Endnote 9 – Kadesh-Barnea—In the Bible and on the Ground

Cohen interpreted the remains as belonging to two different fortresses built one on top of the other. The lower fortress, in his view, was surrounded by a thick, massive wall and was labeled Stratum 3; the upper one was surrounded by a casemate wall and was labeled Stratum 2. As shown by one of us (D. Ussishkin, “The Rectangular Fortress at Kadesh-Barnea,” Israel Exploration Journal 45 [1995], pp. 118–127), only a single fortress was erected here, as suggested at the time by the earlier excavator, Moshe Dothan. The massive wall of Cohen’s earlier fortress is simply the massive foundation—in other words, the substructure—of the superimposed casemate wall, all forming parts of the same fortress wall.