Archaeologica.org

The ludicrous use of biblical references for archaeological finds continues.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 174545.htm

Led by Thomas Levy of UC San Diego and Mohammad Najjar of Jordan's Friends of Archaeology, an international team of archaeologists has excavated an ancient copper-production center at Khirbat en-Nahas down to virgin soil, through more than 20 feet of industrial smelting debris, or slag. The 2006 dig has brought up new artifacts and with them a new suite of radiocarbon dates placing the bulk of industrial-scale production at Khirbat en-Nahas in the 10th century BCE – in line with biblical narrative on the legendary rule of David and Solomon. The new data pushes back the archaeological chronology some three centuries earlier than the current scholarly consensus.

No one even bothers to suggest how the finding of a 10th century BC copper mine in Jordan has anything to do with the mythical Solomon but that doesn't stop them.

Well, there is a lack of a competing story.
But, of course, the “Lack of evidence in not evidence of lack” argument cuts both ways.

KB, I could just as easily publish a story stating that King Solomon invented spaghetti.

There were plenty of copper mines in the area since bronze was a big-time industry. Now -- find Ophir for me and I'll become a true believer!

But, of course, the “Lack of evidence in not evidence of lack” argument cuts both ways.

Kenneth Kitchen is dead wrong with that observation. The fact that we have no evidence for Godzilla flattening Tokyo does not mean that it might have happened.

"Absence of evidence" is a key indicator for evidence of absence. It is not "proof." It surely is evidence. The fact that extensive excavations in Jerusalem around the Gihon Spring has shown no evidence of a major 10th century city but rather only a miniscule village it certainly suggestive that the OT tale is a later fabrication.

Could the next shovel in the ground provide evidence to the contrary? But scholars don't have to sit around waiting for them to find it before commenting on the evidence which does exist.

Good point on evidence vs. proof.

I've just caught up with this.

I understand that objections (eg Finkelstein et al) to the Biblical account are on the grounds that there is no actual evidence for the level of cultural development required to support Solomon's empire.

From the ScienceNews article:

“We have conclusively shown that industrial-scale copper production occurred at this site in the 10th and ninth centuries B.C., which resonates with Old Testament descriptions of vibrant, complex societies in the same area at that time,” Levy says.

Cog said:

There were plenty of copper mines in the area since bronze was a big-time industry.

What's going on here?

Copper, as an integral component of bronze, was an important mineral throughout the bronze age and did not suddenly stop being used when iron was invented.

This is all a continuation of the trend started in 1930 when Nelson Glueck found ancient mines in the Timna Valley and promptly called them Solomon's mines, too. (They turned out to be Egyptian.)

They have not identified a single artifact relevant to any "Solomon" and the pseudo-religious claptrap they put out to publicize their finds is a disservice to archaeology.

A mine in Jordan does nothing to alter the fact that Jerusalem was a tiny village (at best - archaeologist David Ussishkin makes an argument that it was abandoned at the time!) during the 10th century.

Copper, as an integral component of bronze, was an important mineral throughout the bronze age and did not suddenly stop being used when iron was invented.

How true, thank you Min. Steel is stronger than bronze and holds a sharper edge longer so it was valuable in weaponry, but bronze continued to have many other uses in household items, art, decoration, etc. It still is popular today.

I have seen discussions that early iron was no where near the strength or hardness of "steel" but that it's primary value lay in the fact that it was more plentiful and easier to work than bronze.

It's advantage lay in the fact that it did not make "better" weapons but many more of them.

"Quantity" has its own "quality" as the military maxim goes.

Alexander the Great's Macedonian heavy infantry was still wearing bronze cuirasses in the 4th century BC and they remained in style for a long time after that....until the Romans overwhelmed the Greek style of fighting in the 2d century.

Min and Cog - just to make sure I’ve got this right:

1. Levy et al have pushed the date of the smelting site back to an earlier time. I assume you do not dispute this (or do you?).

2. The date of the site is irrelevant to anything in the Bible. Do you know if the Bible mentions copper, Edom and Solomon in the same breath?

3. Levy et al say that their excavations have produced evidence for “vibrant, complex societies in the same area at that time”, thus challenging the Finkelstein objection. Now, this seems to me to open up an area for legitimate academic dispute.

4. The Biblical authority for Solomon and all his works is something of a side issue. In fact, it gets in the way of the archaeology and anthropology. However, is it probably not the case that without the Biblical incentive then this research might never have started. The same can probably be said for much Middle Eastern archaeology.

Pushing the use of copper "back" to 1,000 BC is kind of a misnomer. Copper had been used extensively in Egypt in the Old Kingdom and copper as a component of bronze is well attested throughout the bronze age ( almost by definition!) which goes back to 3,000 BC.

The Timna Valley copper mines (near Aqaba) were in full production during the 18th Dynasty (1400's BC) under Egyptian control.


What they are trying to say (by sleight of hand) is that the states of Edom and Moab (which are mentioned in the OT) existed and were running those mines and that therefore there had to be a fully developed state in order to do so. That is a stretch to the breaking point of the evidence. Raw materials were as valuable then as they are now and the fact that copper was a useful metal only means that someone ran a mine. The ore could be transported and sold to anyone with the cash to buy it.

One need not invent an entire new kingdom in order to sustain a mine. Assyrian records indicate that Moad and Edom grew up into full states as part of the Assyrian trade network with Arabia. Even Jerusalem benefited from that network...but in the 8th century, not the 10th.

That does not mean that there was no one living on tne east bank of the Jordan in the 10th century and who might have seen a great economic opportunity in the mine.

P.S.

1 Kings 9 mentions gold for Solomon. I t doesn't really mention a "gold mine."

27And Hiram sent in the navy his servants, shipmen that had knowledge of the sea, with the servants of Solomon.

28And they came to Ophir, and fetched from thence gold, four hundred and twenty talents, and brought it to king Solomon.

King Solomon's Mines was actually a 19th century novel by H. Rider Haggard.

No one has any clue where "Ophir" was....if it was anywhere. It could well have been Shangri-La.

One quibbly point:

Pushing the use of copper "back" to 1,000 BC is kind of a misnomer.

They weren't pushing the use of copper back but rather the date of the site.

From your second post I guess you don't know of a biblical reference to copper, Edom and Solomon. Come to think of it, if such a reference did exist Levy et al would have said so (triumphantly, I suppose).

One of my annoyances with this news report is that the original article is unavailable without subscription so we don't know exactly what Levy et al did say.

I phrased that poorly. Finding a copper mine in 1,000 bc when the bronze age was already 2 millenia old is not terribly significant. Part of Finkelstein's argument against the historical reliability of the OT is that Edom and Moab did not exist as states at the time that the bible tale was set...although they did exist at the time the OT was written.
My sense here is that they are trying to equate the mine with a "state" to own and operate it.

The whole point of Kings is to show the opulence of "Solomon's Court." I really don't see how copper would have fit in there. Copper had an industrial use as a component of bronze but it was not a valuable metal in and of itself by the time the OT was written.

I agree that with the mainstream press writing the headlines that there is a danger that they are misstating what Levy said. They have done it before.

Minimalist wrote:The ludicrous use of biblical references for archaeological finds continues.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 174545.htm

Led by Thomas Levy of UC San Diego and Mohammad Najjar of Jordan's Friends of Archaeology, an international team of archaeologists has excavated an ancient copper-production center at Khirbat en-Nahas down to virgin soil, through more than 20 feet of industrial smelting debris, or slag. The 2006 dig has brought up new artifacts and with them a new suite of radiocarbon dates placing the bulk of industrial-scale production at Khirbat en-Nahas in the 10th century BCE – in line with biblical narrative on the legendary rule of David and Solomon. The new data pushes back the archaeological chronology some three centuries earlier than the current scholarly consensus.

No one even bothers to suggest how the finding of a 10th century BC copper mine in Jordan has anything to do with the mythical Solomon but that doesn't stop them.

Minimalist -

This kind of hilarity is exactly equivalent - to me, anyway -

Of using Lot's Wife to validate

The Hallstatt salt mining culture.


hoka hey

john