The Late Bronze Egyptian Garrison at Beth Shan: A Study of Levels VII and VIII, 2 vols.

AuthorMumford, G.D.

Between 1921 and 1933 the University Museum of the University of Pennsylvania conducted a series of excavations at the site of Beth Shun under the successive directorships of C. S. Fisher, A, Rowe, and G. M. FitzGerald. However, despite the excavators' publication of the results of their work in a series of preliminary reports and four volumes, various stratigraphic details and up to half of the excavated Late Bronze Age and Iron Age material culture assemblages from Beth Shan remained unpublished until 1966 (vol. 1, p. xxvii, see James 1966: xiv, 2-3). In that year F. W. James published a reappraisal of Iron Age levels VI-IV, and in 1973 E. D. Oren published the Early Bronze IV to Iron Age I tombs from the northern cemetery (Oren 1973). F. W. James died in 1983 prior to the completion of her reexamination and publication of the Late Bronze Age material culture from levels IX-VII at Beth Shan. Fortunately, her project has been continued by Patrick McGovern, who examined and published (McGovern 1985) much of the jewelry from Beth Shan (levels IX-VII) and other sites. The splendid pair of volumes under review represents the final publication, by James, McGovern, and thirteen other scholars, of virtually the entire excavated and/or recorded and collected material culture assemblage from the Late Bronze lib levels (VIII, VII, and Late VII) at Beth Shan.

Volume one is divided into eleven chapters and one appendix written either by individual authors (primarily E McGovern) or by a combination of scholars. The companion volume of plates contains numerous line-drawings and, to a lesser extent, photographs of almost the entire corpus of recorded and collected pottery vessels, small objects, and faunal material. However, the illustrations exclude "previously published scarabs . . ., stelae . . ., very close parallels. . . . and poorly illustrated and/or provenienced artefacts" (v. 1, p. xxix). Each figure is defined on the facing page by its registration number, provenience, type, material, surface treatment, number of examples (in particular for beads and pendants), and the present location or status of the item. In addition, the volume of plates also contains several technical graphs and dendrograms of small objects, pottery, and silicate vessel specimens, xeroradiographs of several ceramic vessels and objects, SEM (scanning electron microscopy) micrographs of glazes and pottery vessel interiors, optical photomicrographs of a few copper-based Objects, and a selection of various site photographs.

Chapter one (pp. 1-67) consists of a reanalysis of the stratigraphic framework of levels VIII, VII, and Late VII, based upon the original field records in the archives of the University Museum. The original field records included a "diary, architect's notebook and plans, object register, photographs and drawings, letters," and other sources (v. 1, p. 1). Unfortunately, only two general site plans of levels VIII and VII are illustrated in these volumes (maps 1 and 2), whereas a republication of the detailed plans of various areas such as the Migdol (Rowe 1929: 85) would have been very useful. Only a few minor changes were made to the original site plan for level VII, where several rebuildings of Late VII walls are indicated by hatching on map 1. McGovern has reexamined Rowe's original assignment of level VIII to "pre-Amenhotep III" and level VII to "Amenhotep III" and has reassigned them to the reigns of Ramesses I and/or Sety I and Ramesses II, respectively, basing these new dates on advances in the Palestinian pottery sequence and the monumental inscriptional evidence at Beth Shun (v. 1, p. 5; cf. Rowe 1940: ix).

The remainder of chapter one divides the site into eleven distinct areas,(1) with an introduction to the archaeological context for each area, followed by the component loci within each area of levels VIII, VII, and Late VII. Each of these loci is accompanied by a comprehensive list of all the pottery vessels, objects, and recorded faunal material found in each locus, with references to either an illustration or the current status of each item, whether "discarded," "disposition unknown," or "in Jerusalem" (Rockefeller Museum). McGovern and others examined firsthand and redrew where necessary all the material in the Beth Shun collections of the University Museum; however, much of the material in the Rockefeller Museum's collection from Beth Shan - with the exception of the scarabs,(2) beads, and pendants(3) - remains unexamined other than through the site records and illustrations in the University Museum. It should be noted that in several cases the use of photographs of objects in the Rockefeller Museum collection (v. 1, p. 227) has offset the absence of firsthand examination.

Chapter two...

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