Biblical Archaeology Review

Mercer, EA, Text No. 49.

For this text, see Cyrus H. Gordon, Ugaritic Textbook (Rome, Italy: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1965), Text No. 54, lines 11–12.

Mercer, EA, Text No. 35, line 37.

Samuel A. B. Mercer, The Tell el-Amarna Tablets (EA), 2 vols. (Toronto: Macmillan, 1939), Text No. 11, line 14.

Adolf Erman, The Ancient Egyptians. A Sourcebook of Their Writings, transl. Aylward M. Blackman (New York: Torchbooks/Harper & Row, 1966), pp. 92–108.

A similar H| was found on an ostracon from Arad that dates not later than the eighth century B.C. and not earlier than the tenth century B.C. A similar H| can be seen on the Gezer calendar from the tenth century B.C., but this is incised on stone so it is not a good comparison to our painted H|. A similar H| appears on a decanter found at el-Kom, near Hebron, belonging to the eighth century B.C.

The clearest parallels come from Megiddo level VI, Ta’anach level IIb, Lachish level III, Tell Beth Mirsim level A, as well as from other sites that provide an average date of ninth to eighth centuries B.C.

Similar silver hoards have been found at Megiddo (Megiddo II [Chicago, 1948], pl. 229, pp. 7–9), at Shechem (Shechem, [London, 1965], p. 8), at Gezer (Gezer II, [Jerusalem: Hebrew Union College and Archaeological School in Jerusalem, 1974], p. 262, fig. 408), as well as at other sites in Israel, but none contains such an unusual quantity as at Eshtemoa.

E. L. Mayer and L. M. Reifenberg of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem published a short report in Yediot (Vol. 9, 5702, pp. 41–44), the quarterly of the Israel Exploration Society.

See Magen Broshi, “Estimating the Population of Jerusalem,” BAR 04:02.