jan 1, 1017 BC - Moat in Jerusalum

Description:

The Moat of Ancient Jerusalem
A monumental discovery reshapes our understanding of ancient Jerusalem.
By Brent Nagtegaal


In the last few years, the excavation team from Tel Aviv University and the Israel Antiquities Authority have unearthed a man-made gorge in the bedrock. At 35 meters (115 feet) wide and 6 to 9 meters (20 to 30 feet) high, the cut section is massive. (A full description of the moat was published in the Tel Aviv University Journal in an article titled “An Early Iron Age Moat in Jerusalem Between the Ophel and the Southeastern Ridge/City of David.”)

Archaeologists have excavated the western slope of the ridge and have exposed a large cross section of the moat. While a road and residences prevent further excavation east, previous small-scale excavations conducted near the center of the ridge by Kathleen Kenyon in the 1960s and Rina Avner in 2003 revealed lower-than-expected bedrock heights. The Givati team, by combining their findings with those of Kenyon and Avner, concluded that the moat almost certainly continues across the entire width of the ridge. The excavators also believe the moat was man-made, and not a natural feature.

This is a major discovery: It means that the original City of David was at one time separated from the Ophel and Mount Moriah by a gigantic trench.

When was the moat built?

We don’t know exactly, and it is almost impossible to determine (at least for now). We can, however, identify the latest possible time that the moat was built.


Prof. Yuval Gadot and Dr. Yitfah Shalev stand inside the moat (Looking North East)
courtesy of the Givati Parking Lot Expedition and the City of David Archive
The southern bedrock wall of the moat is extremely steep (it’s the deepest part of the entire feature). The gradient of the wall is so steep archaeologists believe it had to be carved (formations like this are not known to occur naturally in the Meleke rock formations in Jerusalem).

The northern slope of the moat isn’t nearly as steep. It also descends in two steps. As part of the step-down, excavators uncovered curious bedrock grooves running north-south in the same direction as the moat.

Archaeologists excavated inside three grooves and observed a thin whitish surface made of crushed limestone. Under this surface they found a stratified fill with pottery types indicative of the early Iron iia period (10th century b.c.e.) through to perhaps the Iron iia-b transition, or the late ninth century. After studying this and other stratigraphic data, the excavators concluded: “It may be safely determined that the cutting of the ditch occurred no later than the late Iron iia.” According to them, this would be the late ninth century—about 100 years after the death of King Solomon.

Note, this is the latest possible date of construction. It is probable, as the Givati team believes, that the moat was constructed long before the late ninth century b.c.e.

It needs to be considered alongside the archaeological discoveries from this same period in the areas directly northeast and southeast of the ditch, both of which were excavated by the late Dr. Eilat Mazar of Hebrew University.

First, as the Givati report notes, there’s the “monumental complex” discovered on the Ophel over the past 15 years, which includes what Dr. Mazar believed to be a 10th-century city wall. Although they take the view that some of the large buildings on the Ophel can possibly be dated a little later than Iron iia, they note the early Iron iia dating of the “massive constructional fill” that supported a large Ophel structure.

Second, there are the Iron iia remains discovered immediately southeast of the trench, in the northernmost part of the City of David. The most important feature in this area is the Stepped Stone Structure, situated about 15 meters (50 feet) south of the proposed eastern side of the moat. Measuring over 20 meters (66 feet) tall, the Stepped Stone Structure is by far the largest man-made feature from the Iron Age ever discovered in Israel.

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