While Biblical Hebrew literacy has been widely studied, numeracy—the cognitive ability to understand and manipulate numbers—remains a largely overlooked, underexplored domain. This article addresses this gap by examining the Arad Ostraca. These texts were produced in the early 6th century BCE and concern routine administrative operations, including issuing, receiving, and recording goods such as wine, bread, and grain. We pay close attention to timekeeping systems, including references to days, months, and a single regnal year and propose that some documents reflect a structured six-day supply cycle. It divides a 30-day month into five segments, establishing a calendrical system, which might have been influenced by Egyptian or Mesopotamian administrative traditions. Furthermore, the use of hieratic numerals in these otherwise Hebrew texts suggests a complex hybrid scribal culture. The paper argues that scribes and officials at Arad regularly engaged in quantification and planning, embedding numeracy into the syntax and lexicon of their written communications. However, because these inscriptions stem from a military and bureaucratic context, they likely represent a specialized linguistic register and do not necessarily testify to how Biblical Hebrew was used in other circles. The study thus contributes to our understanding of cognitive, logistic, and linguistic development in Iron Age Judah, while cautioning against generalizations beyond the administrative sphere.

This paper presents the results of brief salvage investigations of two Early Natufian occupations on the western side of the Lower Jordan Valley. Both sites were located adjacent to major water sources at a time when the latest Pleistocene Lake Lisan was shrinking rapidly. This occurred towards the end of the drier Bolling/Allerod and immediately preceding the onset of wetter conditions at the beginning of the Younger Dryas. While Fazael VI was located within the eponymous wadi adjacent to a major spring, Salibiya XII was located within the Rift Valley floor itself, in close proximity to springs and seeps forming the Salibiya depression marsh and ponds. The extents and depths of both occupations indicate they were significant basecamps, whether permanent or seasonal. These features include the presence of bedrock mortars, high chipped stone artifact densities, characteristic ground stone tool assemblages (especially notable are the capstones), and artistic or symbolic items. The absence of architectural remains likely relates to the limited nature of the investigations. Faunal remains, especially the relatively abundant and heterogeneous avifauna from Fazael VI, indicate that the majority are present in the region only during the cooler months. 

This study integrates excavation reports, aerial photography, and ethnohistorical sources to document ephemeral Bedouin farming practices at Qubūr el-Walēyide in southwestern Israel. Reanalysis of the site’s stratigraphy identifies and redates two distinct phases of agricultural activity. The early phase, dubbed the fossil plow zone (Strata 1-2, 1a-2, 2-2), is now dated to the late 16th–late 19th centuries CE. The late phase, identified as the Mandate plow zone, is demarcated by tilled topsoil (Strata 1-1, 1a-1, 2-1). Based on aerial photography, this phase of cultivation is assigned to the late 1940s. This study also highlights a chronological break and a loss of spatial memory at Qubūr el-Walēyide, a phenomenon observed at other sites in the Negev, such as Tell el-Hesi. Finally, this research contributes to broader debates about the visibility of mobile communities in the archaeological record and the persistence of traditional land use in the Negev during the Ottoman and Mandate periods.

A recent study by Ecker and Leibner in the Palestine Exploration Quarterly examined a Late Roman boundary stone discovered at Abil al-Qamḥ (biblical Abel Beth Maacah), contextualizing the inscription within the Diocletianic tax reforms. This article presents a revised identification of Golgol, one of two toponyms mentioned in the inscription, and places it at al-Zūq al-Fauqānī, approximately 1.5 km southeast of Abil al-Qamḥ. Drawing on British Mandate cadastral maps, this study focuses on the Arabic micro-toponym Juneijil (Jnējəl), situated near al-Zūq al-Fauqānī, which preserved the toponym Golgol. This identification offers a more plausible linguistic and geographical correlation with the boundary stone inscription and underscores the need for a broader reassessment of site identifications in the Diocletianic boundary stone corpus.

In an archaeological excavation conducted in 2016 on the northern slope of Tel Lachish, the triangular lower-right corner of a Hebrew ostracon was found. It was assigned to Level II, which was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. Despite the very faded condition of the inscription, the following phrase can be cautiously reconstructed for its bottom line: “On the 1[6?] (day of the month) Shapan [son (of)        ].” This phrase probably summarizes or closes an  administrative document.

Of the various chrono-stratigraphic entities of the Chalcolithic period in the southern Levant, the Middle Chalcolithic period (ca. 5300–4700 BCE) is the most poorly defined, with most of the relevant data coming from Tel Tsaf. While excavations at Tel Tsaf in the last two decades provide valuable information concerning the site’s upper occupational levels, the earlier strata and their material culture are still unknown. Past excavations focused on the later stage of the site’s occupation, leaving unanswered questions concerning the transition from the Early to the Middle Chalcolithic period. In order to shed new light on this topic, the current paper presents the results of the renewed research project, which focuses on the earliest occupational levels at Tel Tsaf, coinciding with the onset of the Middle Chalcolithic period. To start defining the characteristics of this episode, we present the archaeological layers, features, and finds uncovered just above the Lisan bedrock. We discuss the results’ implications and their contribution to an improved understanding of the Chalcolithic period’s broader temporal framework in the southern Levant.

This paper examines the phenomenon of recurring names on Judahite private jar-handle impressions. The large number of recurring names in this corpus has been noted as early as 1941 by David Diringer, who proposed that many stamp-bearers belonged to the same family. This phenomenon has rarely been discussed in subsequent literature, however. I offer a new statistical analysis, showing that the high recurrence of names among the private stamps cannot be due to mere chance and should rather be explained in terms of genealogical relations. These relations span at least two generations and involve between 30% and 60% of the stamp bearers. These results have two main implications. First, they vindicate Diringer’s intuitions about the importance and genealogical nature of recurring names among the jar-handle impressions. Second, they suggest that the private jar-handles phenomenon probably had a longer time span than often assumed, lasting several decades rather than a handful of years before the Assyrian invasion of 701 BCE.

Of the numerous Iron Age II (First Temple period) ancient sites across the southern Levant, none has yielded as many inscriptions as Jerusalem. This abundance manifests in numbers as well as diversity of forms, media, and subjects. They include personal names and titles of kings, princes, governors, scribes, priests, sons, daughters, fathers, wives, and grandfathers (approximately a dozen names are biblically attested) and feature content of a general historical, geopolitical, financial, commemorative, and religious nature. These inscriptions broadly span from the Iron Age IIA to the fall of Jerusalem, ca. 586 BCE. Here, we review the corpus of provenanced Iron Age II inscriptions from Jerusalem and conclude that its size and quality demonstrate a significant literary capacity, the background for the writing of biblical texts.

Fragments of unique mold-blown glass beakers displaying well-defined, low-relief architectural niches or recesses devoid of standing figures were recovered by the 1963–1965 Yigael Yadin Masada Expedition of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Israel Exploration Society. The fragments were found in Building VII, in Casemate 1266, and in its adjacent Dump 1275. The beakers are tall and narrow; their rim and lower body are cylindrical; their middle is divided into eight straight panels of equal width, joined at an angle of 45 degrees. Each panel is bounded on either side by a sectioned column, smooth on the bottom and fluted at the top, standing on a double-torus (Attic) base and capped with an ionic capital. The sunken rectangular niche between the columns is angular on top and curved at the bottom; it is framed by a narrow ridge inside a wide, oblong groove. Triangular pediments with a raised spheroid in their center straddle some of the capitals. An undulating garland of raised dots encircles the beaker above the pediments and below the rim. This vessel has no published equivalents and is dated, by technique and context, to the second half of the 1st century CE. Are the Masada Arcaded Beakers a local product?

The cultural contact between Canaanite and Egyptian hieratic scribes in Late Bronze Age southern Canaan promoted the consolidation and refinement of the Early Alphabet, which had hitherto been mainly modeled after hieroglyphic sign shapes. Lachish seems to have been pivotal in these encounters. Based on two recently found inscriptions from this site, one hieratic and one Early Alphabetic, it can now be shown that the “handshake” between the scribal traditions occurred already during the 18th Dynasty, in the mid–late 15th century BCE. This is more than a century before the region’s Ramesside administration of the 19th and 20th Dynasties when the scribal contacts intensified considerably.

A recent article presenting the results of paleomagnetic dating conducted at Tell ed-Duweir (ancient Lachish) indicates that a burnt Iron Age tower was destroyed by Sennacherib in 701 BCE, verifying earlier observations that are not under debate. However, the article’s caption suggests that the 2 km-long stone fortification dubbed the Revetment or the Mid-slope City Wall should also be dated to the Iron Age. However, this claim ignores the stratigraphically complicated relationship between the tower and the Mid-Slope City Wall and the date of the city wall itself, questions that are examined in the current paper. The paper ends with a discussion of the Assyrian use of fire during the siege of Lachish.

The subject of literacy in ancient Israel and Judah remains hotly debated among scholars, and the case of the Kingdom of Judah proves especially controversial. To disentangle a complicated issue, this article first draws up a typology of approaches used by scholars to tackle questions such as the population’s rate of literacy, the Judeans’ ability to write down literary texts, and the development of literacy throughout the centuries. Then, it critically examines two quantitative approaches, which have been highly influential and currently promote the thesis that the levels of literacy were minimal in the early monarchic period in Judah (in contrast to the situation in Israel) and considerably increased at the end of this period.

This article deals with an obscure Biblical Hebrew (BH) wine-associated lexeme, ẓo'e ( צעה ). The lexeme appears five times as metaphors in the biblical Books of Isaiah and Jeremiah, reflecting consistency in the contemporary Judahite vernacular. The translations of these occurrences vary greatly, suggesting that the idiom may have fallen out of use after the Babylonian conquest in 586 BCE. The lexeme also appears on Arad Ostracon 16 (AO 16), which derives from the late Iron Age fortress of the same name. It was recently discovered thanks to the application of advanced technologies to the ostracon’s verso, revealing the lexeme הצע, hẓ'. In this article, we endorse the newly deciphered reading of AO 16 but reinterpret its content, offering new insight into wine handling in late Iron Age Judah.

Although research of the Arad Ostraca often focuses on the victuals supplied to military squads passing through the fortress, where these products originate from is rarely asked. This study examines the Arad Ostraca for evidence of agricultural products raised as taxes from the inhabitants of the Beer Sheva-Arad Valley. It aims to enhance our understanding of how the agricultural tax collection system was used to supply the army with victuals. Seven ostraca exemplify the collection and administration system of tax-in-kind in the valley. This conclusion arises from the registration of large quantities of unprocessed agricultural products in these ostraca and their connection to clans or even towns in the area.

Lachish Letter 4 is mostly legible and understandable, save one word, וידע, the punctuation and object of which are still controversial. Here, I suggest it should be read וְיָדַע and that its object is Š^emaʻyāhū, a high-ranking army officer who came from Jerusalem to the Maresha Fortress in order to study Judah’s western defense lines. This proposition is supported by syntactical analogies with contemporaneous biblical verses. Thus interpreted, I propose that Lachish Letter 4 is not an alarming note on the fall of the Azekah Fortress, as some scholars argue, but a routine progress report on orders issued by the regional commander in Lachish.

This article presents a tentative review of the information about First Temple-period Judahite cult, which historians of religion can glean from the various inscriptions discovered so far. It surveys the various deities, sanctuaries, cultic rites, and feast days mentioned. When an inscription’s reading, dating, or interpretation is controversial, I take a stand as an epigrapher but also consider the archaeological context and biblical literature. This status quaestionis seems to capture an important historical evolution of Juhadite cult.

This article takes a fresh look at the various Hebrew inscriptions of the pre-exilic period, which are to be understood as letters, model letters, or dedicatory inscriptions. In particular, letter introductions and letter endings are examined. Not all elements of the earlier model letter introductions are found in later periods. Military-style letters between superiors and their subordinates are very brisk but nevertheless use various idiomatic and syntactic devices to express their objectives. Letters between colleagues or friends emphasize the blessing of YHWH they wish for their recipients but still differ from dedicatory inscriptions. The unprovenanced Hebrew ostraca published so far employ the same basic greeting formulas known from provenanced materials. Some letters from Arad and Lachish seem to have peculiar endings due to important information being kept for the last sentence.

Drawing from recent work in media studies as applied to the ancient world, I will argue that all epigraphic evidence and all literary texts that may have their roots in Iron Age Judah must be understood as having a metonymic function because the ancients understood written texts as simple representations of broader messages that had been or would have been delivered in some oral form. I will illustrate this assertion by discussing representations of epigraphic materials in Deuteronomy (phylacteries, mezuzot, stelae), text-critical variants in the manuscript evidence of Deuteronomy, and the Lachish letters. I will conclude that the Lachish letters did not necessarily contain the full messages, and the courier of the ostraca would deliver a more elaborate oral communication. This metonymic function of documentary literature may have contributed to the development of the collective scribal memory that preserves the fullness of the traditional literary texts, a fullness that no one manuscript could possibly preserve since the traditional literature was transmitted with textual fluidity so that it existed in textual plurality.

The late 8th century BCE lmlk stamp seal impressions on jar handles are among the most distinctive epigraphic findings in Judah. Currently, they comprise more than two thousand provenanced items from throughout the Judahite territory. While three of the four words engraved below the word lmlk, “(belonging) to the king,” refer to well-known Judahite cities—Hebron, Ziph, and Socoh—the fourth—mmšt— remains incomprehensible since it was first sighted in 1868. In this study, I argue that mmšt is not the name of a city but the expression “from (the?) maś’ēt”—masoretized מִמַּשְׂאֵת—spelled without the aleph. The maś’ēt was a huge and unique ad hoc collection of agricultural products initiated by King Hezekiah as part of his preparations for the anticipated invasion of the Assyrian army following his rebellion. These products were subsequently distributed in jars, whose handles were stamped with the inscription “(belonging) to the king – from (the?) maś’ēt.”