Bronze Age Mediterranean

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Bronze Age Mediterranean The Israelites
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Archaeology

• Archaeologists search for evidence to
  reconstruct
• how a group of people lived
• how and why things happened in the past
• what was important to them
• what sort of religious beliefs they had
• how they interacted with their environment and
  with other groups of people
• an understanding of why human culture has changed
  through time

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Archaeology

• Material Culture
• Physical remains of human activity
• Means by which humans adapt to the world
• Artifacts
• Objects manufactured or modified by humans.
• Classified into types which reflect function or
  use, styles from a
  particular time period, or specific groups of
  people
• Features
• Objects that are either made or used by humans
  that are nonportable.
• Buildings, pits, hearths, or irrigation canals
  are examples of features.
• Attributes
• Archaeologists classify or type artifacts and
  features

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Archaeology

• Archaeological Sites
• Reflect places where people did something
• Excavation
• Systematic digging up of an area used by people
  in the past (a site)
• Scientific manner
• Reveals artifacts and features from various
  periods

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Archaeology

• Cultural Identification Methods
• 1. Seriation
• Styles of things tend to change
• Pottery, coins, clothing
• 2. Dating Methods 
• Radiocarbon
• Organic material
• Archaeomagnetic
• 3. Epigraphy
• Analysis of ancient inscriptions
• Ostraca - Broken pieces of clay pots used to
  write short documents

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Archaeology

• Context of Artifact
• Location of an artifact or feature in
  relationship with all other artifacts and
  features in three-dimensional space.
• horizontal space, depth (vertical space) and time
• Relationship of artifacts and features across
  space and over time.
• Relationships between artifacts and features that
  help an archaeologist reconstruct human behavior.
• Preserving the Context
• recording where it was found
• what it was found with
• at what level of excavation it was found
• Provenience
• Refers to the location of artifacts and features

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Archaeology

• Stratigraphy
• Historical layering of archaeological material
  buried over time
• Sites built up by thousands of years worth of
  habitation in the same place
• Over generations sites were built up consisting
  of many stratigraphic layers, which represent
  different phases of habitation
• People would often knock down structures and
  build new ones on top
• Older material being deeper than the newer
  material
• Reconstruct a time-line, or chronology, for the
  occupation of the site by layers
• Mounds or Tels created by the accumulation of
  debris over time

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Stratigraphy
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Interpreting Archaeological Data

• Report of Findings
• Scholarly or popular
• Make Inferences
• Educated guesses based on scientific archaeology
• Subjective analysis and bias
• Personal, political and religious agendas
• Pseudoarchaeology
• Search for Atlantis
• Popular TV
• Controversies
• Sir Arthur Evans
• Megiddo

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Bronze Iron Age Mediterranean
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Chronology of Bronze Iron Ages

• The Bronze Age is divided into three parts
• Early Bronze Age (3300 - 1950 BCE)Middle Bronze
  Age (1950 - 1539 BCE)Late Bronze Age (1539 -
  1200 BCE)
• The Iron Age is divided into two parts
• Iron Age I (1200 - 950 BCE)Iron Age II (950 -
  586 BCE)
• The division between the Bronze and Iron Age
  marks a significant technological innovation,
  namely the adoption of ironworking, which over
  time replaced bronze as the most popular metal
  for tools, weapons and armor.

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Minoan Civilization

• Semitic people from the Asia Minor, eastern or
  southern Mediterranean
• Based on island of Crete, and expanded to other
  islands in the Mediterranean.
• Settled around 2600 BCE
• Great trading power by 1900 BC
• Principalities each dominated by a palace
• Knossos most dominant city
• Not a warrior culture
• Best ships in the Mediterranean
• Named for King Minos by Arthur Evans

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Minoan Civilization

• Society Culture
• Matriarchal
• Peaceful no city walls
• No displays of power or glorification of weapons
• Prosperous
• elaborate facilities
• beautiful creations
• Religion
• Mother goddess worship
• Images of women, no men
• Snake goddess
• Fertility rituals
• Bull images prominent
• Writing
• Linear A - Script derived from cuneiform
• Not yet deciphered
• No surviving Minoan literature

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Minoan Civilization

• Minoan Art
• Frescos show pleasure-loving lifestyle
• Luxury and sophistication
• Naturalistic, not stiff
• Smooth lines, vibrant colors, sense of nature
• Three-dimensional figures
• Palaces
• Vast spaces
• Maze of storerooms, workrooms and living quarters

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Minoan Civilization

• Thera
• Minoan city in Aegean Sea
• Destroyed by Santorini volcano
• Opulent lifestyle
• End of Minoan Civilization
• Palaces destroyed by some force around 1450 BC
• Invasion or natural disaster
• invaders from the Greek mainland
• Greek memory
• King Minos
• Theseus Minotaur

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Canaanites

• Late Bronze Age culture of Palestine
• Never ethnically or politically unified as a
  single nation
• Share sufficient similarities in language,
  religion and culture
• Common Semitic heritage
• Many affinities in mythology and ideology of
  kinship with Mesopotamia
• Major influences on the development of early
  Israeli culture and religion
• Protagonists and neighbors

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Canaanites

• Southern Levant
• Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, Jordan, and
  southern portions of Syria and Lebanon
• Metropolises stood on well-watered terrain on
  vital trade routes
• Major inland cites Jericho, Beth-shan, Megiddo,
  and Hazor
• Coastal cities most sophisticated and
  influential Tyre, Sidon, Byblos, Arad and Ugarit
  
• Individual city-states ruled by a monarch and
  warrior class, with a large free serf class
• Patriarchal society
• Lower classes were the artisans and farmers
• Merchants traded throughout Mediterranean world
  Egypt, Greece, Cyprus, Asia Minor
• Nomadic pastoral population - Shasa
• Groups of bandits and refugees - 'Apiru

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Warfare in Canaan

• Internal warfare external invasions a constant
  threat
• Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Sea Peoples
• Maintenance of armies and the defense of cities
  of the highest concern
• Fortified cities were built for defense against
  marauding bands and enemy armies as early as 3000
  BCE.
• Styles of warfare and weaponry evolved in the
  southern Levant
• Chariots and infantry

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Egypt in Canaan

• Egypt ruled Canaan for more than 300 years during
  the Late Bronze Age and early Iron Age
• Deities, arts and technology were exchanged
  between the two cultures
• In 1456 BCE, Pharaoh Thutmoses III won a decisive
  battle against a coalition of Canaanite rulers at
  Megiddo.
• Egypt used Canaan as a buffer against rival
  empires further north
• Canaan was a source of revenue through taxes,
  tribute and trade
• Egypt stationed small garrisons in major towns
  like Jerusalem

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Canaanite Religion

• Association between place, deity and royalty
• Deities associated with places, such as cities
  and eventually nations
• King or city-ruler is chief official of deitys
  cult
• Temples functioned quite literally as the god's
  house
• High Places Open air sanctuaries
• Built on hill with altar for sacrifices
• Local gods and goddesses were special
  manifestations of the great deities
• Extensive assimilation of characteristics
• Pantheon
• El, the creator and supreme god
• Asherah, his consort and fertility goddess
• Ba'al, storm and fertility god
• Anat, goddess of hunting warfare.

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Ugarit

• Powerful Canaanite City-State
• Northeastern Mediterranean coast in the 14th and
  13th centuries BC
• Discovered in 1929 at Ras Shama
• Huge archive of texts discovered
• Canaanite religion and culture
• Many texts are poetic in a language similar to
  the biblical psalms
• Proto-Canaanite Alphabet
• Many contacts by sea which introduced foreign
  influences on culture and religion

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Megiddo

• Major Canaanite and Israelite city
• Located at juncture of three major trade routes
  main pass
• Site of many important battles
• Armageddon derived from harmegiddo or mountain
  of Megiddo
• Most impressive collection of ivories dating to
  1200 BC

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Ancient Israel

• Important Questions
• When did the Israelites establish themselves in
  Canaan?
• Where did they come from?
• What parts of the Old Testament story are
  accurate?
• How were they influenced by their Canaanite
  neighbors?
• What role did the Exodus play in establishing
  Israel as a people?
• How did their religion develop?

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Interpreting History of Ancient Israel

• How do we know information about Ancient
  Israelites?
• Analyze traditional literature in Bible
• Samuel primary source for history of Israel
  during 11th 10th centuries
• Find information that was earlier than the time
  it was compiled and see how historically accurate
  it is
• Compare to other cultures at the time
• Trace origin of people of Israel through
  archaeological record
• Aramaic - Lingua Franca of Palestine
• Hebrew - Most of Old Testament

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History of Early Israel

• Israelites established themselves as a people in
  Canaan through process of ethnic
  self-identification
• Drew boundary lines between themselves and their
  neighbors
• Devotion to a national god, Yahweh
• Israel first emerged in the central hill during
  13th cen.
• Lowland cities along the coast were destabilized
  at the time, which led to a movement out of the
  cities and into the central hills
• Associated with a shift from an urban to a
  village lifestyle

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History of Early Israel

• Hill country isolated during late Bronze Age from
  the controlling influence of the Egpto-Canaanite
  culture of the lowlands
• Customs and ideas that developed there were
  different from those of the dominant Canaanite
  culture
• Archaeological record shows
• Hill country relatively empty prior to the 12th
  cen.
• no farming of land
• no pottery for village prior to 12th cen.
• Hill county fills up with villages from 12th cen.
  On Israelite people

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History of Early Israel

• Conquest traditions Once the highland
  populations become substantial enough, armed
  conflict originated and was the historical memory
  for the conquest of the lowland cities
• Merneptah Stele - reveals that there was a people
  known as Israel in Canaan by about 1207 BC
• Israelites established themselves enough to be
  noted by a campaigning pharaoh
• Judges Tells of Israelites living side-by-side
  with Canaanites
• Contradicts Joshua conquest story
• Arrival of Philistines in the 12th cen.
• motivated Israelites to create a confederacy to
  be militarily stronger

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Jerusalem

• Jebusite city conquered by David
• built city on top of a spring within city walls
• Small, only about 15 acres
• Isolation helped it remain relatively secure from
  conquering foreign armies
• Not located on either of the major north-south
  trade or military routes.
• David named city City of Peace
• Shalom
• David built his city on Mount Zion

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Temple

• Built by Solomon about 960 BC
• A dazzling attraction
• Holy of Holies held Ark of the Covenant
• Completely destroyed by Babylonians in 586 BC
• Rebuilt by Jews after exile in 516 BC
• Site of Temple Mount in Jerusalem today

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The Exodus

• National myth of escape from Egypt
• Focal point for national unity
• Purpose of establishing nation in Canaan
• Justified land claims in Canaan
• Created a xenophobia against Canaanites, who were
  seen as the oppressor
• Functioned to exclude others who had not
  participated
• Coded certain values into the culture - all
  Israelites shared background of their ancestors
  as slaves in Egypt
• Covenant with Yahweh
• In return for emancipation and the gift of the
  land of Canaan they must worship him and obey his
  law

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The Exodus

• Questions
• Was earliest Israel in Canaan a product of the
  Exodus? or
• Was the national myth formed from a subsequent
  experience?
• Details of the Exodus conform to the Canaanite
  experience of Late Bronze Age
• There were Semites in Egypt
• There was intense building under Ramesses II
• There was forced labor
• Moses name is clearly Egyptian
• Hyksos invasion connection
• Joseph story may be the Israelite cultural memory
  of the Hyksos period
• Semitic Hyksos invasion may have taken the form
  of a longstanding immigration into the Delta and
  then expanded to control Egypt as a whole for
  about a century

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The Exodus

• Peaceful Migration Theory
• Repeated incidents of small groups of
  pastoralists leaving Egypt for Canaan during 13th
  cen. BC
• Have historical memories of state labor and
  taxation in Egypt
• Associating themselves with other Semites such as
  the Hyksos
• Such migrations would leave no historical evidence

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Yahweh

• Yahweh was the god of the Israelite league of
  tribes
• Israeli monotheism developed not from polytheism
  but out of a national god religion
• Other nations in region had their own national
  gods
• Yahwism evolves in early Iron Age Canaan
• Separates Israelites from neighbors
• Israelites first meet Yahweh at Mt. Sinai
• Sinai in Midian to east?
• Moabite Stone, c. 840 BC
• Earliest listing of Yahweh name
• Documentary Hypothesis 3 gods formed into one
  by later biblical writers
• Yahweh combined with El Shaddai, Elohim of
  Patriarchs

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Israelite Religion- Canaanite Influenence

• Monolatry - worship of a single god without
  denying the existence of other deities
• Different gods are worshiped as Yahweh under
  separate aspects
• Evidence that the Israelite peoples were
  influenced by Canaanite religion
• Baal worshipped at many different sanctuaries
  from Syria to Gaza
• Aspects of Baal assimilated into Yahweh
• Imagery and symbolism of Baal myths borrowed by
  early Israel
• Use of personal and place names with Baal
  elements
• Bitterly condemned throughout Bible shows
  significance
• Asherah Cult symbol or Female deity
• Consort of Yahweh?
• Standing Stones
• High Places open air sanctuaries

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Biblical Prophets

• Fervent religious leaders of mid-8th cen. to 6th
  cen.
• Called for religious reforms
• Admonished people of Israel and Judah to abandon
  the worship of other gods beside Yahweh
• Reacting to threat of Assyria and Babylonia
• Explained the destruction of Israel in 722 BC as
  a punishment sent by Yahweh for their failure to
  observe the Covenant
• Concerned about social inequality - wealthy
  exploiting poor
• Elijah, Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Jeremiah
• Ezekial led exiles home, called for rebuilding
  of Temple

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Writing of the Old Testament

• Documents and writing went through numerous
  revisions and adaptations
• Choice of documents and modifications were
  determined by contemporary religious criteria
• Basic shape of Bible formed by Post-Exile period
  Jerusalem Temple writers
• Redactors- 7th and 6th centuries BC
• Took ancient traditions and made them make sense
  for current religion
• Judaism came together in 6th cen. BC

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Phoenicians

• Greatest sea-farers of the ancient world
• From 1,200 BC onward Phoenician cities emerged as
  independent city-states on coast of eastern
  Mediterranean
• Continued the religious and artistic traditions
  of the Late Bronze Age Canaanites
• Established colonies throughout Mediterranean
  world

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Phoenicians

• Greek name for culture
• related to purple dye
• Never a unified nation, a coalition of
  independent city-states
• Shared culture and language
• Each had its own god and its own ruler
• Aradus, Byblos, Berytus, Sidon, Sarepta Tyre
• Few records - history pieced together from
  records of other nations
• Everything written on papyrus
• Trade and war with others
• Look to the sea
• Overpopulation and pressure Near East empires
• Set up colonies from North Africa to Sicily and
  Spain to promote trade

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Phoenicians

• Trade and Manufacturing
• Superior ships
• Traded goods with cultures from Assyria to Spain
• Cedar trees from mountains of Lebanon
• Purple die from snail
• Precious metals
• Made glass from coastal sand
• Controlled trade in silver, gold
  and tin
• Brought great wealth
• Papyrus Byblos
• Ventured outside of Mediterranean
• Spread culture and learning

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Alphabet

• First true alphabet
• By about 1200 BC
• Major contribution
• Evolved from Proto-Canaanite
• Phonetic
• Based on distinct sounds
• Consists of 22 letters
• All consonants
• Spread to other cultures
• Aramaic, Hebrew
• Greeks using letters by 10th cen.
• No papyrus documents remain