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Number 296 
November 1994
ARTICLES
BOOK REVIEWS
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in the Nahal Beer Sheva Area:
The Radiocarbon Aspect
ISAAC GILEAD
Archaeological Division
Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
84105 Beer Sheva, Israel
There are now dozens of 14C determinations
from the Chalcolithic sites in the Nahal Beer Sheva
area, most of them from the site of Shiqmim. The role
of those dates, and stratigraphy, in establishing
the history of the Chalcolithic settlement is described.
Outlined also are the problems and prospects of defining
phases of settlement by averaging sets of radiocarbon
dates. The radiometric data suggest that the sites
of Horvat Beter and Bir es-Safadi were settled centuries
after Shiqmim was established. The article also illustrates
that the radiocarbon dates cannot support the hypothesis
that the subterranean structures in the Nahal Beer
Sheva sites preceded the above-ground buildings.
JAMES F. ROSS
Virginia Theological Seminary
Alexandria, VA 22304
An imported jar found in Tomb 164B at Vounous
in Cyprus is shown to be from Palestine, dating to either
very late EB III or early EB IV. Otherjars from Tombs
64 and 68 are somewhat later, but still in EB IV, probably
from Syria. The evidence of these imports supports raising
the chronology of the periods represented by the tombs,
respectively EC I and II and MC I.
of the Dolphin Vase as Determined by
Neutron Activation Analysis
PATRICK E. McGOVERN
Museum Applied Science Center for Archaeology (MASCA)
The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and
Anthropology
33rd and Spruce Sts.
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104
JANINE BOURRIAU
McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research
62 Sydney St.
Cambridge CB2 IJW
United Kingdom
GARMAN HARBOTTLE
Department of Chemistry
Brookhaven National Laboratory
Upton, NY 11973
SUSAN J. ALLEN
Egyptian Art Department
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
5th Avenue at 82nd St.
New York, NY 10028
The Dolphin Vase which was excavated from
a Middle Kingdom Egyptian tomb at the capital city of
Lisht, is so named because of its naturalistic depiction
of dolphins. This pottery jug, dated ca. 1750-1700 B.C.,
epitomizes the network of international relations of a
prosperous period: found in Egypt, the dolphins appear
to be Minoan in style and yet the vessel shape and manufacture
are of Levantine inspiration. Statistical evaluation of
the chemical composition of its pottery ware by neutron
activation analysis (NAA) makes it virtually certain that
the Dolphin Vase originated in the Gaza region of southern
Palestine. Trade relations between the latter region and
Egypt, with consequent s listic and technological exchange,
intensified under the so-called "Hyksos," a Semitic dynasty
that controlled the eastern Nile Delta between ca. 1700
and 1550 B.C.
MICHAEL G. HASEL
Department of Near Eastern Studies
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85716
The name Israel in the Merneptah stela
of ca. 1207 B.C. has entered a new phase of discussion
and debate in recent reconstructions of the origin of
ancient Israel. Some of the issues involved include the
translation of tht, name Israel and the location and nature
of the entity Israel. Attempts to resolve some of these
concerns have included linguistic analyses of the designation
Israel; structural analyses of the final hymnic-poetic
unit; and some attempts to identify archaeological correlations
with Merneptah's campaign in Palestine. This study assesses
a number of linguistic analyses indicating that the Egyptian
designation is properly translated as Israel. Our new
structural analysis reveals that Israel is located within
the region of Canaan and Hurru, designations that stand
parallel to each other. Israel is an agricultural/sedentary
socioethnic entity. The term "seed," Egyptian prt,
based on contextual relations in other military texts,
means "grain," supporting the identification of Israel
as a largely agricultural, noncity-state entity.
Historical Considerations
BARUCH HALPERN
Department of History and Jewish Studies Program
Pennsylvania State University
University Park, PA 16802
The first fragment of the Tel Dan stela,
discovered in 1993, caught the attention of the public
particularly for its mention of the "house of David,"
providing a stratified index of the historicity of thatfigure,
and of the early monarchy. The editio princeps placed
the inscription early in the ninth century B.C.E., relating
it to the invasion of Ben-Hadad I. Reconsideration of
the stela suggests, however, that it belongs to the end
of the ninth century, when Aramean ascendance over Israel
was on the verge of being broken. The language of the
stela also indicates that the Aramaic of Damascus in this
era had close connections with Hebrew and Moabite.
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