Researchers from Tel Aviv University (TAU) and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have identified a new type of early human group at the Nesher Ramla excavation site, dated to 140,000 to 120,000 years ago. According to the researchers, the morphology of the Nesher Ramla group shares features with both Neanderthals (especially the teeth and jaws)… Read More
“King Solomon made for himself the carriage; he made it of wood from Lebanon. Its posts he made of silver, its base of gold. Its seat was upholstered with purple, its interior inlaid with love.” (Song of Songs 3:9-10) For the first time, rare evidence has been found of fabric dyed with royal purple dating… Read More
A new study by Tel Aviv University and the Israel Antiquities Authority indicates that a workshop for smelting copper ore once operated in the Neveh Noy neighborhood of Beer Sheva, the capital of the Negev Desert. The study, conducted over several years, began in 2017 in Beer Sheva when the workshop was first uncovered during… Read More
Researchers at Tel Aviv University (TAU) have analyzed 18 ancient texts dating back to around 600 BCE from the Tel Arad military post using state-of-the-art image processing, machine learning technologies, and the expertise of a senior handwriting examiner. They have concluded that the texts were written by no fewer than 12 authors, suggesting that many… Read More
The sprawling 11,500-year-old stone Göbekli Tepe complex in southeastern Anatolia, Turkey, is the earliest known temple in human history and one of the most important discoveries of Neolithic research. Researchers at Tel Aviv University and the Israel Antiquities Authority have now used architectural analysis to discover that geometry informed the layout of Göbekli Tepe’s impressive… Read More
For thousands of years, indigenous hunting societies have subsisted on specific animals for their survival. How have these hunter-gatherers been affected when these animals migrate or go extinct? To answer this and other questions, Tel Aviv University (TAU) researchers conducted a broad survey of several hunter-gatherer societies across history in a retrospective study published on… Read More
In 2012, a monumental Iron Age temple complex dating to the late 10th and early ninth centuries BCE was discovered at Tel Moẓa near Jerusalem by archaeologists of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). The site, identified as the biblical city of Moẓa, within the boundary of the tribe of Benjamin (Joshua 18:26), served as an… Read More
The ancient Samaria ostraca — eighth-century BCE ink-on-clay inscriptions unearthed at the beginning of the 20th century in Samaria, the capital of the biblical kingdom of Israel — are among the earliest collections of ancient Hebrew writings ever discovered. But despite a century of research, major aspects of the ostraca remain in dispute, including their… Read More