City of David (archaeological site)

Overview

The area is one of the most intensively excavated sites in the Holy Land.^[46] Archaeological practice at the site has been criticized for its practitioners not acknowledging political and corporate motivations, questionable field practice and overtly skewed interpretations.^[11]

Location and topography

It is on a narrow ridge running south from the Temple Mount.^[47][48] The site has a good defensive position, as it is almost surrounded by the Central or Tyropoeon Valley to its west, by the Hinnom Valley to the south, and the Kidron Valley on the east.^[49]

The ridge is currently inside the predominantly Arab neighborhood of Wadi Hilweh, which is part of Silwan, an East Jerusalem suburb.^[47][48]

Bronze and Iron Age

It is thought to have been the site of a walled city from the Bronze Age, which enjoyed the defensive advantages of its position.^[49] In the pre-Israelite period, the area is thought to have been separated from the site of the later Temple Mount by the Ophel, an uninhabited area which became the seat of government under Israelite rule.^[49]

In 2014, excavations at the Givati parking lot argued there had been no 10th-century city wall, meaning: no fortified settlement in the City of David during the Iron IIA (c. 1000–925 BCE),^[50] the time span usually proposed by biblical scholars for the reigns of David, Solomon and Rehoboam.

During the reign of Hezekiah (reign c. 716–697/687 BCE), the walls of Jerusalem were expanded westward, across the Central Valley from the City of David and the Temple Mount, enclosing a previously unwalled suburb in the area known today as the Western Hill of the Old City.^{[citation needed]}

Exploration

Archaeological exploration of the area began in the nineteenth century, with excavations undertaken by Charles Warren in 1867. Warren was sent by the Palestine Exploration Fund. Warren conducted an excavation of the area south of the Temple Mount and recovered a massive fortification. The finding led him to conduct more excavations at the area south of the Temple Mount. There he revealed a vertical shaft descending from a slanted tunnel to an apparent water source. He suggested that the shaft was used to supply water to the city, which he believed was the old biblical city of David. Today this shaft is called after its discoverer "Warren's shaft", but his interpretation has been proven wrong, as the shaft is not man-made and had not yet been discovered by Jerusalem's inhabitants in the 10th century BCE.

There have been numerous excavations since and several digs are currently underway. Complete chronological lists of the digs are available at the website of the Israel Antiquities Authority, dating to following periods:

• Late Ottoman^[51]
• British Mandate^[52]
• Jordanian^[53]
• early Israeli^[54]

In 2010, an archaeological survey of the City of David was conducted by Rina Avner, Eliahu Shukron and Ronny Reich, on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA).^[55] In 2012–2013, two teams of archaeologists conducted surveys of the area on behalf of the IAA; one led by Joseph (Joe) Uzziel,^[56] and the other by Yuval Gadot.^[57] Archaeological surveys in the City of David continued in 2014, led by Uzziel,^[58] and Nahshon Szanton.^[59]

Dating

A four-year project started in 2017, called "Setting the Clock in the City of David" and led by Yuval Gadot, an archaeologist at Tel Aviv University together with Elisabetta Boaretto (Weizmann Institute of Science), plus two Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologists, Joe Uziel and Doron Ben Ami, intends to carbon-14 date sites in Jerusalem. At the time only ten reliable carbon dates existed from all of the city's digs. According to Gadot, the chronology of Jerusalem is "an assumption on an assumption on an assumption".^[60][61] The results of several studies have been published^[62] including for the Gihon Spring Tower^[63] and for Wilson's Arch.^[64]

Moat

An at least 70-metre long, 30-metre wide and 9-metre deep moat, separating the Southeastern Ridge from the Ophel and the top of the Temple Mount, was identified in 2023 in the Givati parking lot dig, with an additional segment to the east discovered by Kathleen Kenyon in the 1960s and now understood as part of the same defensive ditch.^[65][66] It is not possible to determine when it was hewn out of the bedrock, but it was in place by the Late Iron Age IIA, around 900 BCE.^[65][66] It reached from Jerusalem's central valley (Josephus' Tyropoeon Valley) in the west, to the western slopes of the Qidron Valley north of the Stepped Stone Structure, thus either protecting the northern walls of the Bronze Age city if it is indeed that old, or separating the Iron Age II, so Israelite acropolis, which possibly included the Temple Mount, from the residential part of the city.^[65][66] Researchers tentatively connected it to a passage from the Hebrew Bible, 1 Kings 11:27, where a gap in the walls of David's city is mentioned.^[66] After significantly modifying Jerusalem's topography for centuries, the moat disappeared again in the Late Hellenistic period, when it was backfilled as part of construction activities.^[65]

Upper (northern) area

In the uppermost (northern area):

• The Large Stone Structure
• The Stepped Stone Structure

City of David archaeologist Eilat Mazar believes that a so-called Large Stone Structure she has discovered at the upper area of the site and tentatively dated to the tenth to ninth century BC, may be the palace of King David.^[67] Not far from that excavation area a number of bullae (seal impressions) were unearthed, bearing the names of Yehucal son of Shelemiah and Gedaliah son of Pashhur, two officials mentioned in the Book of Jeremiah.

Gihon Spring and water systems

The Gihon Spring is a major water source used in several successive ancient water systems.

The remains at the site include several water tunnels, one of which, the Siloam Tunnel, was built by King Hezekiah and still carries water, along with several pools including the Pool of Siloam known from the Old and New Testaments.

• The Gihon Spring, which lies on the eastern slope of the southeastern hill of Jerusalem aka the City of David, and is generally considered the very reason why the city first emerged at this specific location.^[49] It has been noted that above the Gihon Spring was found a massive town wall, which wall is used to determine the location of the ancient settlement.^[68]

The ancient water systems connected to the Gihon Spring^[49] include natural, masonry-built, and rock-cut structures, such as

• The Spring Tower
• Warren's Shaft, a natural shaft, once thought to have been a water supply system. Although within the bounds of the City of David, it is thought to have been inaccessible during the period attributed to King David.^[69]
• The Siloam Channel, a Canaanite (Bronze Age) water system that preceded the Siloam Tunnel
• The Siloam Tunnel (also known as Hezekiah's Tunnel), an Iron Age water supply system where the Siloam inscription was found
• The Siloam Pool - two connected pools, an upper one from the Byzantine period at the exit of the Siloam Tunnel, and the recently discovered, lower pool dating to the Hasmonean part of the Second Temple Period.

Eastern slope

On the eastern slope of the ridge, towards the Qidron Valley:

• City walls and towers, a columbarium, rock-cut vaulted tunnels once interpreted as royal Judahite tombs (T1 and T2), a rock-cut pool where the Theodotus Inscription was discovered (for associated synagogue see here), etc.

Central Valley street and channel

• The Jerusalem Water Channel, a large drainage system running down the Central (Tyropoeon) Valley, covered by the following:
• A monumental stepped street probably used by Second Temple-period pilgrims and built over the Jerusalem Water Channel.

South of the city

Outside the walls to the south:

• King's Garden (excavated in 1894–1897 by Bliss and Dickie).^{[70][71][72][73]}

Givati area west of Central Valley

The Giv'ati Parking Lot excavations extend over an area of about 5 dunams (1.2 acres).^[74]

Here archaeologists claim to have found the remains of the Acra,^[75] a fortress built by Antiochus Epiphanes to subdue those Jerusalemites who were opposed to Hellenisation.

Ophel area north of the city

See Ophel: Jerusalem ophel.

Chalcolithic (4500–3500 BCE)

Chalcolithic remains include bits of pottery found in clefts in the bedrock by Macalister and Duncan.^[76] The expedition also discovered a number of places where the bedrock had been cut in various ways. These included areas where the rock had been smoothed and others where it had been cut to form flow channels. There were also several groups of small basins, sometimes called cup marks, cut into the bedrock. These are assumed to have been used for some form of agricultural processing. Macalister and Duncan speculated that they were used in olive oil processing.^[76] Edwin C. M. van den Brink, who notes that similar carved basins have been found at Beit Shemesh and near Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut, speculates that they may have been created by repeated grinding and crushing activity, such as the grinding of grain or the crushing of olives.^[77] Eilat Mazar speculates that they were used to collect rainwater.^[49]

Early Bronze Age (3500–2350 BCE)

Pieces of pottery have been found.

Middle Bronze Age (2000–1550 BCE)

Middle Bronze Age Jerusalem is mentioned several times in Egyptian texts from the 19th–18th centuries BCE.^[78]

Late Bronze Age (1550–1200 BCE)

Pottery and bronze arrowheads dating form this period have been found.^[49]

In 2010, a fragment of a clay tablet dating from the 14th century BCE was uncovered, making it the oldest written document yet uncovered in Jerusalem. It is dated by the writing it bears, in an ancient Akkadian cuneiform script. The text was deciphered by graduate student Takayoshi Oshima working under professor Wayne Horowitz. According to Horowitz, the quality of the writing indicates that this was a royal inscription, apparently a letter from the king of Jerusalem to the pharaoh in Egypt.^[79] Professor Christopher Rollston points out that there is no mention of any personal names or titles and no place names in the document. He notes that the quality of the script is good but that this does not show that it is "international royal correspondence." He also suggests that caution should be taken before positing a definite date as it is not a stratified find, having been discovered after excavation in a "wet sieving" process.^[80]

Iron Age I (1200–980/70 BCE)

In 2024, several researchers published a number of radiocarbon tests conducted in five different parts of the City of David which they argue provide evidence for the existence of an urban settlement in Jerusalem all through the 12th–10th centuries BCE.^[81]

Iron Age IIa (1000–925/900 BCE)

The period of the tenth and ninth centuries BCE has been the subject of an intense scholarly dispute, as well as of ongoing archaeological investigations.^[82]

The 2005 discovery by archaeologist Eilat Mazar of a Large Stone Structure, which she dated to the tenth century BCE, would be evidence of buildings in Jerusalem of a size appropriate to the capital of a centralized kingdom at that time. Others, most notably Israel Finkelstein of Tel Aviv University, argue that the structure could, for the most part, be from the much later Hasmonean period.^[83] However, new evidence continues to emerge from the dig. Mazar's date is supported by 10th century imported luxury goods found within the Large Stone Structure, including two Phoenician-style ivory inlays once attached to iron objects. Comparable objects found in a Phoenician tomb at Achziv suggest that they may have decorated a sword handle.^[84] A quantity of luxury round, carinated bowls with red slip and hand burnishing support both the tenth century date and a sophisticated, urban lifestyle.^[85] A bone has been radiocarbon dated by Elisabetta Boaretto at the Weizmann Institute, showing a probable date between 1050 and 780 BCE.^[85] A large section of a "delicate and elegant" black-on-red jug, also found in the structure, is of a kind dated to the second half of the tenth century BCE.^[86][87]

In 2010 Mazar announced the discovery of what she believed to be a 10th-century BCE city wall. According to Mazar, "It's the most significant construction we have from First Temple days in Israel," and "It means that at that time, the 10th century, in Jerusalem there was a regime capable of carrying out such construction." Aren Maeir, an archaeology professor at Bar Ilan University, said he has yet to see evidence that the fortifications are as old as Mazar claims.^[88]

Doron Ben-Ami wrote in 2014 that, on the basis of his own excavations in the Givati parking lot area bordering on the "City of David" from the north-west, there was apparently no 10th-century city wall: "Had a fortified settlement existed in the City of David, then the course of the city wall on the west would have had to pass through the Givati excavation area. No such city wall has thus far been found. This means that the Iron Age IIa settlement [c. 1000–925 BCE] was not fortified."^[50] Ben-Ami's findings stand in stark contrast to those of R. Reich and E. Shukron who, on the basis of their findings, have disproved Warren's theory that King David (c. 1000 BCE) captured Jerusalem by entering into the city through the shaft now known as Warren's Shaft, and have concluded that the shaft was largely in disuse at that time,^{[dubious – discuss]} although it was within the city and the city was, indeed, encompassed by a monumental wall which they had excavated.^{[89][90][91][92]} This ancient wall, found on the eastern-most flank of the Kidron valley in the ancient City of David, rather than in the Giv'ati Parking Lot, was preserved in its full height (6 m.), measuring 2 m. in width.^[93]

The discrepancy can perhaps be attributed to the limited confines of the Giv'ati Parking Lot and where Ben-Ami and his team were expecting to find a wall when, in fact, the ancient wall went beyond the bounds of the excavated Parking Lot.

Iron Age IIb (c. 925–720 BCE)

Ben-Ami goes on saying that his Givati findings indicate that "the fortified city of the Iron IIB, which encompassed both the City of David and the Western Hill, had no need for a fortification line between these two sectors of the city."^[50] Nevertheless, subsequent excavations at Givati and other sites have shown that 9th century Jerusalem "included an acropolis to the north and a city on the lower, southeastern, ridge with a barrier separating the two."^[94]

Iron Age IIIb (8th century – 586 BCE)

This is the period that corresponds to the biblical Kings Hezekiah through Josiah and the destruction of the Kingdom of Judah by Nebuchadnezzar II.

King Hezekiah secured the city's water supply against siege by employing his men to dig a 533 metres (1,749 ft) conduit deep within the meleke limestone bedrock and, in so doing, to divert the waters of the Gihon Spring to a place on the west side of the City of David,^[98] and covering over all signs of the source of the spring and the fortifications that had surrounded it in earlier periods. He built the Pool of Siloam as a water reservoir. Hezekiah then surrounded the new reservoir and the city's burgeoning western suburbs with a new city wall.^[99][100]

Bullae with the names of Yehucal son of Shelemiah and Gedaliah son of Pashhur, two officials mentioned in the Book of Jeremiah, have been found.^[101][102]

In 2019, during the excavations of the Givati Parking lot, a seal bearing Paleo-Hebrew inscription was discovered, belonging to "Natan-Melech the King’s Servant".^[103]

Babylonian and Persian periods (586–322 BCE)

Two bullae in the Neo-Babylonian style, one showing a priest standing beside an altar to the gods Marduk and Nabu.^[104] A polished, black, scaraboid stone seal showing a "Babylonian cultic scene" of two bearded men standing on each side of an altar dedicated to the Babylonian moon god Sin. The scaraboid is understood to have been produced in Babylonia, with space left below that altar for a personal name. In that space are Hebrew letters that Peter van der Veen has read as the name Shelomit.^[105]

Hasmoneans, Herodians and Roman governors (167 BCE – 70 CE)

Major archaeological finds include the Pool of Siloam, and the monumental stepped road built by Pilate and drained by an impressive channel. Active Roman-era excavations are also underway at the Givati Parking Lot dig site,^[106][9] where the remains of a palace attributed to Queen Helena of Adiabene were discovered in 2007.^[107]

Byzantine period (324–628 CE)

The Byzantine-period mansion called the "Eusebius" house stood in the area now underneath the visitor's center, atop the central part of E. Mazar's Large Stone Structure.^[108][109]

During the excavation of the area adjacent to the west, the so-called Givati Parking Lot dig, many Byzantine-period finds were made, including a hoard of 264 gold coins from the time of Emperor Heraclius (7th century CE).^[106]