Yishai Fleisher (JewishPress.com) takes us on an adventure in the famous Ir Davide (City of David) in Jerusalem. Connections between the history of the Jewish people in Israel and the modern day discovery of archeological evidence.
YouTube:
Standing in support of Israel, Jews, and believers in all the nations, in the name of Jesus (Yeshua). Sharing biblical truth, encouragement, news and prophecy.
Showing posts with label archaeology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label archaeology. Show all posts
Thursday, August 29, 2013
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Fit for a King: Find Testifies to David's Royalty
Ancient Royal Seals from
time of King David, Jerusalem
Fit for a King: Find Testifies to David's Royalty
By Erin ZimmermanCBN News
JERUSALEM, Israel -- When Eilat Mazar realized she'd discover an ancient structure near Jerusalem, she turned to the Bible to help explain what she'd found. She learned that this new discovery supports the biblical accounts of King David and his son Solomon.
Second Samuel 5:11 says the Phoenician king Kiram "sent messengers to David and cedar trees, and carpenters and masons, and they built David a house."
"So it's a palace/fortress well built for good reasons, which is probably the palace that Hiram built for king David," Mazar speculated.
"We know its date, which is around 1000. That is around the time of King David. The Phoenician style of construction is quite emphasized. The Phoenicians are great builders as we learn from our excavations in Phoenician sites," she said.
Inside, the team found more evidence of royalty, from ancient seals used by court officials, to a variety of carved ivory utensils -- too expensive for a regular home, but perfect for a palace.
Mazar explained the "major part of the structure is still hidden and needs to be excavated." She believes "what we have in hand is less than a quarter."
A New Discovery
Across the street from the City of David, Mazar is directing another dig. She told CBN News just outside the Temple Mount she found more royal ruins. This time from David's son Solomon.
Dig across street from City of David, Jerusalem
In 2010, excavations revealed a giant wall more than 220 feet long and almost 20 feet high. Mazar said this is the city wall described in 1 Kings 3, which says that Solomon built "the wall all around Jerusalem." It connected David's old city with Solomon's new temple.
"And we can really say that the biblical description of King Solomon building the wall of Jerusalem around suits so well what we see (in the ruins).This is the only place that a fortification line is needed. It's surrounding that area; it connects to the Temple Mount. It's everything that fits the biblical story," Mazar argued.
Critics were quick to dispute Mazar's conclusion, but she had carbon dating on her side. Pottery shards found at the ground floor dated to the 10th century B.C. when Solomon was king.
"Sometime in the late 10th century, early 9th century, the king of Jerusalem built a most highly skilled fortification that indicated it's a strong regime, centralized, with great abilities. But then, we have this biblical story that tells about King Solomon doing the same thing. So, he did, and then like, 50 years later, some other king did the same thing?"
She suggests this is enough evidence for crtics to stop "fighting against the Bible." Mazar claims, "The reality is that a sophisticated fortification was built by King Solomon." And what has been discovered is "only part of it," a very big part.
Inside the wall were more clues pointing to King Solomon. 1 Kings 4:7 says that he had "12 governors who provided food for the king and his household." And inside the gate Mazar's team found evidence of their work: jar handles with seals inscribed "to the king" and large clay jars for storing grain.
Mazar believes they came from the royal bakery.
"On one of the vessels, there is an inscription, an incision in ancient Hebrew saying "lazar ha'o" to the minister that was in charge of the "o." That's probably the ophim, in Hebrew, which is bakery," she said.
But Mazar's hunt for the house or David isn't over yet. Next on her agenda is another royal palace. This time she'll be looking for the house of King Solomon."
"Whatever I'll be able to add and contribute to the excavation of Jerusalem, this is my huge privilege. There is only one Jerusalem in the world. But it's not like I'll start or end anything. We are only at the beginning of it and it's going to be generations to come," Mazar predicted.
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Israel to open exhibit on King Herod
Israel to open exhibit on King Herod
National museum preparing exhibition on Jewish ruler under Roman occupation two millennia ago. Palestinians object to display of artifacts from West Bank sites, say international law violated
Israel's national museum is preparing an exhibition on King Herod, The exhibit features about 30 tons of findings from his lavish palaces.
Israel Museum
The museum says it will return the antiquities after the exhibit closes in nine months.
Theater box found at Herod's palace
Associated Press
|
Ehud Netzer of Jerusalem's Hebrew University said the room provides further evidence of King Herod's famed taste for extravagance.
Herod commissioned Roman artists to decorate the theater walls with elaborate paintings and plaster moldings around 15 B.C., Netzer said. Its upper portions feature paintings of windows overlooking a river and a seascape with a large sailboat.
Part of exposed theater box (Photo: Gabi Laron)
This is the first time this
Herod was
The team first excavated the site – sitting atop a man-made hill 2,230 feet high – in 2007. Netzer described the site as a kind of "country club," with a pool, baths and gardens fed by pools and aqueducts.
After Herod's death in the 1st century B.C., the complex became a stronghold for Jewish rebels fighting Roman occupation, and the palace site suffered significant battle damage before it was destroyed by Roman soldiers in A.D. 71, a year after they razed the Second Temple in Jerusalem.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4333012,00.html
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Rare Find of Temple Era Artifacts near Jerusalem
Rare Find of Temple Era Artifacts near Jerusalem
Archaeologists have discovered a rare cache of artifacts, testimony of a ritual cult before the Jewish kingdom abolished them.
First Publish: 12/26/2012, Israel National News
History discovered near Jerusalem
Israel news photo: IAA
The discovery, like may others, was made during road excavation, this time at a new section of the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem Highway, known as Highway 1. The archaeological site is known as Tel Motza, at the Motza turnoff less than five miles west of Jerusalem.
A ritual building and a cache of sacred vessels date back approximately 2,750 years.
"The ritual building at Tel Motza is an unusual and striking find, in light of the fact that there are hardly any remains of ritual buildings of the period in Judae at the time of the First Temple," according to Anna Eirikh, Dr. Hamoudi Khalaily and Shua Kisilevitz, directors of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority.
“The uniqueness of the structure is even more remarkable because of the vicinity of the site's proximity to the capital city of Jerusalem, which acted as the Kingdom's main sacred center at the time,” they added. According to the archaeologists, "Among other finds, the site has yielded pottery figurines of men, one of them bearded, whose significance is still unknown."
Tel Motza and the surrounding region are renowned for their prime archaeological importance. Many finds have previously been uncovered at the site, from a variety of different periods. From the 1990s to the beginning of the present millennium, the site was excavated in preparation for the new route taken by Highway 1.
At the time, the site's archaeologists proposed once more identifying the site with the Biblical settlement "Mozah" mentioned in the Book of Joshua – a town in the tribal lands of Benjamin bordering on Judaea (Joshua 18: 26). The proposal was based, among other things, on the discovery at the site of a public building, a large structure with storehouses, and a considerable number of silos.
Archaeologists identified the site as a storehouse, run by high-ranking officials, for Jerusalem's grain supplies.
The current excavations have revealed evidence that provides another aspect to our understanding of the site. "The current excavation has revealed part of a large structure, from the early days of the monarchic period (Iron Age IIA),” the archaeologists said. “The walls of the structure are massive, and it includes a wide, east-facing entrance, conforming to the tradition of temple construction in the ancient Near East: the rays of the sun rising in the east would have illuminated the object placed inside the temple first, symbolizing the divine presence within.
“A square structure which was probably an altar was exposed in the temple courtyard, and the cache of sacred vessels was found near the structure. The assemblage includes ritual pottery vessels, with fragments of chalices (bowls on a high base which were used in sacred rituals), decorated ritual pedestals, and a number of pottery figurines of two kinds: the first, small heads in human form (anthropomorphic) with a flat headdress and
The archeologists
Ritual elements in the Kingdom of Judah are recorded in archaeological research, especially from the numerous finds of pottery figurines and other sacred objects found at many sites in Israel, and these are usually attributed to domestic rituals.
However, the remains of ritual platforms and temples used for ritual ceremonies have only been found at a few sites of this period.
According to the site's directors, "The finds recently discovered at Tel Motza provide rare archaeological evidence for the existence of temples and ritual enclosures in the Kingdom of Judah in general, and in the Jerusalem region in particular, prior to the religious reforms throughout the kingdom at the end of the monarchic period (at the time of Hezekiah and Isaiah), which abolished all ritual sites, concentrating ritual practices solely at the Temple in Jerusalem."
Monday, October 1, 2012
Israeli Archaeologists Unearth Solomon-Era Reservoir
Israeli Archaeologists Unearth Solomon-Era Reservoir
Solomon-era reservoir
Archaeologists digging beneath Jerusalem's Old City have discovered a huge reservoir near the Temple Mount.
"One day we found an opening in the bedrock ," Eli Shukron, an archaeologist with the Israel Antiquities Authority, said. "I put my hand inside to look to see what is going on and we found a huge water cistern."
The cistern dates back to the First Temple built by King Solomon and is one of the largest ever from that time found in Jerusalem.
It's situated close enough to the Temple Mount that experts believe pilgrims used the water for bathing and drinking.
It could have also supplied water for everyday activities on the temple itself. Shukron said the man-made reservoir shows that ancient Jerusalem needed more water than came from a natural spring.
"Not all the water coming from the Gihon Spring, a lot of water coming from water cistern that we found like this here in this area," he explained.
The cistern looks like a cavern dug into solid bedrock. It is about 40 feet long with a width and height of more than 15 feet.
Plastered from top to bottom, it could have held some 66,000 gallons of water.
"The water comes from a tunnel in the Tyropone Valley… and from the valley they move the water into the water cistern," Shukron said.
A small pool of fresh water still exists there today and each new discovery like this helps fill in the picture from thousands of years ago.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)