Abstract
AN exhibition of the material discovered by the Wellcome Archæological Research Expedition to the Near East in the second season's excavation at Tell Duweir, 25 miles south-west of Jerusalem, under the direction of Mr. J. L. Starkey, will be held at the rooms of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 2 Hinde St., W.I, on July 2–21. The work of the Expedition during the past season has now established the extent of the Early Copper Age site as covering at least 150 acres. It includes the remains of a large dolmen. The upper terrace of a limestone ridge flanking the Tell across the western valley was found to be honeycombed with caverns which had been artificially enlarged and adapted as dwellings in the Early Copper Age, and re-used at a later date as burial places. Metal here occurred rarely, but unique for this early period was a heavy gold bead, contemporary with proto-early dynastic age in Egypt. Rough castings from moulds were found on the surface. Pottery was hand-made; and small pottery bowls showing a sharp impress afforded evidence of textiles. A large necropolis lower down the side of the ridge yielded contracted burials in small oval chamber-tombs with a shallow shaft. In these were daggers or darts, food vessels, etc. This cemetery is equated with the Egyptian Old Kingdom. At the north-west corner of the Tell, the Hyksos fosse and revetment were uncovered; and the later system of defence was traced in its entirety. The Persian residency superimposed on the Jewish palace-fort destroyed in the sixth century B.C. was cleared.
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Excavations at Tell el Duweir, 1933–34. Nature 133, 975–976 (1934). https://doi.org/10.1038/133975c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/133975c0