ReViews

060

Almost 40 years after the end of the excavation of the settlement at Qumran, adjacent to where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, the first volume of a projected multi-volume “final” report appeared. Unfortunately this long delay is not at all rare in Palestinian archaeology. The first volume of the “final” report consisted of the field notes of the excavation, in French, by Roland de Vaux, and an album of photographs.¹ This was nevertheless a most welcome contribution to the study of a site that produced the most important finds ever discovered in the Holy Land and one of the most important in world archaeology.

A few years later a German translation of the first volume was issued, without the expensive photograph album but with very useful detailed indices (no less than 114 pages) and a careful digest of the rich information in the book.² Then followed an English version (also without the photograph album)³ which is, to quote J.B. Humbert, the editor of the original edition, “clearer than the French original in significant places.”

Now we have the second volume of the final report, but it is not exactly what we expected. Very little of the actual finds from Qumran are presented here. Instead we are treated to an effort to bring the latest scientific techniques to bear on the archaeological evidence.

This heavy new tome contains mostly studies in anthropology, physics and chemistry. It has 9 sections, 21 chapters and 35 contributors from 10 countries, undoubtedly an impressive international project. It is not possible to survey properly all the chapters in the book, so I will concentrate on areas of interest to me.

The first section deals with the provenance of the Qumran pottery. A chapter entitled “Neutron Activation Analysis [of] Scroll Jars and Common Ware,” by Jan Gunneweg and Mark Balla, describe a method for establishing the “chemical fingerprints” of clay in a vessel. The premise is that every clay source on earth has its unique geochemical history, hence a unique geochemical composition. This study’s conclusion that “the chemical fingerprint[s] are unique to Qumran itself” is based not only on the trace elements of the pottery material but also on the potters’ techniques, such as levigation, temper and firing.

Nevertheless the study’s conclusion that some of the vessels were not locally made is likely erroneous. I believe all the jars that held scrolls were most probably produced at Qumran; the pottery forms have almost no parallels elsewhere and the clay composition is similar to Jerusalem and Hebron mountain clays (in the vicinity of Qumran there is no suitable clay for fashioning pots). The site had two pottery kilns during the century and a half when it was occupied; there was no need to import already- made vessels. Earthenware vessels are bulky and fragile, to say nothing about the Qumranites’ obsession with ritual purity. Three to four camel loads of clay (about one ton) from quarries a day’s journey away could have supplied the Qumran potters’ needs for a very long time. There was no need to bring finished goods to Qumran, only the raw material, clay.

“The Provenance of Scroll Jars in the Light of Archaeometric Investigations,” by Jacek Michniewicz and Miroslaw Krzysko, is a detailed and sophisticated petrographic study that concludes that the clay for the pots was brought from the Judean mountains but that it is impossible to pinpoint the exact source (or sources).

The section dealing with the Qumran cemetery opens with a “Reassessment of Controversial Studies on the Cemetery” by 061Jonathan Norton. This essay tackles the vexing problem of the presence of women and children in a graveyard that, according to most Qumran scholars, was supposed to serve an Essene, that is, a celibate, community. An elegant solution was suggested not long ago by Joe Zias: At least a dozen women’s graves were later Bedouin burials. Zias’s main argument is that these burials differ from the standard orientation of the graves, north-south, and matches the Muslim custom in this part of the world: east-west, with the head turned south, towards Mecca. Norton has difficulties with Zias’s theory, difficulties that this reviewer regards as imaginary. Norton believes that the Qumran/Essene hypothesis can account for existence of female and infant burials in the cemetery. Despite my disagreement, however, his essay is the most detailed argument published to date about the cemetery and is accompanied by the best bibliography. It is also well argued.

“Anthropological Analysis of the Human Remains: The French Collection” by Susan Guise Sheridan, Jaime Ullinger and Jeremy Ramp, is the most thorough study ever done of these skeletal remains. Of the 1178 tombs in the Qumran cemetery⁴ only 55 were unearthed in scientifically controlled excavations, of which a mere 39 have undergone modern anthropological analysis, about 3 percent of the total interred. This study focuses on the remains that are in the hands of French institutions, roughly half the total. This is certainly a small sample, insufficient for sound conclusions, but they do point to a short life expectancy for the Qumran residents, 34–36 years, in a period when the average age at death was 50 (this is the reviewer’s computation, ignoring statistical caveats). Unfortunately, the laws of the State of Israel prohibit grave digging, which makes this wise and painstaking study of special value.

The first essay in the section on “Ritual Baths and Pools” is entitled “Plastered Pools, a New Perspective” by Katharina Galor. She begins with this well-put sentence: “The stepped and plastered pools at Qumran are considered by many as the most important architectural element relating to the general interpretation of the site.” And rightly so. There are 13 stepped pools at the site, pools that are without any reasonable doubt regarded as miqvaot (ritual baths). Among the 500–600 ritual baths in Palestine, there is only one that approaches the size of the largest of Qumran’s ritual pools. Nowhere else do we find such a density of ritual baths. This is one of the reasons (and there are many) why Qumran is regarded as a religious settlement. This agrees perfectly with the intense preoccupation of the Dead Sea Scrolls people with purity and defilement. This also agrees very well with what Josephus tells us about the Essenes. Therefore it is strange to read at the end of Galor’s elaborate and erudite study that “Any expectation that the pools can solve the puzzle of ‘sectarian identity’ is overly ambitious and non-realistic. The uniqueness of the pools at Qumran should not be overrated.” As a matter of fact, the identification of Qumran as an Essene monastery does not depend only on its ritual baths, but it is one of the main arguments for this identification.

“An Archaeometric Study of Plasters from the Water Installations,” by Aryeh Shimron, is a pioneer project and supplies us with a wealth of information. One example: The Qumran plasters, unlike plasters from several other sites, contain high concentrations of cadmium, sulfates, uranium, strontium and barium. Could some of these materials have contributed to the short life expectancy of the Qumranites?

Lack of space precludes the discussion of some other important essays, such as Mireille Bélis’s on textiles, another by André Lemaire on inscriptions and graffiti, and a reassessment of the archaeology of Qumran by Humbert and Chambon.

This is a very well-produced book, beautifully designed and excellently illustrated. It is a real contribution to Qumran studies and to Palestinian archaeology in general.

Yet one would wish for a tighter editorial policy. For example, six scholars from four countries subject a couple of palm date pits and a piece of a wooden coffin to radiocarbon dating. This is an effort that is much more than what is called for, especially considering the results. Careful copyediting would have deleted banalities such as “A cemetery is a cemetery. What more can one ascertain from burial places?” And this in reference to a unique graveyard!

Almost 40 years after the end of the excavation of the settlement at Qumran, adjacent to where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, the first volume of a projected multi-volume “final” report appeared. Unfortunately this long delay is not at all rare in Palestinian archaeology. The first volume of the “final” report consisted of the field notes of the excavation, in French, by Roland de Vaux, and an album of photographs.1 This was nevertheless a most welcome contribution to the study of a site that produced the most important finds ever discovered in the Holy Land and one of […]