The 8th season of Excavations at the Ein Gedi village

Dr. Gideon Hadas

Director of Ein Gedi Oasis Excavations

Dead-Sea & Arava Science Center

The 8th season of excavations in the Second Temple period village of Ein Gedi lasted for four weeks in January, 2010.  It took place under the auspices of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and was financed by contributions from private individuals, various funds and the Dead-Sea & Arava Science Center.  Volunteers from Israel and abroad took part in the excavations, most of them devoted veterans from former seasons.

We continued revealing the houses of the ancient village of Ein Gedi located on the eastern side of the village lane, and now have the general plan of the exposed site.  It also became clear that the village’s eastern side had been damaged when land reclamation took place there in the 1950s.  It is therefore hard to say where the entrances to the rooms were, and it is quite difficult to identify the internal division of the dwellings.

It seems that there were three buildings.  The northern building - the “Boulder House” -  has four spaces.  The entrance to the courtyard was from the eastern side, where remains of two ovens were found close to the door.  It was possible to go from the courtyard to a northern room and up to the boulder level to the north-west room, and then to continue to a southern room where remains of an oven and jars were found.  Later, an agricultural terrace was built above this room’s walls.  Under the boulder, the “Third Beer Cellar” was found, going down to one meter in depth; it was partly built and partly hewn in the rock.

The central dwelling south of the “Boulder House” also included four spaces.  Two rooms are attached to the lane wall and another two are further east.  On the floor of the western room faint traces of an oven and the remains of a few jars were found, and also several artifacts, including a Roman key.  The eastern side of the rooms was no longer there, due to the land reclamation.  Walls of an earlier period, probably from the Hasmonean period, were now revealed.  Two complete jars were found under the floor.

Only three rooms remained in the southern building, the “Censer House”, in addition to a courtyard on the eastern side.  A round stone from an earlier building was discovered in the south-west corner under the floor, reused as a grinding stone, as well as a complete jar covered by a hemispheric soft limestone bowl.  In addition, an installation used as a base for a jar was found shattered in the north-west corner, and also a small juglet.  Moreover, another whole juglet and an unbroken censer were revealed.  A few cooking pots had previously been found during the last season.   The remains of an oven and pieces of jars were found at a lower level in the center of the courtyard.   A small test square was opened in the south-east corner of the courtyard, where a layer of Hellinistic pottery was revealed.  Underneath it, we found a layer of whitish earth formed by run-off water – a phenomenon typical of the whole site.

The finds were similar to those of the former seasons:  many shards including a few of glass, dozens of bronze coins, and nails made of iron and bronze.  Animal bones, remains of charcoaled palm tree trunks, and a few bitumen chunks were also unearthed.

Undoubtedly the highlight of this season is the unbroken censer covered in soot, and the base pieces of two different ones.  One base piece of this pottery vessel was found during a previous season, while another one lay on the surface of the oasis and was found many years ago.

In this part of the village, as well as at the “Southern House” on the western side, the architecture and different orientation of some of the walls indicate an earlier stage of the Hasmonean period.  Verification will only be possible after identification of the pottery and coins has been made.  It is quite clear now, as a result of our excavations at this site,  that the village was established  here in the Hasmonean period, while a fortress was established on top of Tel Goren.  Village life at this site was ended by a fire that ruined it close to the second year of the First Jewish Revolt against the Romans in 67-68 C.E.