Salvage excavations in Jericho Research Papers (original) (raw)

This paper presents a study of the rich archaeological landscape of the Jericho Oasis, drawing on historical aerial photography and more recent satellite imagery to survey this cultural landscape and assess issues affecting its preservation over the past century. The timing of the paper is pertinent as non-U.S. satellite companies have recently begun to produce higher resolution satellite imagery of Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), and restrictions on imagery resolution in the U.S. have been lowered as a result of research by the EAMENA project. Whilst increasingly widespread availability of high-resolution satellite imagery and orthophotos can effectively support heritage monitoring in this heavily-developed region, this paper demonstrates that it is the use of historical aerial photography that has enabled the identification of a range of previously unrecognized archaeological features. These new data offer a first tentative step in revising our current understanding of the development of human settlement across the Jericho Oasis.

- by Pierfrancesco Izzo and +1
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- Archaeology, Near Eastern Archaeology, Remote Sensing, Near Eastern Studies

Remains from the early Roman period (first century AD) were uncovered in the courtyard of the UNRWA school in the site of Suwwanet eth-Thiniya in Jericho, one and a half km north of Tell es-Sultan on the southern bank of Wadi Nu’eima, west of the Jericho-Beisan road. The salvage excavation was carried out on behalf of the Palestinian Department of Antiquities in 1997 following bulldozing fifteen holes in the courtyard of the UNRWA school. The excavation was carried out within the framework of the Emergency Clearance Campaign of Archeological Sites Palestine, funded by the Dutch Government. Excavation was carried out in four squares in the western part of the damaged area. Three main strata were distinguished in the excavated area. The main occupation (stratum I) is featured by a series of rooms, dating to the early Roman period.

On a scarred hillock of barren soil, shaded by a square of white canvas, a group of determined Palestinians has started to reclaim the ancient history of their people.
Hamdan Mohammad Taha, the Palestinian Authority’s director of archeological excavations in the Jericho area, explained the importance of the tiny oblong hole he and his assistants have dug under a blazing sun in this desert oasis.
“In the last 100 years, archeology was a foreign affair for most Palestinians,” he said. “It was connected with people who come and dig in Palestinian soil, and then remove what they find. We are trying to change the view of the average people, to teach them that archeology is about history--their history.”

- by Hamdan Taha
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- Syro-Palestinian archaeology, Dead Sea Scrolls, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Jericho