J-Post on the Safi EB board games

A short article on our recent article in PEQ (see here) on the EB games at Tell es-Safi/Gath has appeared in the Jerusalem Post – check it out!

Jeff’s official summary of the 2022 spring season

Final day of the 2022 spring season!

So today was the final day of the 2022 spring season. Final photos were taken in Area D east (ground and aerial), the remote sensing team finished the last area that they were collecting data from, and a we had a chance to use drones with LIDAR and a thermal camera to take views of various parts of the site.

Check out the pics and clips below

Great season – and perhaps we’ll be back for another short season sometime in the early summer!

Day 5 of 2022 spring season

The 5th day of the 2022 spring season was a great success. The remote sensing team finished the 2nd area that they are collecting dating from, and tomorrow, we finish off the third. In Area D East, we continued working in the two squares and have nice Iron IB materials, as well as several very nice phytolith rich levels, which should provide a lot of environmental and other data.

We finished off the day with a quick visit to Tel Miqne-Ekron, which has an enormous and beautiful wheat field in its center – perfect for the soon to be feast of Shavuot!

See pics and clips below.

Tomorrow is the final day of the short, but very successful season, and we’ll finish up the remote sensing, take final fotos, and conduct various types of drone photography.

Great season – super team! Thanks to all!

4th day of 2022 spring season

We had a great day today! In the probe in the two squares in Area D east (south of the gate), we now have at least 4 phases, from Iron IIA down to Iron I! This appears to be the first clear domestic Iron I context from the lower city, seemingly definitive proof that Gath expanded to the lower city already in the Iron I! (as I have been claiming for several years)

In addition, we continued to work in Area M, and we started the remote sensing work, with both ground penetrating radar and resistivity.

In addition, we had a visit from Alex and the “History of Israel Channel” who interviewed me and Jeff on site (see here my last interview with them).

Check out pictures and clips from today:

SASA (Save Ancient Studies Alliance) online conference – Aug. 14-15, 2022

I have been requested by the organizers to post about the SASA (Save Ancient Studies Alliance) online “Opening the Ancient World Online Conference”, which will be held on Aug. 14-15, 2022.

SASA is an admirable organization, trying to raise awareness of the importance of ancient world studies at academic institutions world wide, and how the current trend of closing such programs is the wrong thing to do.

For more information, see here.

Day 3 of 2022 spring season

We had some great results today. In Area D East we are in the Iron I, and another complete lamp, a “spinning bowl, 2-3 tabuns and other finds. In Area M, we uncovered a very nice monolithic stone pillar in one of the domestic houses in this area, as well as other finds.Apo

The remote sensing team, consisting of Apostolos Sarris (Univ. Cyprus) and Nikos Papadopulos (IMS-FORTH), from Cyprus and Greece, arrived, and started working. Also, Yoav Vantin (archaeomagnetism) and Oren Ackerman and Yankees Schreibman (geoarchaeology), came out to do some sampling.

I mainly was driving around, and doing gardening (see the video below).

Great day!

New article on EB Games at Safi!

A new article on EB game boards and pieces from Tell es-Safi/Gath has just appeared.

The article, spearheaded by Shira Albaz, is yet another result of the joint grant that Haskel Greenfield and I received a few years ago from the Canadian SSHRC.

The full title is:

Albaz, S., Greenfield, H. J., Greenfield, T. L., Brown, A., Shai, I., and Maeir, A. M. 2022 Daily Life and Cultural Appropriation in Early Bronze Age Canaan: Games and Gaming in a Domestic Neighborhood at Tell Eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath, Israel. Palestine Exploration Quarterly. https://doi.org/10.1080/00310328.2022.2069942

Here is the abstract: 

Discussions on daily life in Early Bronze Age society in the southern Levant often focus on subsistence or ritual phenomena, while aspects relating to entertainment and leisure are rarely discussed. This paper presents evidence for gaming behaviour, in the form of game boards and game pieces, that were recovered in the excavations of the Early Bronze Age (early to mid-3rd millennium BCE) residential neighbourhood at Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath, Israel. All the objects discussed are considered to be part of games (playing pieces, casting pieces, and boards) based on their resemblance to game boards and pieces published from various Early Bronze sites in the southern Levant (e.g., Arad, Megiddo, and Bab edh-Dhra), serve as the backdrop for: 1) a perspective on the social and cultural relationships reflected in these games; 2) an examination of the origins of the ‘Senet/30 Houses’ game; and 3) the appropriation of foreign cultural facets in Early Bronze Age Canaan.

Hope you find this makes you want to go play a game!

All the best

Aren

More pics from day 2 from Maria

Maria just sent me a few nice pictures from today, mainly work in Area M.

2nd day of spring 2022 season!

Today we continued work in the field. In Area D east, we’re working on Iron IIA (including a complete lamp), and hopefully about to go thru to Iron I. In Area M, we’re removing part of a balk, and exposing the corner of a wall.

Check out some photos from today!