Khirbet Qeiyafa

My tour of Israel ended two weeks ago and I have been at the dig site since then. Our work days are Sunday-Thursday where we are working for 8 hours a day and then we get the weekend off to either go back to Jerusalem or travel throughout Israel. The dig site that I am currently excavating is Khirbet Qeiyafa, which is in the Elah Valley and is about an hour southwest of Jerusalem. Our hostel, Ramot Shapira, in Beit Meir though is only a 25 minute drive from the dig site, which is nice considering we leave for the site at 4:40 am!

Excavations at Khirbet Qeiyafa, also known as the Elah Fortress, started in 2007 and since then, Hebrew University of Jerusalem Professor Yosef Garfinkel has been the primary director of the site. In the past four excavation seasons, the most significant discoveries have been the two city gates and the 10th century BCE Ostracon, which is pottery with inscriptions. The two city gates are important because they legitimize Professor Garfinkel's theory that Qeiyafa is the ancient biblical city of Sha'arayim, which was a Judean city associated with King David. Also, this disproves the minimalist theories of archaeologists like Israel Finklestein, who believe that King David and Solomon were nothing more than local tribe leaders who lived in tents in unfortified cities. In Israel there is a debate amongst archaeologists as to whether or not you should use the Bible as a reference point for these ancient cites. The discovery of two city gates prove that Qeiyafa is a fortified Judean city, which had typical Judean urban planning as well as cooking habits because no pig bones have been found at the site. Also, most of the pottery which is found above the bedrock, but under the top soil and the Hellenistic layer, are from Iron Age IIA, which dates back to 10th century BCE. The Ostracon was an important find because it is one of the oldest 10th century BCE inscriptions ever discovered. Professor Gershon Galil of the Hebrew University of Haifa, published a proposed reconstruction of the inscription which reads:

• you shall not do [it], but worship the [Lord].
• Judge the sla[ve] and the wid[ow] / Judge the orph[an]
• [and] the stranger. [Pl]ead for the infant / plead for the po[or and]
• the widow. Rehabilitate [the poor] at the hands of the king.
• Protect the po[or and] the slave / [supp]ort the stranger.

Also, Qeiyafa is a unique site to excavate as it is one of the only sites to have a full time Numismatist, who studies the currency of the time periods. Every time that we are at the site, Yoav, our Numismatist, continually uses a metal detector to search for coins, seals, and other metal finds. Because he is there all of the time, as of the start of this season, 270 coins which span three times periods have been found at Qeiyafa, which is an extremely large number of coins to find at one particular site.

part of the wall that was excavated last season

The Elah Valley

one of the two city gates

Iron Age 2a pottery

Michelle and the pick axe...this is how we work on a lot of our days.

the valley at 5 am in the morning

a completely intact 10th century BCE storage jar...a very rare find, which was found in my square!

restorable storage jars also found in my sqare

Besides a small piece missing on the lip of the jar, its as good as new and only 3,000 years old!

Me, Sam (who found the intact jar), and Michelle with our buckets of restorable pottery jars

a picture of the 10th century BCE Ostracon found at Qeiyafa