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May 19, 2009
An Inscribed Jar Handle and a Seal
There are in couple of interesting finds in the news today.
Ha'aretz reported the first. The English tanslation of the origainal Ha'aretz Hebrew article is loaded with problems and I think even the Hebrew, which I cannot read with great fluency, has a few problems of its own. The picture on the left is from Ha'aretz and other than it could have been higher resolution and better lit there is really nothing wrong with it. The inscription is on a jar handle and reads,
b]n nḥm
so]n of Nacham (or Nechum)
But the Ha'aretz article has mnḥm, Menachem. While I was trying to figure out the reading and the vertical line between the m/n and the clear n, Robert Deutsch, in a comment reported on Jim West's blog, did it for me. Both nḥm and mnḥm occur in epigraphic texts as well as in the Hebrew Bible. One can find useful discussions of this inscription on the Biblical Studies and the ANE-2 list servers. Claude Mariottini also has provided some commentary.
The second interesting find is a broken seal, not a seal impression, but a seal. It comes from City of David excavations. The Israel Antiquities Authority (temporary link) announced the find and the picture to the left is by Vladimir Naykhin of the IAA. It comes from the first temple period. The inscription on the bone seal reads,
lšʾl[
ryhw (thingy) [
Even if the last letter is broken off, the first line is fairly clear, "belonging to Saul." No, this is not that Saul. The second line is likely a patronym but I can't find a name with that spelling in the Hebrew Bible or Hebrew epigraphic material. Assuming the last three letters are a theophoric element, perhaps one could compare the name rʾyh, Reaiah, in 1 Chronicles 4:2 and elsewhere.
The article says the thingy is a "floral image or a tiny fruit" but it looks more like a thingy to me.
Posted by Duane Smith at May 19, 2009 2:16 PM | Read more on Archaeology |
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