|
The Early Bronze City (3000 - 2650 BC)
The Beersheba "depression" or "basin" makes for relatively easy travel
from Arad (1) westward to the
trunk road leading to Egypt and (2) eastward to the
Dead Sea (one kilometer down). In addition, the
only good road through the central mountain range splits in two at Hebron, one
branch descending to Beersheba, the other to Arad. At Beersheba, however,
there was no city in the Early Bronze Age (EB). With the rare exception of
Jericho, we stand
at the beginning of urbanization in the land. "Arad" (we don't know its name
in this period) lorded it alone in the basin as an urban emporium, exchanging
copper from Sinai for the wine, olive oil and grain of the north. Much of the
pottery attests to Arad's connections with Egypt and the copper-producing
settlements in Sinai. In the north Arad could connect to city states such as
Ai, Jericho, Yarmuth, Gezer, Megiddo,
Beth Shean, Hazor and
Dan.
In addition to wine and olive oil, Egypt wanted
asphalt for waterproofing ships and
mummification, and asphalt could be had in the Dead Sea.
When the earth trembled in the
southern part of that deep rift, pieces of bitumen (asphalt) would break away
and float to the surface. Presumably, the "Aradians" exported it to Egypt.
They deposited chunks of bitumen under the floor of one of their temples - as an
offering perhaps.
At the time of the earliest city here,
urbanization was well underway on the Upper Euphrates, under Sumerian
influence, and Egypt had just entered its first historical period.
(One pottery shard at Arad is incised with the name of Narmer, first pharaoh
of the first dynasty, who reigned around 3100 BC.) It was a time of population
growth. On the basis of archeological surveys, the number of people in the
land at this time has been estimated at 150,000 (Mazar p. 112). Such growth
was spurred by the domestication of livestock, which made possible a more
intensive agriculture.
At Arad, for example, archaeologists found the bones of sheep and goats
all over the site. There were cattle bones too, indicating use of the plow. The bones
of asses testified to the main means of long-range transport. (The horse and
camel were not yet domesticated.) Under Ruth Amiran, the Arad archaeologists
also found carbonized wheat, barley, peas, lentils, chickpeas, flax seeds and
olive pits (visible today in the Early Bronze room of the Israel Museum).
Here was a thriving city center, surrounded (a survey has indicated) by
villages.
|
|
About 2850 BC, the inhabitants built a wall along the watershed of the natural
amphitheater. They laid out a network of streets in such a way that all rain
falling within the wall would flow downhill to the reservoir, then an open
pool of about 1000 square meters. Near it they erected public buildings. The
planning was meticulous, as it would have had to be to maintain 2500 people
(figuring 100 per acre) despite occasional years of drought and attacks by
nomadic tribes.
Except for the Israelite fortress, no one ever built here
again. Nor has rainfall-erosion taken the toll it has elsewhere. The ruins, therefore,
are in a good state of preservation.
|
|
Here is
another view, from the north and closer in.
Note again the city wall running along the
watershed, and how the radial pattern would enable water to flow
through the streets to the reservoir. More than a kilometer long,
the wall would have required a great many soldiers to defend it;
no doubt the villagers took refuge in the city and provided troops
as well. The wall was probably at least 12 feet high. Its two
courses were filled with rubble. From it protruded 35 - 40
towers, which enabled the defenders to shoot at attackers who
might try to take cover up against it. These attackers were
probably desert tribes such as the later Amalekites, although
there may have been occasional problems with Egypt too. The
diggers found ash from a major destruction around 2800 BC. The
city was then rebuilt. |
|
In addition to the pottery, the city's architecture illustrates
its contacts with north and south. Its twin temples were similar in design to
those at Megiddo in the north, also from this period. Yet the houses were very
like contemporaneous dwellings found in southern Sinai.
Looking into these houses, we can get a feel of what life was
like almost 5000 years ago. They all have a similar form (again, central
planning at work): from an outer courtyard, where most of the daily chores
took place, you took a single step down into the main room, which was
rectangular with benches on the sides.
|
On
the benches were vessels. In the middle of the room was a wooden pillar
on a stone base. This pillar supported a beam that ran the length of
the roof; the roofing material could span the space between each long wall and
the beam. The archaeologists even found a clay model of such a house. It shows a
runnel around the door, which would have directed the rain away from the
opening into the street; thence it would have flowed to the reservoir. Houses
of a similar plan have been found in the copper-producing EB settlements of
southern Sinai, whose granite shows up in pottery shards found in Arad (as
Arad pottery shows up there). |
|
The smaller finds at Arad may be viewed at this
link. Of special
interest is the photograph labeled "stele": it may represent the dying and
rising vegetation god. If you enlarge it, you will see two stick-like figures
incised on rock. Both have hands and heads that resemble ears of grain. One is
lying on a mat or bed (or in a grave?), while the other is vertical. They
cross at the region of the loins, which has led some scholars to think that we
have here, rather, the depiction of a heavenly union, a marriage of gods.
We are not sure what led to the city's final destruction. One
or several factors may have had a part. The climate became drier in the middle
of the third millennium BC. Also, Egypt became more active in southern Sinai
at this time, perhaps undermining Arad's exclusivity as a trade emporium. And
of course there were the ever-hungry desert nomads.
|
