City of David

An issue of significant importance to three of the world’s religions today – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam – is the physical location of the Jewish temples from antiquity built by Solomon, Zerubbabel, and Herod. The Temple Mount in Jerusalem, also known as Mount Moriah, is recognized as the traditional location of these three temples by the vast majority of Jews and Christians today. It also represents a source of immense conflict between Jews and Muslims since it is an important Muslim shrine, the Haram al-Sharif, or “the Noble Sanctuary.” In this paper I attempt to critically explore the location of the ancient Temple Mount. I examine the Haram al-Sharif along with a location in the City of David as possibilities for Mount Zion. I consider archaeological evidence, applicable biblical and non-biblical historical texts, as well as modern and historical maps and diagrams.

Approximately 900 bronze coins, all individual finds, were discovered during the 2013 excavation season of Area D3. We focused our attention on coins in loci excavated in Stage 3 of the excavation strategy, since it was there that we could clearly pin-point the coins’ precise location within the 12 sub-layers of the landfill (see Chapter 2). To these coins we added a number found in loci we were certain were “clean” even if we could not state their exact sub-layers. The outcome of this was an assemblage of 200 coins that are listed in the catalog below (Table 4.1 and Figs. 4.1–4.3).1
A flan mold fragment was also found and discussed below, after the coins (Fig. 4.2). Similar assemblages are known from other excavations in the City of David and adjacent regions (see, for example, Ariel 2013; Farhi forthcoming). However, these derive from excavations of previously populated areas and thus differ in nature from the finds from Area D3.

Segments of massive walls identified as city walls dated to the Middle Bronze Age (MB II) period were uncovered on the eastern slope of the City of David by Kenyon, and later by Shiloh. A massive fortifications complex was uncovered near the Gihon Spring by Reich and Shukron, and this too was dated to the MB II.  New analysis of the data possibly indicates that all these fortifications date to the Iron II B-C , to the 8th-7th centuries BC rather than the MB II. This suggestion cannot be conclusively proven and it is presented here as an alternative concept to the current, generally accepted one. If that is so MB II Jerusalem was an unfortified settlement. The "Cyclopean" city wall in Tell Rumeidah/ancient Hebron, usually dated to the MB II is discussed at the end of the paper. It is argued that this wall too possibky dates to Iron II B-C rather than MB II.
The paper was published in Levant, 48(2), 2016, pp. 135-151

From 2005 to 2008 archaeological excavations were carried out at the summit of the City of David under the directorship of Dr. Eilat Mazar on behalf of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The excavations were conducted in the area of the City of David Archeological Park visitor's center, managed by the Ir David Foundation. Unearthed were the impressive remains of fortifications and a massive royal structure, as well as large amounts of pottery, bullae, seals, ivories, figurines and arrowheads. The finds range in date from the beginning of the Iron Age II (the 10th century BCE) until the Early Islamic period (the 11th century CE). This volume is the first in a series of final reports of the excavations at the summit of the City of David. It presents the architectural remains of the Stepped Stone Structure of the palace of King David, built by the Phoenicians in the 10th century BCE; the collapse of a structure destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE and the poor construction built on top of it immediately following its destruction; a section of Nehemiah's city wall, including the Northern Tower, erected in the 5th century BCE; and the Persian, Babylonian and Iron Age II layers sealed beneath it, one on top of the other. These findings have dramatically altered previously held conceptions of the development of ancient Jerusalem and provide striking tangible evidence for its Biblical narratives.

The Seleucid Acra and Queen Adiabene's palace have both been falsely located in the Givati Parking Lot, because the City of David and Acra were both south of the temple, located above the Gihon Spring.  This paper provides the literary evidence for these claims, including the statement in Antiquities showing that Simon the Hasmonean destroyed the Seleucid citadel and the hill it stood on.

On 7 July 1880, Albert Socin published an article informing the readers of the Journal of the German Palestine Association of a new discovery in Jerusalem. That discovery would become known as the Siloam Inscription. The following article is an English translation of Albert Socin‘s, “Eine neue Entdeckung in Jerusalem,” Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palaestina-Vereins, (Leipzig: 1880), 54-55.

ABSTRACT
The ‘City of David’ in Silwan is on the original site of Jerusalem. Located in Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem, it is both an illegal Israeli settlement in a Palestinian neighbourhood and a popular international tourist destination. This article examines how the site is narrated by tour operators and tourists through fieldwork, interviews and analysis of tourist comments on the TripAdvisor site. It argues that Israeli settlers have successfully harnessed tourist discourse in order to present their vision of a Jewish Jerusalem in which Palestinian existence is ignored or treated as a threat. The site allows tourists to connect to and experience a mythical biblical past, something which answers to tourist desires
to have an authentic encounter with the destination culture. In the site’s narratives, the presence of Palestinians in the area is elided over through spatial and linguistic separation and by denying  their  legitimate  presence.  This  indicates  how  the congruence between Zionist and tourist discourses discursively legitimises Israeli colonisation of Silwan

Does verifying the actual site (for the Jerusalem Temples) really matter? Questioning the ‘traditional’ location of the Holy Temple at or near the Dome of the Rock is no trivial matter for those heavily invested in the topic. But, we should always welcome challenges to any status quo—the Temple location being no exception to that rule. That said, any alternate claim will require overwhelming evidence to the contrary and to date, nothing compelling has materialized. This introductory column (from the September 2015 Premier Edition of the Prophecy Watcher) provides a general overview to the controversial subject at the time.

Though few in absolute number, the vessels presented in this report comprise a crucial contribution to the overall study of Jerusalem during
the Second Temple period. This is because within Area E were two primary contexts dating to the third and first half of the second centuries BCE –
periods that had heretofore not been identified “on the ground” in Jerusalem. The third century BCE is represented by part of a building that contained
two disturbed floor deposits (L606 and L626) with burned but largely complete vessels (Str. 8). The first half of the second century BCE is represented by a cemetery of probably non-Jewish cist graves, possibly those of Seleucid soldiers from the Akra (Str. 7B). The graves lay immediately east of the line of the Hellenistic city wall. The cemetery was dug into the terraces that were first constructed in Str. 7B. The terrace complex continued in use during Str. 7A, when the cemetery was no longer in use.

The thought-provoking articles written by Israel Finkelstein on the archaeology of the Bronze and Iron Ages as a whole, and on Jerusalem in particular, have had a tremendous influence on our work in the recent excavations of the eastern slope of the City of David. His call to question the consensus has created a challenge to accept new data and revise our interpretations accordingly. It is in this context that we are pleased to contribute this paper to a book in his honor.

The Trumpeting Stone, discovered by Benjamin Mazar in 1973, provides one very compelling piece of extant evidence for placement of the Temple (Herod's) atop the "traditional" Temple Mount (Haram al-Sharif) as opposed to (as has been recently proposed) down to the south in the City of David.

The Jerusalem city spring is traditionally and presently known by the name of Siloam (Siloah), even though its water comes from the Gihon spring. An underground conduit, the so-called Hezekiah Tunnel, carries the water from the spring under the southeast hill to this day. For nearly two millennia, this western mouth of the tunnel was considered the source of Siloam, or the Siloam of Jerusalem. The actual source, the Gihon, was forgotten for over a millennium. Today, the Southeast Hill water systems are among the most extensively studied archaeological sites in the world. This study deals with the cultural memories of Siloam. On the basis of a diverse selection of different text and images, the author develops a cultural history of the Jerusalem city source from its beginnings to the present. Particular attention is paid to the plurality and variability of cultures of remembrance and their connection with material structures and architectures. To this end, the work combines a historical-critical study of sources with a remembrance-cultural approach from a spatial-sociological perspective.

The article presents a group of thirteen inscribed bullae and a stamp seal, dated to the late 8th–early 6th centuries B.C.E., discovered in the recent excavations of Area U in the City of David, Jerusalem. Following the presentation of the archaeological context and palaeographic analysis of the finds, we discuss the names appearing on them and their contribution to the broader topic of the history of Jerusalem, with a special emphasis on the connection of the findings to the importance of the Gihon Spring and to the debate regarding Israelite refugees in Judah.

New Carbon-14 tests show that massive Middle Bronze fortifications near the Gihon Spring in Jerusalem shall not be regarded to this period anymore. The archaeological community is in a rage. If the Canaanite fortifications did not exist, how credible would be the biblical account of the United Monarchy?