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In 2007 the name “Khirbet Qeiyafa” was still unknown both to professional archaeologists and to the public. In 2008 Khirbet Qeiyafa became world-famous. This spectacular success is entirely due to the figure of King David, who is so well known from the biblical tradition but is a very elusive figure from the archaeological or historical point of vi...
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... We should not be surprised to learn that the 926/925 BC date for Shoshenq's incursion agrees poorly with radiocarbon data at archaeological sites likely destroyed by this Libyan pharaoh. For instance, excavators of Khirbet Qeiyafa (Garfinkel et al. 2016) proffer no agent of destruction while rejecting Shoshenq I due to their Thielean timeline for Rehoboam, which is 40 years below the 14 C date range. The Hebrew Bible's 970 BC date for Shoshenq I's Palestinian campaign may be the only way to align radiocarbon, lunar dating, and textual data with a plausible date for the campaign. ...
Studies since 2005 have raised doubts about the Assyrian King List's (AKL) intention and ability to measure absolute time. If telescoping of time occurred, it would be difficult to detect during periods when royal annals were scant. The best way to detect discontinuity in the AKL is by comparison with contemporary king lists, such as one constructed from 1-2 Kings regnal formulas. If the AKL conflates time, an assessment of the plausibility of historical scenarios resulting from different timeframes allows for discrimination between one timeline or another. Israel and Judah's interlocking chronological systems make a comparison with the Neo-Assyrian timeline possible but contain 44 more years than the timeline implied by the AKL and Assyrian Eponym Canon. By narrowing the window of time within which a deficit in the Neo-Assyrian canons may have occurred, possible reasons for missing years in the consensus chronology present themselves. This investigation concludes that Assyria sought to maintain the legitimacy of the institution of kingship during a protracted period of unacceptable or anomalous authority. Concerns surrounding the continuity of kingship would have dictated the final form of the Assyrian King List/Assyrian Eponym Canon. Using Divided Kingdom regnal data, a revision of the historical timeline is proposed that aligns archaeological, radiocarbon, biblical, and Assyrian data.
... The material from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem excavations at Khirbet Qeiyafa is significant, as it is dated between the late 11th and first half of the 10th century BCE (Garfinkel and Kang 2011). Being a fortified and planned settlement with a developed central administration, the site's chronology (Iron I, Iron I/IIA transition or Early Iron IIA), as well as its cultural, social and political association all remain matters of significant debate (e.g., Finkelstein and Fantalkin 2012;Garfinkel and Ganor 2009;Garfinkel, Ganor and Hasel 2014;Garfinkel, Kreimerman and Zilberg 2016;Singer-Avitz 2016;Fantalkin and Finkelstein 2017;Naʾaman 2017). ...
... We emphasize that these tendencies cut across otherwise quite differing schools of thought in biblical archaeology, biblical historiography, and different perspectives on the United Monarchy or 10th century BC Israel. Mazar (2007b, p. 145), for instance, posits that "reading the Hebrew Bible, one would expect archaeology to prove the existence of the strong, mature State of David and Solomon with a large city in Jerusalem, dense urban settlement throughout the country, and formal inscriptions and art," whereas Garfinkel (2017;Garfinkel et al. 2012Garfinkel et al. , 2016Garfinkel et al. , 2019 directly tethers the material realization of state formation to the emergence of urbanism as marked by fortifications and consistent patterns of city planning during the Iron Age, and the Iron Age IIA in particular. He (Garfinkel 2017, p. 127) even views the archaeology of the 10th century BC as backing up the biblical description of United Monarchy's emergence under David because "the biblical text…describes state formation processes" in ancient Israel. ...
One of the most significant aspects of cultural variation that world archaeology has revealed is the many different forms of social complexity among ancient and more recent premodern societies. Although this exposes the shortcomings of older evolutionary approaches, Levantine and broader Near Eastern archaeology remains relatively inflexible and conservative in the perception of social complexity in the archaeological record. A necessary association between complexity and monumentality remains prevalent, whereby monumentality is understood as an important operative cog in the complexity machine. Conversely, complexity can only be read in the archaeological record where monumentality is present. This paper seeks to untie this necessary association by demonstrating that complexity without monumentality occurred in societies of the biblical period that were fully or partly nomadic and otherwise lacked a clear cultural conception of monumentality as central to the ideology of political authority and structure. This is done through the presentation of early Iron Age Edom and its implications for the understanding of the neighboring United Monarchy of ancient Israel.
... 20%), including two gates, two piazzas, a casemate city wall, a peripheral belt of buildings abutting the city wall, a large pillared building (Area F), and a major public building occupying the highest point of the site (Area A) (Fig. 2). While the excavation results have been published in detail Hasel 2014, Keimer, Kreimerman, andGarfinkel 2015;Garfinkel, Kreimerman, and Zilberg 2016), three points are worth rehearsing. Firstly, the casemates are oriented away from the gates (Fig. 3). ...
The earliest fortified sites in the kingdom of Judah in the early 10th century BCE feature a casemate city wall lined with an abutting belt of houses, which incorporate the casemates as rear rooms. This urban plan is clearly recognized in the sites of Khirbet Qeiyafa, Tell en-Naṣbeh, Khirbet ed-Dawwara, and, as discussed in detail, Beth Shemesh. Recently, excavations at Lachish, Level V, uncovered a similar pattern comprising a peripheral belt of structures abutting the city wall. This city wall was solid with no casemates. These sites have far-reaching implications for understanding the urbanization process, urban planning, and borders of the earliest phase of the kingdom of Judah.
... Khirbet al-Ra'i adds another site to our record of the poorly known early Iron Age IIA, a phase some scholars prefer to term 'the Iron Age I/IIA transition'. In recent years scholars have debated whether the Iron Age IIA should be subdivided into two or three phases (Herzog and Singer-Avitz 2004;2006;Garfinkel 2011;Garfinkel and Kang 2011;Katz and Faust 2014;Kang 2015;Garfinkel, Kreimerman and Zilberg 2016). Our preferred subdivision into three phases is summarized overleaf in Table 3. ...
From 2015-2019 excavations were conducted at the site of Khirbet al-Ra'i, in the Judean Shephelah 4 km west of Lachish. Remains from the 12th-10th centuries BCE have been uncovered. In the late 12th and 11th centuries BCE the site appears to be the main site in the region after the fall of Canaanite Lachish. In the early 10th century it was a small village contemporary with the fortified city of Khirbet Qeiyafa.
... The site is located on top of a hill overlooking the Elah Valley. The major occupation phase here is Stratum IV, a fortified city from the Iron Age IIA, dated to the early 10th century BCE (Garfinkel et al., 2016). After some 700 years, in the Late Persian -Early Hellenistic era, Khirbet Qeiyafa was reoccupied (Stratum III, Freikman et al., 2014: 101-128;Garfinkel, in press). ...
In this study, the shape of socketed bronze arrowheads is analysed and expressed as a series of mathematical trends which are then compared to chemical and lead isotope composition, as well as to the categorization of traditional non-computerized typology. It is shown that while traditional typology has statistical validation, additional important information can be gleaned from 3-D geometric morphometric shape analysis (3DGM), particularly when combined with material analyses. For example, arrowheads that are traditionally categorized as a single type demonstrate minute shape differences that correlate with the sites where they were found. This micro-variability, detected only through 3DGM, has potential cultural, chronological and regional implications. Most importantly, this pilot study shows that chemical and isotopic composition is correlated to a specific shape trend, revealed through computerized analysis, rather than to the traditional typological classification. This opens up new vistas for a more advanced analysis of archaeological finds.
... The same issue has been raised in connection with the fortified city at Khirbet Qeiyafa. Detailed analysis of the various cultural aspects has clearly shown that Khirbet Qeiyafa was a Judean city ( Garfinkel et al. 2016). Lachish is identified as a Judean city based on the cultural continuity from Level V to Level IV and then to Level III, without any destruction episode or drastic cultural change. ...
When and where the process of state formation took place in the biblical kingdom of Judah is heavily debated. Our regional project in the southwestern part of Judah, carried out from 2007 to the present, includes the excavation of three Iron Age sites: Khirbet Qeiyafa, Tel Lachish, and Khirbet al-Ra’i. New cultural horizons and new fortification systems have been uncovered, and these discoveries have been dated by 59 radiometric determinations. The controversial question of when the kingdom was able to build a fortified city at Lachish, its foremost center after Jerusalem, is now resolved thanks to the excavation of a previously unknown city wall, dated by radiocarbon ( ¹⁴ C) to the second half of the 10th century BCE.
... Then, in the late 11th-early 10th century (the transition from the Iron Age I to the Iron Age IIA) the fortified settlement of Kh. Qeiyafa, whose nature is hotly debated, was erected (Garfinkel et al. 2012(Garfinkel et al. , 2015Garfinkel, Kreimerman and Zilberg 2016;Piasetzky 2016; see also Faust 2014d). Later, in the course of the Iron Age IIA, the older Canaanite centers experienced significant changes. ...
The “governor’s residency” at Tel ‘Eton was destroyed in the late 8th century BCE in an Assyrian military campaign. While the numerous finds enable a detailed reconstruction of life on the eve of the destruction, this elite house was cleaned continuously, and since no floor raisings were identified, little was known of the building’s period of use. Radiocarbon ( ¹⁴ C) samples taken from within a foundation deposit and from the floor make-up, however, indicate that the earliest phase of the residency was built in the late 11th–10th century BCE. This has bearings on the date in which social complexity evolved in Judah, on the debate regarding the historicity of the kingdom of David and Solomon, and it also provides the earliest date for the use of ashlar stones in Judah. Finally, the long life of the “governor’s residency” exemplifies a little addressed phenomenon—the old-house effect—in which buildings and settlements existed for a few centuries, but only left significant remains from their last phase. The earlier phases are hardly represented in the finds, barely studied, and rarely published. We suggest that the old-house effect influences archaeological interpretations world-wide, and is also responsible for recent attempts to down-date social complexity in Judah.
... In 2007 to 2013 a large-scale excavation project was launched on behalf of the Institute of Archaeology of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, directed by Saar Ganor. In 2009-2011 Michael Hasel of the Southern Adventist University joined the project as an associate director (Garfinkel and Ganor 2008a, 2008b, 2008c, 2012a, 2011a, 2011b, 2012a, 2012b, 2012cGarfinkel, Kreimerman and Zilberg 2016). There are a number of methodological factors that guided our work at Khirbet Qeiyafa: − Choosing the Site: Khirbet Qeiyafa is a relatively small site (2.3 hectares) with a short-lived occupation (two main periods), thin accumulation (two meters maximum) and a rich Iron Age layer. ...
... Yet to date, the discussion was mainly one-sided because the excavators possessed all the concrete data of the excavation and made remarkable efforts to present the results The present article is a slightly revised version of an article published in Hebrew in Zion (2017/1). 1 Namely, in two detailed archaeological reports (Garfinkel and Ganor 2009;Garfinkel, Ganor and Hasel 2014), in a Hebrew book that presents the excavation's results and the excavators' interpretation (Garfinkel, Ganor and Hasel 2012), in a book that carries the title Debating Khirbet Qeiyafa and presents the debate over the nature and political affiliation of the site and its excavators' viewpoint on all the disputed issues (Garfinkel, Kreimerman and Zilberg 2016), and in a series of articles in professional and semi-popular journals (Garfinkel and Ganor 2008;Garfinkel, Ganor and Hasel 2010;Garfinkel 2011: 50-53;Garfinkel and Kang 2011;Garfinkel et al. 2012;2015b;Garfinkel, Ganor and Mumcuoglu 2015). 2 Maeir (2012a: 22-25), Faust (2013: 213-14), Mazar (2014: 361-64) and Pioske (2015) supported the identification of Khirbet Qeiyafa as a Judahite site. 2 JOURNAL OF HEBREW SCRIPTURES of the excavation through their own prism. Indeed, the picture they presented of the historicity of the biblical account of the time of the United Monarchy fascinated both the media, which enthusiastically reported the results of the excavation and broadly cited the excavatorsʼ interpretation of the findings, and the broader public, gladly embraced evidence that supports the "correctness" of the biblical history of David, the golden age of Israelʼs history. ...
... My article concentrates on these conclusions and carefully examines the arguments the excavators presented regarding the siteʼs political, ethnic, and cultural affiliation and its place within the contemporaneous political system of south Canaan. The discussion focuses on the new book of Garfinkel, Kreimerman and Zilberg (2016) that presents the debate over the relations of Khirbet Qeiyafa to the highlands of Judah and the political and cultural identity of its inhabitants. Since this book presents in great detail the views of the siteʼs excavators and uses an extreme polemical tone toward other views expressed in the debate, re-examining the conclusions presented therein offers an ideal opportunity for cracking what might be called the "riddle of Khirbet Qeiyafa." ...
The article critically examines the argument that Khirbet Qeiyafa was a Judahite stronghold established by king David. Detailed analysis of the published reports do not disclose any findings that connect it to either Jerusalem or the Judean and Benjaminite highlands in the 10th century BCE. On the contrary, the site conducted ramified commercial relations with districts located throughout the Land of Israel and beyond. It is evident that Khirbet Qeiyafa is connected neither to the emergence of the kingdom of Judah nor to king David, and should be studied in the context of the Shephelah, the district in which it is located.
