Khirbet Kerak
Encyclopedia
Khirbet Kerak
(Arabic: Khirbet al-Karak, "the ruins of the castle") or Beth Yerah ") is a tell located on the southern shore of the Sea of Galilee
in modern day Israel
. The tell spans an area of over 50 acres and contains remains dating from the Early Bronze Age (c. 3000 BC - 2000 BC) and from the Persian period
(c. 450 BC) through to the early Islamic period (c. 1000 AD). A form of Early Bronze Age pottery
first discovered at the tell but also seen in other parts of the Levant
(including Jericho
, Beth Shan, Tell Judeideh, and Ugarit
) is known as "Khirbet Kerak ware."
empties into the Jordan river and rises 15 meters above sea
level. It is triangular in shape and approximately 1.2 km by 380 m (at its widest point), covering 60-75 acres. The Jordan river runs to the south, although it previously (until the medieval period at the earliest) ran north and west of it.
, points to trade/political relations with the First dynasty of Egypt
, at approximately 3000 BCE. Excavators have identified four levels of occupation from the Early Bronze Age (EB). Architectural development shows the procession from (sometimes oval) pit dwellings (I) to mud-brick (II), to basalt foundations with mud-brick (III), and then on to basalt structures (IV), over approximately 1000 years. The basalt houses belong to the same phase as the Khirbet al-Kerak pottery, dated to the Early Bronze Age III. From the earliest phases, the settlement was protected from the south and west by a city wall (the north and east facing the Sea of Galilee). The wall consisted of three connecting parallel walls, forming a massive wall, 25 feet (7.6 m) thick, built of mud-bricks. The gate was on the south and was built of basalt. Evidence of an urban, orthogonal layout was found, dating to the EB II, supporting the claim that the city was one of the regional urban centers of the period.
A large (90*120 feet) building (“the circles building”) was built in the EBIII, at the northern part of the tel. Of this building only the basalt foundations of the walls remain, in the form of a pavement 30 feet (9.1 m) wide. In this pavement, ten sunken large circles were found. Each circle is intersected by two partition walls forming four compartments. In the courtyard were ovens in which Khirbet al-Kerak pottery was found. The building is generally identified as a public granary. At full capacity, the granary could hold an estimated 1700 tons of grain.
Below this building, remains dated to both EB I(b) and EB II were found. At some point, the building was parceled out to various artisans during EB III––clearly not the original purpose for which the structure was built.
Middle Bronze Age (2200–1550 BC) - Around 2000 BC, the city was destroyed or abandoned. From the Middle Bronze Age I, a paved street, a potters workshop and other remains were excavated. Middle Bronze Age II is represented by a tomb. Parts of the city walls are also dated to the MB.
Biblical period - There are no signs of habitation from 1200-450 BC until the site's reuse during the Persian period.
or other Bronze or Iron Age sources, the name preserves part of the Canaan
ite toponym of Ablm (Heb. Abel), "the city/fort (qrt) of his-majesty Yarih" (also Ablm-bt-Yrh) which is mentioned in the 14th century BCE Epic of Aqht and is thought to be a reference to the Early Bronze Age structure extant at Khirbet Kerak.
The name Bet Yerah has generally been accepted and applied to the site of Khirbet Kerak, though the evidence for its being located there is circumstantial. Established in the Hellenistic period (c. 4th century BCE), Bet Yerah ceased to exist with the end of that period (c. 1st century BCE). It was given the Greek name Philoteria by Ptolemy II Philadelphus
for his sister, as indicated by remains dating to the Ptolemaic rule (3rd century BCE). Hellenistic remains identified as those of ancient Philoteria by Amihai Mazar
consist of, "a considerable number of spacious town-houses built on an orthogonal plan within the confines of the Early Bronze Age
fortifications. The total extent of the settlement was about 700 meters from north to south, and 200 meters from east to west. Ceramic and other finds of the 3rd-2nd centuries BCE were abundant in this settlement, and some houses had remains of decorated wall plaster." Four villas in Philoteria/Bet Yerah dating to the late Hellenistic period are the oldest known examples of the big mansion (domus), a type of domestic architecture seen in Roman-Byzantine period Palestine. One of them measures 22 x 12 metres and consists of 11 rooms decorated with marble, stucco, and mosaics that were accessed by way of a entrance to a colonnaded courtyard.
During the Roman period, a fortress was built there and the place became known and named for this feature. The Jerusalem Talmud
mentions Bet Yerah as sitting alongside Sinnabri (al-Sinnabra), describing both as walled cities, but also uses the name Kerakh to refer to Bet Yerah. Kerakh, meaning "fortress," was the Aramaic
name for the site in the Roman period, and it is from this name that the Arabic Khirbet al-Kerak ("ruins of the castle") is derived.
, a church was constructed there and it shows signs of having been reused as a dar, or manor house, during the early Islamic period.
An Arab
Islamic palatial complex or qasr in al-Sinnabra, known by the same name, served as a winter resort to Mu'awiya, Marwan I
, and other caliphs in Umayyad
-era Palestine
(c. 650-704 AD). For decades, part of this complex was misidentified as a Byzantine era (c. 330-620 CE) synagogue
; excavations carried out in 2010 confirmed an architectural analysis made by Donald Whitcomb in 2002 suggesting the building to be the qasr of al-Sinnabra. Constructed in the 7th century by Mu'awiya and Abdel Malik, another Umayyad caliph who also commissioned the building of the Dome of the Rock
in the Old City of Jerusalem, it likely represents the earliest Umayyad complex of this type yet to be discovered.
During the Crusades
, it was the site of the 1113 Battle of Al-Sannabra
, and in the lead up to the Battle of Hittin in 1187, Saladin
and his forces passed through al-Sinnabra before moving on to command the roads around Kafr Sabt
.
In 1933, Na'im Makhouly, a Christian Palestinian from Nazareth, who was an inspector for the Mandate Department of Antiquities at the time of the construction of the Samak-Tiberias highway that cut across the tell, conducted a salvage excavation.
During the 1940s, parts of the tell were excavated by Benjamin Mazar
, Michael Avi-Yonah, Moshe Sheteklis, and Emanuel Dunayevsky. In 1946, in the northern quadrant of the tell, a fortified compound consisting of a series of large structures, including a bathhouse adjoined to large apsidal hall that is decorated with colorful mosaics, was discovered just above the granary (AKA the Circles Building), an Early Bronze Age structure uncovered in previous excavations.
Between 1950 and 1953,
P.L.O. Guy and Pesach Bar-Adon, two Israeli archaeologists
excavated the compound, falsely identifying a building there as a 5th-6th century Palestinian synagogue, because of the presence of a column base engraved with a seven-branched candelabrum.
Excavations by the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago in 1960 uncovered a Byzantine church to the north of the fortified compound.
In 1976, Ruth Amiran
conducted a salvage excavation on the tell. More salvage excavations were carried out by Nimrod Getzov in 1994 and 1995.
In the summer of 2003, excavations were renewed in the northern part of the site with a pilot excavation in the granary. Excavations undertaken by Israeli archaeologists headed by Raphael Greenberg from Tel Aviv University
's Institute of Archaeology in 2010 confirmed that the fortified compound was in fact the Arab Islamic palatial complex of al-Sinnabra.
Khirbet Kerak
Khirbet Kerak or Beth Yerah ") is a tell located on the southern shore of the Sea of Galilee in modern day Israel. The tell spans an area of over 50 acres and contains remains dating from the Early Bronze Age and from the Persian period through to the early Islamic period...
(Arabic: Khirbet al-Karak, "the ruins of the castle") or Beth Yerah ") is a tell located on the southern shore of the Sea of Galilee
Sea of Galilee
The Sea of Galilee, also Kinneret, Lake of Gennesaret, or Lake Tiberias , is the largest freshwater lake in Israel, and it is approximately in circumference, about long, and wide. The lake has a total area of , and a maximum depth of approximately 43 m...
in modern day Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
. The tell spans an area of over 50 acres and contains remains dating from the Early Bronze Age (c. 3000 BC - 2000 BC) and from the Persian period
Achaemenid Empire
The Achaemenid Empire , sometimes known as First Persian Empire and/or Persian Empire, was founded in the 6th century BCE by Cyrus the Great who overthrew the Median confederation...
(c. 450 BC) through to the early Islamic period (c. 1000 AD). A form of Early Bronze Age pottery
History of pottery in the Southern Levant
The history of pottery in Palestine describes the discovery and cultural development of pottery in Syro-Palestinian archaeology in the historical region of Palestine, which includes the modern day polities of Israel, the Palestinian Authority administered areas of the West Bank and the Gaza strip,...
first discovered at the tell but also seen in other parts of the Levant
Levant
The Levant or ) is the geographic region and culture zone of the "eastern Mediterranean littoral between Anatolia and Egypt" . The Levant includes most of modern Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, the Palestinian territories, and sometimes parts of Turkey and Iraq, and corresponds roughly to the...
(including Jericho
Jericho
Jericho ; is a city located near the Jordan River in the West Bank of the Palestinian territories. It is the capital of the Jericho Governorate and has a population of more than 20,000. Situated well below sea level on an east-west route north of the Dead Sea, Jericho is the lowest permanently...
, Beth Shan, Tell Judeideh, and Ugarit
Ugarit
Ugarit was an ancient port city in the eastern Mediterranean at the Ras Shamra headland near Latakia, Syria. It is located near Minet el-Beida in northern Syria. It is some seven miles north of Laodicea ad Mare and approximately fifty miles east of Cyprus...
) is known as "Khirbet Kerak ware."
Location
The tell of Khirbet Kerak (Arabic: Khirbet al-Karak, "the ruins of the castle") or Beth Yerah "), lies where the Sea of GalileeSea of Galilee
The Sea of Galilee, also Kinneret, Lake of Gennesaret, or Lake Tiberias , is the largest freshwater lake in Israel, and it is approximately in circumference, about long, and wide. The lake has a total area of , and a maximum depth of approximately 43 m...
empties into the Jordan river and rises 15 meters above sea
Sea of Galilee
The Sea of Galilee, also Kinneret, Lake of Gennesaret, or Lake Tiberias , is the largest freshwater lake in Israel, and it is approximately in circumference, about long, and wide. The lake has a total area of , and a maximum depth of approximately 43 m...
level. It is triangular in shape and approximately 1.2 km by 380 m (at its widest point), covering 60-75 acres. The Jordan river runs to the south, although it previously (until the medieval period at the earliest) ran north and west of it.
History
Early Bronze Age (3300/3500-2200 BCE) - The 2009 discovery at the tell of a stone palette with Egyptian motifs, including an ankhAnkh
The ankh , also known as key of life, the key of the Nile or crux ansata, was the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic character that read "eternal life", a triliteral sign for the consonants ʻ-n-ḫ...
, points to trade/political relations with the First dynasty of Egypt
First dynasty of Egypt
The first dynasty of Ancient Egypt is often combined with the Dynasty II under the group title, Early Dynastic Period of Egypt...
, at approximately 3000 BCE. Excavators have identified four levels of occupation from the Early Bronze Age (EB). Architectural development shows the procession from (sometimes oval) pit dwellings (I) to mud-brick (II), to basalt foundations with mud-brick (III), and then on to basalt structures (IV), over approximately 1000 years. The basalt houses belong to the same phase as the Khirbet al-Kerak pottery, dated to the Early Bronze Age III. From the earliest phases, the settlement was protected from the south and west by a city wall (the north and east facing the Sea of Galilee). The wall consisted of three connecting parallel walls, forming a massive wall, 25 feet (7.6 m) thick, built of mud-bricks. The gate was on the south and was built of basalt. Evidence of an urban, orthogonal layout was found, dating to the EB II, supporting the claim that the city was one of the regional urban centers of the period.
A large (90*120 feet) building (“the circles building”) was built in the EBIII, at the northern part of the tel. Of this building only the basalt foundations of the walls remain, in the form of a pavement 30 feet (9.1 m) wide. In this pavement, ten sunken large circles were found. Each circle is intersected by two partition walls forming four compartments. In the courtyard were ovens in which Khirbet al-Kerak pottery was found. The building is generally identified as a public granary. At full capacity, the granary could hold an estimated 1700 tons of grain.
Below this building, remains dated to both EB I(b) and EB II were found. At some point, the building was parceled out to various artisans during EB III––clearly not the original purpose for which the structure was built.
Middle Bronze Age (2200–1550 BC) - Around 2000 BC, the city was destroyed or abandoned. From the Middle Bronze Age I, a paved street, a potters workshop and other remains were excavated. Middle Bronze Age II is represented by a tomb. Parts of the city walls are also dated to the MB.
Biblical period - There are no signs of habitation from 1200-450 BC until the site's reuse during the Persian period.
Bet Yerah
Beth Yerah means "House of the Moon (god)". Though it is not mentioned in the Hebrew BibleHebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
or other Bronze or Iron Age sources, the name preserves part of the Canaan
Canaan
Canaan is a historical region roughly corresponding to modern-day Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, and the western parts of Jordan...
ite toponym of Ablm (Heb. Abel), "the city/fort (qrt) of his-majesty Yarih" (also Ablm-bt-Yrh) which is mentioned in the 14th century BCE Epic of Aqht and is thought to be a reference to the Early Bronze Age structure extant at Khirbet Kerak.
The name Bet Yerah has generally been accepted and applied to the site of Khirbet Kerak, though the evidence for its being located there is circumstantial. Established in the Hellenistic period (c. 4th century BCE), Bet Yerah ceased to exist with the end of that period (c. 1st century BCE). It was given the Greek name Philoteria by Ptolemy II Philadelphus
Ptolemy II Philadelphus
Ptolemy II Philadelphus was the king of Ptolemaic Egypt from 283 BCE to 246 BCE. He was the son of the founder of the Ptolemaic kingdom Ptolemy I Soter and Berenice, and was educated by Philitas of Cos...
for his sister, as indicated by remains dating to the Ptolemaic rule (3rd century BCE). Hellenistic remains identified as those of ancient Philoteria by Amihai Mazar
Amihai Mazar
Amihai "Ami" Mazar is an Israeli archaeologist. Born in Haifa, Israel , he is currently Professor at the Institute of Archaeology of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, holding the Eleazer Sukenik Chair in the Archaeology of Israel.Mazar has directed archaeological excavations at a number of...
consist of, "a considerable number of spacious town-houses built on an orthogonal plan within the confines of the Early Bronze Age
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a period characterized by the use of copper and its alloy bronze as the chief hard materials in the manufacture of some implements and weapons. Chronologically, it stands between the Stone Age and Iron Age...
fortifications. The total extent of the settlement was about 700 meters from north to south, and 200 meters from east to west. Ceramic and other finds of the 3rd-2nd centuries BCE were abundant in this settlement, and some houses had remains of decorated wall plaster." Four villas in Philoteria/Bet Yerah dating to the late Hellenistic period are the oldest known examples of the big mansion (domus), a type of domestic architecture seen in Roman-Byzantine period Palestine. One of them measures 22 x 12 metres and consists of 11 rooms decorated with marble, stucco, and mosaics that were accessed by way of a entrance to a colonnaded courtyard.
During the Roman period, a fortress was built there and the place became known and named for this feature. The Jerusalem Talmud
Jerusalem Talmud
The Jerusalem Talmud, talmud meaning "instruction", "learning", , is a collection of Rabbinic notes on the 2nd-century Mishnah which was compiled in the Land of Israel during the 4th-5th century. The voluminous text is also known as the Palestinian Talmud or Talmud de-Eretz Yisrael...
mentions Bet Yerah as sitting alongside Sinnabri (al-Sinnabra), describing both as walled cities, but also uses the name Kerakh to refer to Bet Yerah. Kerakh, meaning "fortress," was the Aramaic
Aramaic language
Aramaic is a group of languages belonging to the Afroasiatic language phylum. The name of the language is based on the name of Aram, an ancient region in central Syria. Within this family, Aramaic belongs to the Semitic family, and more specifically, is a part of the Northwest Semitic subfamily,...
name for the site in the Roman period, and it is from this name that the Arabic Khirbet al-Kerak ("ruins of the castle") is derived.
Al-Sinnabra
Al-Sinnabra or Sinn en-Nabra, as it is known in Arabic, was known in the Hellenistic times by the Greek name Sennabris. It was a twin city of Bet Yerah. In the Byzantine periodByzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...
, a church was constructed there and it shows signs of having been reused as a dar, or manor house, during the early Islamic period.
An Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
Islamic palatial complex or qasr in al-Sinnabra, known by the same name, served as a winter resort to Mu'awiya, Marwan I
Marwan I
Marwan ibn al-Hakam was the fourth Umayyad Caliph, who took over the dynasty after Muawiya II abdicated in 684. Marwan's ascension pointed to a shift in the lineage of the Umayyad dynasty from descendants of Abu Sufyan to those of Hakam, both of whom were grandsons of Umayya...
, and other caliphs in Umayyad
Umayyad
The Umayyad Caliphate was the second of the four major Arab caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. It was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty, whose name derives from Umayya ibn Abd Shams, the great-grandfather of the first Umayyad caliph. Although the Umayyad family originally came from the...
-era Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
(c. 650-704 AD). For decades, part of this complex was misidentified as a Byzantine era (c. 330-620 CE) synagogue
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
; excavations carried out in 2010 confirmed an architectural analysis made by Donald Whitcomb in 2002 suggesting the building to be the qasr of al-Sinnabra. Constructed in the 7th century by Mu'awiya and Abdel Malik, another Umayyad caliph who also commissioned the building of the Dome of the Rock
Dome of the Rock
The Dome of the Rock is a shrine located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. The structure has been refurbished many times since its initial completion in 691 CE at the order of Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik...
in the Old City of Jerusalem, it likely represents the earliest Umayyad complex of this type yet to be discovered.
During the Crusades
Crusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
, it was the site of the 1113 Battle of Al-Sannabra
Battle of Al-Sannabra
In the Battle of Al-Sannabra , a Crusader army led by King Baldwin I of Jerusalem was defeated by a Muslim army sent by the Sultan of the Seljuk Turks and commanded by Mawdud ibn Altuntash of Mosul.-Background:...
, and in the lead up to the Battle of Hittin in 1187, Saladin
Saladin
Ṣalāḥ ad-Dīn Yūsuf ibn Ayyūb , better known in the Western world as Saladin, was an Arabized Kurdish Muslim, who became the first Sultan of Egypt and Syria, and founded the Ayyubid dynasty. He led Muslim and Arab opposition to the Franks and other European Crusaders in the Levant...
and his forces passed through al-Sinnabra before moving on to command the roads around Kafr Sabt
Kafr Sabt
Kafr Sabt was a Palestinian Arab village of nearly 500 situated on a sloping plain in the eastern Lower Galilee located southwest of Tiberias.-History:While Palestine was part of the Roman Empire, Kafr Sabt was known as Kafar Shabtay...
.
Archaeology
The tell was first surveyed in the 1920s first by Eleazar Sukenik and then later by William Foxwell Albright.In 1933, Na'im Makhouly, a Christian Palestinian from Nazareth, who was an inspector for the Mandate Department of Antiquities at the time of the construction of the Samak-Tiberias highway that cut across the tell, conducted a salvage excavation.
During the 1940s, parts of the tell were excavated by Benjamin Mazar
Benjamin Mazar
Benjamin Mazar was a pioneering Israeli historian, recognized as the "dean" of biblical archaeologists. He shared the national passion for the archaeology of Israel that also attracts considerable international interest due to the region's biblical links...
, Michael Avi-Yonah, Moshe Sheteklis, and Emanuel Dunayevsky. In 1946, in the northern quadrant of the tell, a fortified compound consisting of a series of large structures, including a bathhouse adjoined to large apsidal hall that is decorated with colorful mosaics, was discovered just above the granary (AKA the Circles Building), an Early Bronze Age structure uncovered in previous excavations.
Between 1950 and 1953,
P.L.O. Guy and Pesach Bar-Adon, two Israeli archaeologists
Archaeology of Israel
The archaeology of Israel is the study of the archaeology of Israel, stretching from prehistory through three millennia of documented history. The ancient Land of Israel was a geographical bridge between the political and cultural centers of Mesopotamia and Egypt...
excavated the compound, falsely identifying a building there as a 5th-6th century Palestinian synagogue, because of the presence of a column base engraved with a seven-branched candelabrum.
Excavations by the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago in 1960 uncovered a Byzantine church to the north of the fortified compound.
In 1976, Ruth Amiran
Ruth Amiran
Ruth Amiran was an Israeli archaeologist. Her book, Ancient Pottery of the Holy Land: From Its Beginnings in the Neolithic Period to the End of the Iron Age became a bible-like work in the academic field of archaeology quite soon after it was published in 1970, and remains a basic reference for...
conducted a salvage excavation on the tell. More salvage excavations were carried out by Nimrod Getzov in 1994 and 1995.
In the summer of 2003, excavations were renewed in the northern part of the site with a pilot excavation in the granary. Excavations undertaken by Israeli archaeologists headed by Raphael Greenberg from Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University is a public university located in Ramat Aviv, Tel Aviv, Israel. With nearly 30,000 students, TAU is Israel's largest university.-History:...
's Institute of Archaeology in 2010 confirmed that the fortified compound was in fact the Arab Islamic palatial complex of al-Sinnabra.