Excavating The City Of Goliath – Prof. Maeir & Prof. Chadwick
Lately, we paid a short visit to the millennia old city, known throughout the Iron Age, as well as the Hebrew Bible, as Gath – the city of Goliath.
The excavation team has kindly invited us to see how archeology is done from ground level.
Prof. Aren Maeir of the Bar Ilan University is excavating Tell Tzafit, or Tell es-Safi, for more than twenty five years, with his decades long partner, Prof. Jeffery Chadwick of the Brigham Young University in Utah.
Gath was the most important of the Philistine cities during the early period of Philistine history. It was from Gath that Goliath, the fabled champion of the Philistines came, and it was the king of Gath, Achish, who played an important role in the story of the young King David.
The tell, which is situated approximately halfway between Jerusalem and Ashkelon, is one of the largest biblical sites in Israel. Settled continuously from the Chalcolithic period (5th mill. BCE) until modern times, it is a veritable mine of archaeological evidence from all periods.