Tell it-Safi
Tell es-Safi ( Arabic تل الصافي, DMG Tall aṣ-Ṣāfī , New Hebrew תל צפית Tel Zafit ) is a settlement hill (Arabic:تل / Tell ) east of the city of Ashdod in Israel .
The Nahal Tsofita brook rises north of the hill and soon flows into the Nahal HaEla brook from the northeastern Elah valley (Terebinthental). Tell Miqne is 8 km north , where the biblical city of Ekron is believed to be.
Tell is identified with the biblical city of Gath , from which the giant Philistine Goliath is said to have originated . James Porter made this assumption after a trip through Philistia in 1857. The first excavations were carried out in 1899 by Frederick J. Bliss and Robert AS Macalister on behalf of the British Palestine Exploration Fund . In 1996, Prof. Aren Maeir from Bar Ilan University started a large-scale excavation project. In 2005 a pottery shard with two presumably Indo-European names was discovered during the excavations, written in an early Canaanite script, which have similarities with the name Goliath . In 2010 a Philistine temple was discovered and two pillared bases were found inside.
The first traces of settlement date from the Chalcolithic period . Larger structures originate from the Late Bronze Age (approx. 1500–1200 BC) and from the Iron Age I and IIB (approx. 1200–700 BC). A horned altar can be dated to the 9th century, which was found during excavations in 2011. Probably from the end of the 9th century a ditch that could be identified around the Tell. He may testify to the siege and conquest of Gath by King Hazael of Damascus . The lack of finds from the Iron Age IIC, on the other hand, can be traced back to the Assyrian conquest and destruction of the city by Sargon II around 711 BC. Connect. After that the hill seems to have been uninhabited for a long time. In the Byzantine period (4th – 7th centuries) there was a small village called Saphita, which is mentioned on the mosaic map of Madaba . Later, the Crusaders built Blanche Garde Castle in the mid-12th century . Today there is a Muslim cemetery in this area. It goes back to the inhabitants of the Arab village that existed after the crusader era until 1948. During the Palestine War of 1948/49, the Arab population was expelled from the village in July 1948 by Israeli soldiers of the Givati under the command of Shimon Avidan.
literature
(sorted chronologically)
- James L. Porter: Gath , in: William Smith (ed.), A Dictionary of the Bible . London: John Muray and Walton & Maberly 1863, pp. 655-656.
- William M. Schniedewind: The Geopolitical History of Philistine Gath , in: Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 309 (1998), pp. 69-77.
- Aren M. Maeir : The Historical Background and Dating of Amos VI 2: An Archaeological Perspective from Tell es-Safi / Gath , in: Vetus Testamentum 54 (2004), pp. 319–334.
- Stefan Wimmer, Aren M. Maeir: The Prince of Safit: A Late Bronze Age Hieratic Inscription from Tell es-Sâfi / Gath , in: Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palestine-Verein 123 (2007), pp. 37-48.
- Aren M. Maeir, Stefan J. Wimmer, Alexander Zukerman, Aaron Demsky: A Late Iron Age I / Early Iron Age II Old Canaanite Inscription from Tell eṣ-Ṣâfī / Gath, Israel: Palaeography, Dating, and Historical-Cultural Significance , in : Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 351 (2008), 39-71.
- Aren M. Maeir (Ed.): Tell es-Safi / Gath I. The 1996-2005 Seasons. (= Egypt and the Old Testament, vol. 69). Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2012, ISBN 978-3-447-06711-9 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Places and Landscapes of the Bible ; From Keel, Küchler, Uehlinger
- ↑ livenet.ch
- ^ Bar-Ilan University Archaeologists Unearth Major Finds at the Biblical "Gath of the Philistines"
- ^ Nir Hasson: 3,000-year-old Altar Uncovered at Philistine Site Suggests Cultural Links to Jews . In: Haaretz from July 26, 2011
Web links
- The Tell es-Safi / Gath Archaeological Project ( Memento from April 3, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
- gath.wordpress.com (weblog for the dig)
- Photo Essay: Tell es-Safi
Coordinates: 31 ° 41 ′ 57.8 " N , 34 ° 50 ′ 48.1" E