Assaf Yasur-Landau

Middle Bronze Age Settlement Patterns in the Western Galilee, Israel

Abstract During the Middle Bronze Age (MB) II period (ca. 1750–1600 B.C.), Tel Kabri, located in the western Galilee, Israel, was the center of a thriving polity with economic and cultural connections to Egypt, Cyprus, and the Aegean. While Kabri and some neighboring sites have been partially excavated, the rise and fall of the polity has not been clearly understood. We present evidence from the Kabri Archaeological Project (KAP) to reconstruct shifting settlement patterns, demography, and aspects of trade in the Kabri hinterland from MB I to Late Bronze Age (LB) I. We argue that Kabri, in the northern part of the Acco plain, follows a different developmental trajectory than does the site of Acco and its hinterland in the southern part of the plain. Acco was urbanized early in MB I and developed a mature hinterland that persisted throughout MB II and into LB I. Kabri did not begin to bloom until late in the MB I period. Its rapid rise during MB II was accompanied by the abandonment of village sites far from the center of the polity and the fortification of nearby settlements. These efforts to consolidate power and to maintain the flow of goods into the center did not last long, and the polity of Kabri soon collapsed.

Characterizing a Middle Bronze palatial wine cellar from Tel Kabri, Israel.

Scholars have for generations recognized the importance of wine production, distribution, and consumption in relation to second millennium BC palatial complexes in the Mediterranean and Near East. However, direct archaeological evidence has rarely been offered, despite the prominence of ancient viticulture in administrative clay tablets, visual media, and various forms of documentation. Tartaric and syringic acids, along with evidence for resination, have been identified in ancient ceramics, but until now the archaeological contexts behind these sporadic discoveries had been uneven and vague, precluding definitive conclusions about the nature of ancient viticulture. The situation has now changed. During the 2013 excavation season of the Kabri Archaeological Project, a rare opportunity materialized when forty large storage vessels were found in situ in an enclosed room located to the west of the central courtyard within the Middle Bronze Age Canaanite palace. A comprehensive program of organic residue analysis has now revealed that all of the relatively uniform jars contain evidence for wine. Furthermore, the enclosed context inherent to a singular intact wine cellar presented an unprecedented opportunity for a scientifically intensive study, allowing for the detection of subtle differences in the ingredients or additives within similar wine jars of apparently the same vintage. Additives seem to have included honey, storax resin, terebinth resin, cedar oil, cyperus, juniper, and perhaps even mint, myrtle, or cinnamon, all or most of which are attested in the 18th century BC Mari texts from Mesopotamia and the 15th century BC Ebers Papyrus from Egypt. These additives suggest a sophisticated understanding of the botanical landscape and the pharmacopeic skills necessary to produce a complex beverage that balanced preservation, palatability, and psychoactivity. This new study has resulted in insights unachievable in the past, which contribute to a greater understanding not only of ancient viticulture but also of Canaanite palatial economy.

New Radiocarbon Dates from Tel Kabri Support a High Middle Bronze Age Chronology

This article presents new radiocarbon evidence from the Middle Bronze Age palatial site of Tel Kabri (Israel). The final phase of the palace (Phase III) can be dated to Middle Bronze Age II, with an end date around the transition from Middle Bronze II to III or very early in Middle Bronze III. According to our 14 C data, the end of Tel Kabri Phase III (and thus the transition from Middle Bronze II to III) can be dated to ~1700 BC. This date is about 50–100 yr earlier than traditional chronological models for the Middle Bronze Age propose (~1650 BC according to the traditional chronology or ~1600 BC according to the low chronology). 14 C data from Tel Kabri thus add additional evidence for a higher Middle Bronze Age chronology for the Levant, consistent with recent 14 C evidence from Tell el-Dab c a (Egypt), Tel Ifshar (Israel), and Tell el-Burak (Lebanon).

Rethinking Canaanite Palaces? The Palatial Economy of Tel Kabri during the Middle Bronze Age

Here we explore aspects of Canaanite palatial economy through an analysis of finds from the Middle Bronze Age palace at Tel Kabri, a 34 ha site located in the western Galilee of modern day Israel. The palace was founded in the middle part of the MBA I period, and continued without interruption until an advanced part of the MBA II period. Despite the fact that the Kabri palace was vast (perhaps up to 6000 sq m), functioned as the center of a polity, and could commission wall and floor paintings in an Aegean style, there are no signs of literate administration, or even administrative use of sealings. Patterns of animal husbandry, textile production, pottery manufacture and consumption, and storage within the palace all provide evidence that the palace behaved economically much more like an estate than a redistributive center. Our hypothesis is that the palace had aspects of an Oikos economy, i.e., that it functioned as a large household—richer and more populous than other households of the period, but with minimal involvement in the economy of the private sector. This contrasts with the contemporary polities in Syria, such as Alalakh and Ebla, as well as possibly its neighbor to the east, Tel Hazor, which had literate administrations and redistributive economies during this same period.

An MB II Orthostat Building at Tel Kabri, Israel

During the summer of 2011, a two-room monumental structure was found at the site of Tel Kabri in Israel. Designated as the “Orthostat Building” because of its extensive use of orthostats and paving slabs found still in situ, the location, plan, and architectural features of this building raise questions about its function and relation to the palace of Kabri and its chronological phasing within the palace’s history. The use of orthostats and ashlar paving stones, which is otherwise rather rare in Middle Bronze Age structures in Canaan, calls for a reevaluation of the impact of Syrian and Aegean architecture on the Kabri palace, in view of the already established Aegean influence on the site. The building, with its elaborate interior design and features, was erected at the same time that other great architectural changes took place in the palace of Kabri, including a thickening of the palace walls. These changes, although possibly simply functional, are also suggestive of deliberate choices by the palace elite to exemplify their power to the local population while at the same time attempting to follow the greater Mediterranean trends of their time.

The ‘Dor 2006’ Shipwreck: The Ceramic Material

Abstract The ‘Dor 2006’ shipwreck was discovered in 2006 south of the Dor/Tantura lagoon, Israel. The hull remains are of a large ship that was unable to enter the shallow anchorage. Among the finds were 20 ceramic items, including bowls, cooking–pots, jugs, a juglet, lids and amphoras. The cargo has not yet been found. Pottery typology, coins and 14C tests of organic material date the shipwreck to between the second half of the 6th and the first quarter of the 7th centuries CE. The construction tradition is different from contemporary shipwrecks from Dor. Petrography and chemical composition analyses of the ceramics indicate an eastern Mediterranean origin.

Shepherd Kings? A Zooarchaeological Investigation of Elite Precincts in Middle Bronze Age Tel Hazor and Tel Kabri

A zooarchaeological investigation of elite precincts from two major Middle Bronze Age sites in the Galilee region of northern Israel, Tel Hazor and Tel Kabri, was conducted with the aim of revealing differences in the animal economy between them. The results indicate that the elites of the polity of Hazor were strict consumers who exerted economic demands on the surrounding hinterlands and relied on specialized sheep herding. In Tel Kabri, by contrast, there is evidence that the Middle Bronze Age palace elites were engaged in locally based pastoral production as well as extensive utilization of diverse habitats around the settlement. These differences are ascribed to micro-regional differences in the hinterlands of the ancient polities. The dyadic relations between the economic and ecological gateway roles of Middle Bronze Age Hazor and Kabri are discussed.

Musings from a Distant Shore: The Nature and Destination of the Uluburun Ship and its Cargo

Abstract In the following article, using both the Amarna letters and the slightly later Egyptian story of Wenamun as comparanda, we suggest that the Uluburun ships cargo may have been comprised of goods ordered, bought and paid for by an Aegean polity. The Uluburun and its cargo, accompanied by two Aegeans, perhaps Mycenaeans, who may have served as the purchasing agents, were probably en route to their Aegean destination when the ship sank; this destination would most likely have been either Kommos on Crete or Tiryns on the Greek mainland, although Mycenae, Thebes, Pylos or Knossos are also possibilities.

Patterns of Pottery Usage in Middle Bronze Age Canaanite Palaces

The article explores patterns of pottery usage in Middle Bronze Age palaces in Israel, examining mainly aspects of feasting and storage. Middle Bronze palatial assemblages are typologically similar to assemblages from contemporaneous domestic contexts. Prestige vessels are rare and can usually be associated with banqueting. Vessel-type ratios in assemblages from MB I palaces exhibit a balance between storage and food preparation and consumption. However, the assemblages in the MB II palaces vary considerably. While some were geared toward serving food and drink, others reflect a stronger emphasis on storage. Feasting activities in Canaanite palaces, as reflected by the ceramics, was on a significantly smaller scale than it was in palaces in the Aegean or other Near Eastern regions. Storage spaces in Middle Bronze Canaanite palaces were also on a smaller scale and not intended for public purposes. Finally, the usage of imported or specialized (ceremonial or oversized) vessels was limited in Canaanite palaces.

Rethinking Tel Achziv: an Iron II Architectonic and Ceramic Sequence from Southern Phoenicia

By assessing the archaeological corpus of Moshe Prausnitzs 1963 and 1964 excavations at Tel Achziv, the article reevaluates aspects of the chronology and nature of the Phoenician expansion to the area south of the Ladder of Tyre (Rosh Haniqra). The authors present the Iron IIC stratigraphical sequence of Area D, the main excavation, as well as an outline of a typological and quantitative study of its pottery. It is dominated by a building with long and narrow spaces which existed over three phases, from the late 8th to the 7th century BCE. An analysis of the changes in its architecture and pottery assemblage indicate that it began as a domestic unit in Phase 6 and was transformed into a non-domestic structure in Phases 5 and 4, with an emphasis on storage, very likely in relation to trade in the port of Achzib. Finally, a review of settlement patterns in the Western Galilee during the Iron IIC suggests that the enlargement of the settlement at Achzib at the end of the 8th century BCE, and the likely contemporary (re?)building of the fort at Kabri, are indications of a deliberate Phoenician involvement in the resettlement of Achzib, as well as its administration.