Top 10 Archaeological Finds in 2013: Earliest Alphabetic Text

Photo: Hebrew University

Jerusalem is mysterious city. It stores thousands of artifacts that could shed light on important historical and religious mysteries. This is the advantage of Israeli archaeology, because the material that archaeologists find in Israel, gets a loud echo in the press, in the scientific and religious literature. For believers in the inspiration of the Bible, each archaeological find is important, because it usually confirmed the authority of the Holy Scripture. We offer you to get acquainted with the top archaeological finds in Jerusalem in 2013.

Jerusalem’s Earliest Alphabetic Text Eilat Mazar of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem has uncovered an inscribed jar fragment from her excavations near the Temple Mount. Dating to the tenth century B.C., the inscription is the earliest alphabetic text ever found in Jerusalem. The inscribed fragment is part of the shoulder of a pithos, a large neckless ceramic jar. Written in the proto-Canaanite script and reading from left to right, the text consists of a series of letters—m, q, p, h, n, possibly l, and n.
Not only is the inscription incomplete, but its meaning is also a mystery since this combination of letters does not signify anything in known West Semitic languages. Nevertheless, the excavators believe that it likely identified the contents of the vessel or its owner’s name and that it might have been written by a non-Israelite living in Jerusalem during the reigns of David and Solomon. The inscription—along with six other fragments of similar jars—was used as fill to support the second floor of a tenth-century B.C. building (the early Iron IIA period).