Week 4

Home

Well, week 4 is completed; 2 more to go. Dr. Nicolae Roddy brought a group of 16, a few volunteers remained from the 1st session & some more independent diggers brought the total up to 32 volunteers, with a staff of 5 to oversee the work.

Work continued in Chamber 3 where a large quantity of burned barley was found. Its being carefully bagged & stored for further analysis. The volunteers moved a lot of rock & dirt from the spot just east of the ancient city road leading to the main gate. Still no sifting as it was just a lot of fill from the Syrian army position before 1967 & from previous digs where sifted dirt was thrown. Rami still believes that this might be the gate leading out to the spring southeast of the city. A quite nice piece of a bronze needle was found in area A just west of chamber 1(see map below). This was probably used to repair fishing nets. This type of needle with the eye at the tip as been reported at finds at other places at the Sea of Galilee that were connected with fishing. A small folded lead fishing weight was found in A west as well as a number of iron nails, a sample shown below.

A very beautiful piece of polished bone was found in the residential area C where many interesting finds were discovered during previous weeks (see week 2). This is most likely a shuttle used in weaving. A shuttle is a tool designed to neatly and compactly store yarn while weaving. Shuttles are thrown or passed back and forth through the vertical strings; that is between the yarn threads of the warp in order to weave the pattern. The simplest shuttles, known as "stick shuttles", are made from a flat, narrow piece of wood or bone with notches on the ends to hold the weft yarn. More complicated shuttles may incorporate bobbins.

A black polished stone 5 cm high by 6 cm square (~2 in x 2 1/2 in), weighing 537 gm (18.9 oz), most likely used with a balance for weighing objects showed up in area C. Weights and measures were among the earliest tools invented by man. Primitive societies needed rudimentary measures for many tasks: constructing dwellings of an appropriate size and shape, fashioning clothing, or bartering food or raw materials. The Romans gave us our pound weight which is derived from the Roman word libra. This explains why our pound has such a strange abbreviation (lb) and why the astrological sign Libra has an equal-armed balance as its symbol. The Roman pound was different than ours as you can see by the fact that this stone weighs somewhat more than the standard English system pound of 16 oz.

As a climax of 4th week, on Friday, a magnificent, nearly complete oil lamp (bottom right pic) was found among the walls of the residences in area C. The body & wick nozzle are complete, but the back handle is broken off. Although many shards of this type have been discovered, it is the first time that an intact sample of this type has been encountered at Bethsaida. It is certainly a unique discovery.

It dates from the Hellenistic period, mid 3rd century BCE. This particular type was known from Corinth and the Athenian Agora and presumably was imported from there. It features a brown clay with brown glaze. It has a globular body with flat rim and ring base. It is a high quality lamp testifying to the flourishing Phoenician community of Bethsaida prior to the Hasmonean conquest around 100 BCE.

Link to all the pictures I took this season - CLICK HERE

Note : Interesting archaeology blog - http://archaeologydigs.blogspot.com/

Human interest - http://www.communitycorrespondent.com/kptm/, search for Judith Schwartz