Horbat Rosh Zayit is located on a spur that descends from the Lower Galilee mountains westward towards the Acre Valley, about 15 km east of Acre and about 6 km north-east of Tel Keisan. This extension is part of the hilly range that extends from around Tivon in the south to beyond the Lebanese border in the north. This area creates a topographic, landscape and settlement buffer strip between the mountainous Galilee and the northern coastal plain. One of the distinct settlement phenomena characterizing this buffer strip is that during the Kingdom of Israel, the eastern border of the tribe of Asher passed along it (Joshua 19:25-28). During the archaeological survey conducted in the area, a number of sites were discovered (of which Khirbat Abu Modwer Ebalin (“Tel Madur”) was excavated), which were proposed to be identified with settlements mentioned in the Bible along this border. One of these is Cabul (Joshua 19:27), whose name has been preserved in the name of the Arab village Kabul, which is only 1.5 km south of the Rosh Zayit ruins. The proximity of the village of Kabul to the Rosh Zayit ruins, on the side of the archaeological evidence from the site, raised the possibility of its identification with the biblical Cabul.
The excavations at the site
In the excavations in the Rosh Zayit ruin that took place in 1983-84 and 1988-92, two main assemblages were uncovered:
Three settlement phases were found in the center of the site and at its summit. From the early phase, the remains of a residence that was part of a village that existed on the site were found in a limited area. With the destruction or abandonment of the village, drastic changes took place on the site and a building protected by a wall and towers was erected on its remains, which were diagnosed in two phases of existence. Despite having the characteristics of a military citadel, it is clear that the building served as a civil-administrative-economic center. The walls of the citadel were built with goil stones and their corners, as well as the mezuzahs of the openings, were built with ash stones laid using the heads and patinas method. Hundreds of storage jars were found in the citadel’s rooms and in some of them charred wheat kernels and evidence of wine and oil storage were discovered. Of these, the so-called “Hippo” jugs should be noted, which are evident in their clay color, their unusual size and their short life span. Apart from the jars, the following groups of pottery were found: “two-tone” Phoenician vessels, “black-on-red” painted Cypriot-Phoenician vessels, red-rimmed and polished vessels (“Achzib vessels” and “Samarian ceramics”), “painted” Cypriot vessels White” and Phoenician vessels without decoration. Among the kitchen utensils, we should mention the cooking pots with the pantry body (sharp or rounded corner) and the triangular and elongated rim. The assemblage of pottery from the ancient village and the two phases of the citadel’s existence is uniform in nature and essentially corresponds to layers X-IX in Hazor, to layers VA-IVB in Megiddo, to period IIA in Anach and other sites and layers respectively. On the basis of these data, the duration of the existence of the ancient village was determined to the first half of the 7th century BC, the time of the construction of the citadel to the middle of this century and its destruction to the first quarter of the 9th century BC.
The history of the settlement
The history of the settlement in the ruins of Rosh Zayit, as reflected in the findings of the excavations, show that the citadel was preceded by a small village dating from the first half of the 7th century BCE, which can be attributed to the tribe of Asher (Joshua 19:27). During the second half of this century, vast changes in the region, apparently as a result of the handing over of the “land of peat”, that is the Acre valley or part of it, by King Solomon to Phoenician sovereignty (Mal. 15:13-10). This was, apparently, the background for the establishment of the citadel in the ruins of Rosh Zayit, which served as the administrative-economic center of the Phoenician rule in the region. The citadel was destroyed at the end of the 7th century or the beginning of the 9th century BC due to an event whose nature has not been clarified.
discussion
The results of the excavations at the Rosh Zayit ruin have a direct connection to the discussion held in recent years on the archeology of the 7th century BC. The “low chronology” proposed by Finkelstein relies first and foremost on the results of the excavations at Tel Jezreel, where the remains of a royal complex were discovered which, according to what is mentioned in the Bible (Mala 21; Mala 2 8-9) was identified by the excavators with the palace of King Ahab, and therefore dated to the 9th century BCE. However, as many scholars have commented, the difficult state of preservation of Tel Jezreel made it In fact, for a single-layered site. Therefore, the very use of data from this type of site as a basis for a renewed understanding of multi-period sites or historical periods has methodological limitations. Such a site must meet two main conditions: (1) The site must have a solid geographic-historical context which makes it a valid source; and (2) the site should contain many and varied finds in situ, which have the potential to constitute a solid archaeological foundation. Tel Jezreel meets the first condition, but is far from meeting the second condition.
The value of the Rosh Zayit ruin, for its many findings, is incomparably greater from a methodological point of view than the data from Tel Jezreel. The site’s identification with the biblical Cabul and its connection to the “Aretz Kaboul” case that links it to the days of the United Monarchy, gives it the necessary geographic-historical basis. The citadel, its location, its architectural features and the archaeological find discovered in it, make the uncovered complex one of the largest and most important from the Iron Age. Furthermore, despite the great richness of the find, no two-tone or Cypro-Geometric ceramics from the 11th century BC were discovered in the citadel, on the one hand, and Phoenician ceramics covered with red and painted from the 8th century BC on the other hand. In light of all this, the results of the excavations at Rosh Zayit form a solid basis for determining its date to the 17th century BC. The fact that its ceramic assemblage is the same as layers VA-IVB at Megiddo and layers X-IX at Hazor, and in accordance with the other relevant sites and layers, creates an archaeological and historical synchronization that supports the accepted chronological framework of the Iron Age II in general and the 17th century BC in particular.
Biblical Hiking map