Aren M. Maeir

Bar Ilan University | BIU · Department of Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology

The Philistines have been the focus of considerable research over the last 150 years. For much of this time, until the most recent decades, the accepted explanation about the origins, arrival, and cultural development of this group was that of a uniform migrating group, which arrived in the southern Levant just after 1200 BCE, captured the region o...

The Hebrew Bible and other ancient Near Eastern texts describe Egyptian, Aramean, Assyrian, and Babylonian military campaigns to the Southern Levant during the 10th to sixth centuries BCE. Indeed, many destruction layers dated to this period have been unearthed in archaeological excavations. Several of these layers are securely linked to specific c...

Most studies of ritual and symbolism in early complex societies of the Near East have focused on elite and/or public behavioural domains. However, the vast bulk of the population would not have been able to fully participate in such public displays. This paper explores the zooarchaeological and associated archaeological evidence for household ritua...

Discussions on daily life in Early Bronze Age society in the southern Levant often focus on subsistence or ritual phenomena, while aspects relating to entertainment and leisure are rarely discussed. This paper presents evidence for gaming behaviour, in the form of game boards and game pieces, that were recovered in the excavations of the Early Bron...

Herod “the Great”, king of Judea in the second half of the first century BC, was known for his building projects, wealth, and political power. Two of his personal calcite-alabaster bathtubs, found in the Kypros fortress and the palace of Herodium, are among the very limited archaeological evidence of his private life. It seemed plausible that they...

The Aramaeans in Ancient Syria. Edited by Herbert Niehr. Handbuch der Orientalistik, vol. 106. Leiden: Brill, 2014. Pp. xxiv + 462, 25 plts. $189.

In the southern Levant, metal technology was first represented by exotic and prestige items during the Chalcolithic. Later, in the Early Bronze Age, metal implements were gradually adopted for domestic tasks. Since metal tools are rare in the archaeological record, the spread of metal technology can be traced through proxy measures, such as butcher...

Some scholars view Philistine settlement in the southern Levant as the dominant, colonizing imposition of a new urbanism following a period of small cities and structural realignment during the Late Bronze Age. Others view Philistine urbanism as a gradual process that marks emergent, rather than imposed, cities. Here we explore Philistine urban pla...

Conclusive evidence has surfaced for the production of iron objects in urban workshops in the Southern Levant during the early Iron Age. While nearly a dozen sites with metallurgical debris and technical ceramics dating to the 10th–8th c. BCE have contributed to the visibility of the craft, in situ high-temperature installations remain enigmatic in...

The ongoing discussion on the nature of the organization of Early Bronze Age settlements and their social structure in an intensely settled part of the southern Levant (independent 'city-states' vs 'neither cities nor states') calls for data on which to base our understanding of shared economic patterns and regional connections. Here, we report the...

In this paper we discuss two aspects of olive production in Philistia and the Shephelah during the Iron Age. Previous studies suggested that olive oil production became important in this region only in the 8th century bce centred at Tel Miqne-Ekron, and that the Kingdom of Judah was not involved in the production of olive oil in this region. Recent...

An iron and bronze workshop in the lower city of Tell es-Safi/Gath, dated to the mid-late Iron IIA, contributes new data on the chronology, organization, and practice of metal production in the urban Philistine setting. Analyses show that iron objects were likely produced and maintained on a large scale, alongside bronze, employing regionally uniqu...

ÄGYPTEN UND ALTES TESTAMENT Studien zu Geschichte, Kultur und Religion Ägyptens und des Alten Testaments Band 105

The extent of pollution and human mobility in the Iron Age in the southern Levant is estimated in this study through lead (Pb) and strontium (Sr) concentrations and isotopic compositions in human tooth enamel. The concentrations of Pb and other trace metals (Cu, Co, Cd, Zn) and Pb/Ca along with Ba/Ca ratios are used to determine background levels o...

The organization of craft production has long been a marker for broader social, economic and political changes that accompanied urbanism. The identity of producers who comprised production groups, communities, or workshops is out of reach using conventional archaeological data. There has been some success using epidermal prints on artefacts to iden...

In this paper, we describe the results of our recent excavations of the later EB III occupation at Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath. The research has demonstrated that Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath is a large (ca. 24 ha) and significant regional center, surrounded by a thick and extensive fortification system with a high stone foundation and mud-brick superstructure. Systema...

Ancient fermented food has been studied mainly based on residue analysis and recipes and reconstruction attempts were performed using modern domesticated yeast. Furthermore, microorganisms which participated in fermentation were studied using ancient-DNA techniques. In a recent paper, we presented a novel approach based on the hypothesis that enric...

In this article I suggest that the biblical narratives on giants (such as Goliath) deriving from Philistine Gath, and related stories, may very likely have originated from the impressive Iron Age megalithic architecture from Tell es-Safi/Gath, which was visible, on the surface, long after the destruction of Gath. These impressive remains perhaps se...

The organization of craft production has long been a marker for broader social, economic, and political changes that accompanied urbanism. The identity of producers who comprised production groups, communities, or workshops is out of reach using conventional archaeological data. There has been some success using epidermal prints on artifacts to ide...

Ancient fermented food has been studied based on recipes, residue analysis, and ancient-DNA techniques and reconstructed using modern domesticated yeast. Here, we present a novel approach based on our hypothesis that enriched yeast populations in fermented beverages could have become the dominant species in storage vessels and their descendants cou...

More than a century of study of the Philistines has revealed abundant remains of their material culture. Concurrently, our understanding of the origins, developmental processes, and socio-political matrix of this fascinating culture has undergone major changes. Among other facets, Philistine technology has been discussed, but in our opinion, a broa...

In this paper, we present an alternative approach for identifying pottery production groups by classifying shaping techniques on freshly cut thick sections. We expand existing identification criteria by piloting a new method for characterising vessel structure. We demonstrate how this simple and low-cost method permits clear and rapid identificatio...

Ancient fermented food has been studied based on recipes, residue analysis and ancient-DNA techniques and reconstructed using modern domesticated yeast. Here, we present a novel approach. We hypothesize that enriched yeast populations in fermented beverages could have become the dominant species in storage vessels and the descendants of these yeast...

The Social Archaeology of the Levant - edited by Assaf Yasur-Landau December 2018

The question under discussion is whether the dates of the Late Bronze (LBIIB)-LBIII (Iron IA) transitions in three sites in the southern Levant, namely Megiddo, Tell es-Safi/Gath and Qubur el-Walaydah occur at the same time, as has been proposed by Israel Finkelstein in his article in 2016 in Egypt and Levant . Here we respond to Finkelstein’s comm...

The research discusses the administration and centralization of the Kingdom of Judah, which has been the focus of many studies for decades. Here we reassess these issues based on the archaeological finds alongside historical and biblical studies. These lead us to suggest that, at first, the administration in Judah was based on local elites that pla...

The origin of domestic donkeys (Equus asinus dom.) appears to lie in northeastern Africa, somewhere in the region of Somalia, Sudan, and Ethiopia. They were domesticated from the Nubian ass (Equus asinus fer.) sometime early in fourth millennium b.c.e., or around the end of the Chalcolithic (Kimura et al. 2010; Milevski 2009: 251; Rossel et al. 200...

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Analysis of a sacrificed and interred domestic donkey from an Early Bronze Age (EB) IIIB (c. 2800–2600 BCE) domestic residential neighborhood at Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath, Israel, indicate the presence of bit wear on the Lower Premolar 2 (LPM2). This is the earliest evidence for the use of a bit among early domestic equids, and in particular donkeys, in th...

In this paper, we propose an alternative analytical method for identifying vessel shaping techniques at the mesoscopic scale to complement current micro and macro methods in ceramic analysis. We demonstrate how this simple and low cost method permits clear and rapid identification of the signatures indicative of different pottery shaping techniques...

Referring to the dearth of historical archaeological research in Israel, in Between Past and Present: Archaeology, Ideology, and Nationalism in the Modern Middle East, author Neil Silberman states: “Just as the story was beginning to get interesting—when the modern cultures of the region were in the process of formation—the archaeological picture w...

Even though the arrival of the Philistines in the southern Levant is an event that happens “off camera,” that is, before the appearance of their settlement remains, it is an event that was narrativized in the recent past by archaeologists working in Philistia who interpreted the local production of Aegean style pottery as evidence of a massive colo...

During the first decade of the Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath Excavation Project, various areas in the upper city were excavated. Based on the results of the surface survey, however, it was clear that there was extensive settlement in the area to the north of the upper city up until the Elah Valley riverbed. Ten years ago, the excavations were expanded to the l...

The widespread signs of destruction and fire seen at Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath in the upper and lower parts of the city (Namdar et al. 2011; Zukerman and Maeir 2012) include the charred skeletal remains of three women found in Area D, Stratum D3, and five individuals found in Area A, Stratum A3. All appear to have been victims of the same event, namely, th...

Despite over a century of research conducted on the Philistines and their material culture, a very small quantity of finds relating to their burial customs has been reported. This has led to quite a lot of speculation on Philistine mortuary customs, with little evidence in support. At a number of sites, suggestions to distinguish “Philistine” buria...

After Philistine Gath fell to the Arameans in the late ninth century B.C.E. (Maeir 2008; 2012: 47–48) the huge city atop Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath was a ghost town for several decades. Some structures had been burnt or otherwise destroyed, but many were simply abandoned to the elements. As years passed, winter storms and the processes of nature eroded the...

Since its infancy, archaeological research has used survey as a major tool in both regional studies (see, e.g., Conder and Kitchener 1881) and as a tool for project planning. In the former, survey flourished—despite certain critiques as to the validity of the data collected (e.g., Waelkens and Poblome 2004)—whereas the latter was often used minimal...

It is often assumed that domestic animals in early urban Near Eastern centres either are a reflection of the local pastoral economy, or were raised at a distance by pastoral specialists. In this paper, we test these assumptions through detailed isotopic analyses (carbon, oxygen and strontium) of caprines (sheep and goat) from Tell es-Safi/Gath, an...

Worldwide, human impact on natural landscapes has intensified since prehistoric times, and this is well documented in the global archaeological record. The period between the earliest hominids and the Industrial Revolution of the late 18-19 th centuries is known as the Paleo-Anthropocene. The current study reviews key geoarchaeological, floral and...

During the last two decades, a concentrated effort has been made to integrate macro- and micro-archaeology, in the field and in the lab, in the context of the Tell es-Safi/Gath Archaeological Project. In this paper, I discuss the concepts and methods behind this inter- and multidisciplinary approach to field archaeology, and expand on several examp...

An archaeological site is an integral part of its surrounding landscape. This is one of the main novel approaches in the long-term archaeological project of Tell es-Sâfi/Gath. The site has interacted with its surrounding for more than three thousand years. It was impacted by the ancient environment, but also had an impact on both the ancient enviro...

This book honors the memory of Brian Hesse, a scholar of Near Eastern archaeology, a writer of alliterative and punned publication titles, and an accomplished amateur photographer. Hesse specialized in zooarchaeology, but he influenced a wider range of excavators and ancient historians with his broad interpretive reach. He spent much of his career...

The story of Canaanite Gath begins with the el-Amarna texts (Na'aman 1979; Rainey 2012; Levin, this issue), where it appears that the city was a major contender in the Shephelah power plays of the fourteenth century B.C.E. While some have contended the connection between Gath, Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi and the Amarna period ruler Šuwardatu (Moran 1992: 384), th...

The Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath Archaeological Project commenced in 1996 and is one of the largest and longest continuously running archaeological projects in Israel. As the year 2017 marks twenty-two years of research and excavations, it is an apt opportunity to present an overview and reflection on the project in general, and various aspects of the researc...

In 1899, Bliss and Macalister launched a brief but intensive campaign of excavation at the site of Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath and uncovered evidence for a large-scale fortification system and thick deposits from various time periods. While they argued that the majority of remains, including the fortifications, were of Iron Age or later origin, some Early Br...

The Early Bronze Age city at Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath was among the largest urban centers in Canaan, or whatever they called their land at that time (Maeir 2012b: 13; Shai et al. 2016). The city and its people are still mostly a mystery to us. We do not know what they called themselves, or their city (but it was almost surely not “Gath”). They did not wri...

By 1899, Frederick J. Bliss was already a well-known archaeologist when he was asked by the Palestine Exploration Fund (PEF) to excavate the Shephelah mounds. Previously, he dug with William Flinders Petrie at Maidon and then replaced Petrie at Tell el-Hesi (1891–1893). Subsequently, Bliss excavated with Archibald Dickie in Jerusalem on behalf of t...

The climate factor has become a focus of much historical and archaeological investigation, encouraged recently by improvements in palaeoclimatic techniques and interest in global climate change. This article examines correlations between climate and history in the Byzantine southern Levant (c. 4th-7th centuries AD). A proposed 5th century economic...

E.A. Knauf and Philippe Guillaume : A History of Biblical Israel: The Fate of the Tribes and Kingdoms from Merenptah to Bar Kochba. (Worlds of the Ancient Near East and the Mediterranean.) Sheffield: Equinox, 2016. ISBN 978 1 78179 142 4. - Volume 80 Issue 3 - Aren M. Maeir

The author offers an additional perspective on the mending of ancient pottery, suggesting that breakage and repair are part of the normal life cycle of an object and that mending can in some cases lead to an enhancement of the original object and to a valuing of the repaired vessel.

This contribution will consider problems and issues related to understanding architecture and urbanism in postpalatial Crete in its larger Mediterranean context, with reference particularly to Philistia but also to Cyprus and mainland Greece (Fig. 13.1). Comparisons with Philistia and Cyprus are relevant because many scholars have argued for a migr...

Minoan Crete is rightly famous for its idiosyncratic architecture, as well as its palaces and towns such as Knossos, Malia, Gournia, and Palaikastro. Indeed, these are often described as the first urban settlements of Bronze Age Europe. However, we still know relatively little about the dynamics of these early urban centres. How did they work? What...