The Late 4th/3rd Century BCE Transition in the Judean Hinterland in Light of the Pottery of Khirbet Qeiyafa (original) (raw)
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Judea and Samaria Research Studies
In the past few years, there has been a significant increase in the archaeological evidence relating to the early Iron Age IIA (early 10 th c. BCE) in the Judean Shephelah, mainly due to the excavations at Khirbet Qeiyafa and Khirbet al-Ra'i. This paper will examine this period through the lens of petrographic analysis of the relevant pottery assemblages of the two sites. The new results of petrographic analysis of 48 mostly restorable early Iron Age IIA pottery vessels from Khirbet al-Ra'i will be discussed in detail; these results will be compared to the previously published petrographic analysis of early Iron Age IIA pottery from Khirbet Qeiyafa (108 samples). The paper will also provide analysis of a group of Iron Age I pottery, including Philistine pottery and other forms, from Khirbet al-Ra'i. The assemblages are relatively homogenous in their fabrics and mostly locally made, with only few imports (mostly from the southern or central coast of Israel). However, the types of local clays that were used in the two sites were somewhat different.
Palestine Exploration Quarterly, 2009
Smith and Levy (2008) have published an assemblage of pottery from the copper production centre of Khirbet en-Nahas in Jordan. Based on their interpretation of the 14C dates from the site and contra the accumulated knowledge on the ceramic typology of the Levant they argue that this pottery dates to the Iron I and Iron IIA, and that there was no later activity at the site. We show that much of the Khirbet en-Nahas pottery dates to the Iron IIB-C. We argue that the charcoal samples sent for radiocarbon dating originated from the waste of industrial activity at the site in the Iron I and Iron IIA, while the pottery came from a post-production activity in the Iron IIB-Can activity that included the construction of a fort on the surface of the site. We propose that the fort was built along the Assyrian Arabian trade route, at the foot of the ascent from the Arabah to the Assyrian headquarters of Buseirah.