impressive fiction is simply too glib” (p. 164). Regarding the Biblical story of the origin of Israel in Egypt, whence the Hebrews escaped the clutches of Pharaoh, a view increasingly spurned in the mainstream of scholarship, James states, “The tradition is credible” (p. 164). On the subject of Israel’s entry into Canaan, the authors claim that “there is little that is intrinsically implausible in the biblical story of the Conquest as an armed invasion” (p. 165). In comparing the Biblical data with Egyptian or Assyrian royal inscriptions, James argues that the Hebrew writers were “more even-handed” (p. 169). Because the Bible is taken seriously, it is a partner in the enterprise of reconstructing the history of Israel, as it should be.

James explores the problem of dating the famous Lachish letters and favors a date in the Persian period (about 440 B.C.) rather than in the time of the Babylonian invasions (597 and 587 B.C.). The controversy over who destroyed Lachish III is also addressed. Was it the work of Sennacherib in 701 B.C., when Hezekiah was king, as favored by the excavator David Ussishkin? Or did the conflagration come later? J. L. Starkey, the original excavator of Lachish, followed by William F. Albright and Kathleen Kenyon, believed that Lachish III was destroyed by the Chaldeans (Babylonians) in 597 B.C. The authors, however, associate the destruction with Nebuchadnezzar’s final assault on Judah in 587 B.C., in accordance with Jeremiah 34:7. On the other hand, Olga Tufnell and Yohanan Aharoni favored a dating even before 701 B.C.

By introducing this chronological conundrum, and many others like it, the authors are able to show that there is considerable disagreement among archaeolcygists on dating. The problem is simple. Ceramic chronology is still not a precise dating tool for providing absolute dates. Scholars increasingly recognize that movements from one archaeological horizon to another, say from the Middle to Late Bronze Age, are marked by a gradual transition and not by a sharp break with strikingly different types of pottery and architecture.

For this reason, synchronisms with Egypt have been especially important for Syro-Palestinian archaeologists and Bible scholars. But when we turn to chapter 10, the authors show that the astronomical basis for Egyptian chronology rests upon uncertain assumptions. Critical to establishing the chronological framework for the XIIth Dynasty is the el-Lahun papyri’s reference to the sighting of the star Sirius in year 7 of an unnamed king. The assumption has been that this king was Senusret III. More recent study by astronomers of the annual rising of Sirius (the Sothic cycle, after Sothis, the Egyptian name for Sirius) has raised enough questions about the accuracy of the data to necessitate a thorough reexamination of the Sothic and lunar data.

While this reviewer is not convinced that the Egyptian XIXth Dynasty (traditionally the 13th century B.C.) should be lowered to about 1040 to 940 B.C., thus making David and Solomon contemporaries of Ramesses II as this book suggests, the authors have drawn attention to serious problems that cannot be ignored. Even if this study does not provide satisfying solutions to every case, the issues underscored should prompt the reassessment of all areas of Near Eastern chronology, which may result in confirming the generally accepted view, fine-tuning the present system or rethinking the 010chronology. Despite the careful argumentation presented, rethinking the chronology seems unlikely to garner much support, while fine-tuning the present system is certainly possible. In any event, this book forces us to think, and thus is an important contribution to reconstructing the past.

I Have Built You an Exalted House: Temple Building in Light of Mesopotamian and Northwest Semitic Writings

Victor Hurowitz

(Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, 1992) 398 pp., $57.50

The construction of a temple in the ancient Near East constituted an ambitious and complex undertaking. The project required the selection of a site and the choice of an expressive architecture that would communicate the basic and most influential ideas of the religion. Skilled labor had to be recruited and a huge work force conscripted, while a steady supply of the proper building materials needed to be assured. The venture demanded organizational and management skills of a high order. Most important, the entire project called for divine approval and participation in order to endow it with authenticity and legitimacy. The completed monumental structure fostered community pride, strengthened societal identity, advanced social cohesion and enhanced the standing and political power of the sovereign who initiated the project and brought it to fruition. No wonder the building of a temple became a recurrent theme of scribal activity over a long period.

In this study, Hurowitz concentrates on this literary theme, and on one example in particular—the account of Solomon’s building and dedication of the Temple in Jerusalem as set forth in 1 Kings 5:15–9:28. Hurowitz borrows his title from the prayer delivered by the Biblical king at the dedication ceremony of the finished edifice (1 Kings 8:13).

The first part of Hurowitz’s book deals with ancient Near Eastern building accounts ranging from that of King Gudea of the Sumerian city-state of Lagash in southern Mesopotamia (c. 2144–2124 B.C.E.) to the first-century Jewish historian Flavius Josephus’s story (Antiquities of the Jews 15.380–425) of the rebuilding of the Second Temple in Jerusalem under King Herod (37–4 B.C.E.). The author casts a wide net. He presents a detailed and thorough investigation of extant “building stories,” examining more than 20 extra-Biblical accounts found in Sumerian and old 072Babylonian literature, in Assyrian royal inscriptions, in neo-Babylonian royal inscriptions, in Mesopotamian mythology and in Northwest Semitic writings. He also analyzes four Biblical texts: the construction of the Tabernacle in the wilderness of Sinai (Exodus 25:1–27:21, 35:1–40:38), the building of the First Temple, the rebuilding of the Jerusalem Temple by those returning from the Babylonian Exile (Ezra 3–6) and the memoirs of Nehemiah that record how the walls of Jerusalem were repaired (Nehemiah 2:11–4:23). Drawing on all these sources, Hurowitz convincingly concludes that a standard literary pattern characterizes each of these descriptions of temple building, although, to be sure, the texts allow room for individual variation.

The second part of the book focuses on the Biblical account of the great Solomonic enterprise. Here, Hurowitz closely compares every aspect of the narrative with a corresponding literary feature in pertinent Near Eastern extra-Biblical texts. This exercise reveals that the thematic structure of the Kings narrative follows the well-rooted regional pattern. Hurowitz isolates five characteristics that underlie all the building stories: divine approval or command as the rationale for the undertaking, a description of the preparations, a description of the building process and of the edifice, the dedication of the completed edifice and a prayer or blessing.

The layman will not find this highly technical book to be easy reading, but no future commentator on the Book of Kings will be able to ignore Hurowitz’s important and masterly study of temple-building narratives.

The Rape of Egypt: How Europeans Stripped Egypt of Its Heritage

Peter France

(London: Barrie & Jenkins, 1991; distributed by Trafalgar Square, North Pomfret, VT) 240 pp, 29 illus., $29.95

Living in an age when archaeological monuments have become the proud symbols of modern Middle Eastern nations—and the issues of antiquities looting and site preservation have attracted wide public attention—today’s readers will welcome this examination of the historical roots of these phenomena. In The Rape of Egypt, Peter France, a former BBC broadcaster, presents the story of the European exploration (and archaeological plunder) of Egypt from the late 1700s to the 1920s, though perhaps with a less accusing tone than his title suggests.

In his choice of adventurers and anecdotes, France leads readers over ground already well trodden by Brian Fagan in his Rape of the Nile (1975). Nonetheless, France tells the story competently, presenting the familiar cast of characters in the combined Hall of Fame and rogues’ gallery of Egyptian archaeology: Napoleon Bonaparte and his corps of savants, Giovanni Belzoni, Francois Champollion, Sir John Wilkinson, Richard Lepsius and Auguste Mariette. But the author’s often admiring descriptions of the archaeological exploits of these figures leave some question about whether he believes Egypt’s antiquities were plundered by Europeans or, in fact, saved by them. Though he describes the most egregious cases of archaeological vandalism and profiteering, France does not deal with the more complex question of historical expropriation: Why did European scholars assume that they, and not the modern peoples of Egypt, were best qualified to act as ancient Egypt’s official interpreters?

The proximity of Egypt to the Holy Land made it inevitable that many explorers would visit both countries, and, naturally, the historics of Biblical archaeology and Egyptology overlap. The reconstruction of ancient Egyptian history provided a background for the understanding of many of the events of Biblical history, and Egypt even served as a testing ground for the work of Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie, who, at the end of the 19th century, introduced the techniques of modern stratigraphic archaeology to the Holy Land.

France, however, concentrates on Egypt. He ends the book with Howard Carter’s discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922 and the resulting controversy between the sponsors of the dig and the Egyptian government over the ownership of the tomb’s treasures. As France rightly stresses, the sudden fierceness of the controversy was closely intertwined with rising Egyptian nationalism. Yet he puts an unrealistically rosy ending on the story when he declares that the Egyptian confiscation of the finds marked the end of an era, closed by “an independent government of Egypt determined to assert at last its ownership over the ancient monuments within its boundaries, and to take into its own hands the preservation of its ancient heritage” (p. 224). In fact, Egypt’s government remained under close British supervision for the next 30 years, and the plunder continued, though perhaps less openly. The rape of Egypt did not end as definitively as the author would suggest. And the passionate debates that still rage over the ownership of the past—in Egypt and elsewhere in the region—provide adequate proof that France ended his story too soon.

Centuries of Darkness