A NOTE ON AN IRON AGE FOUR-HORNED ALTAR FROMTEL DOTHAN

S G, T K J K

In a recent visit to the site of Tel Dothan the top of a four-horned stone altar of Iron Age type was unexpectedlyobserved among the structural remains exposed by Joseph P. Free in Area L of his excavations of the late 1950s.Owing to the location of this find within a well-dated building complex (labelled ‘House 14 ’) it can be datedwith some certainty to the early Iron Age IIa, i.e. to the 9th century BCE. Dated four-horned stone altars from thisperiod from the northern Kingdom of Israel are extremely rare. ‘House 14 ’ was identified by the excavators as an‘administrative building,’ but we suggest it probably had a primary cultic function.

Keywords: Tel Dothan, four-horned altar, Iron Age IIa, 9th century BCE

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Tel Dothan (Arabic Tell Dôtha ̄) is situated in northern Samaria, south-west of Jenin. Themound covers an area of about dunams ( acres), and overlooks an extremely fertileplain (Fig. ). Its principal source of water is a spring situated at the bottom of the south-western slope.1 Extensive excavations were conducted at the site in nine seasons by JosephP. Free on behalf of Wheaton College, between and , revealing archaeologicalremains from different periods, and exposing more substantial architectural remains fromthe Early Bronze, Late Bronze, and Iron Ages. Preliminary reports on the archaeologicalwork were promptly published by Free (, , , , , , ; see alsoCooley and Pratico ); the first volume of the final report Dothan I appeared in (Master et al. ).

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The excavation team led by Free uncovered important remains of the Iron Age II settlement inAreas A and L, on the south and west side of the mound respectively (Fig. ).

Area A was excavated between and , revealing a long street or lane, with struc-tures and installations on either side, leading in a north-westerly direction towards a rectangu-lar courtyard fronting (on the north) a large rectangular building (of ‘four-room’ type). Adetailed description of these remains has been published by Master et al. (, –).Stacks of bricks were found lying on top of crushed pottery vessels on floors; these brickswere identified by Free as coming from kilns.2 Additional remains of houses were unearthednearby. The fortification wall from this period was not found, but presumably it ran alongthe southern side of the area (i.e. along the crest of the hill above Area D) and was washedaway at some point in antiquity. The finds and a radiocarbon date indicate that thisstratum was destroyed at the end of the th century BCE (Free ; Master et al. ,). Human burials were cut into the debris of these ruined structures in the late th toearly th centuries BCE.

Address correspondence to: Dr Shimon Gibson, University of the Holy Land, POB , Jerusalem , Israel,shimgib@gmail.com

Palestine Exploration Quarterly, , (), –

© Palestine Exploration Fund : ./Z.

Area L was excavated between and , revealing some fourteen houses with avariety of plans, seemingly grouped around a large open area and surrounded on its westby a fortification wall of casemate appearance (Master et al. , –; Fig. ). Only theexternal line of the casemate fortification (W) and a few of its internal perpendicularwalls were identified by the excavators. Master et al. (, ) wrote of the “scant evidencefor [this] second parallel wall.” Today, however, owing to frequent collapses and winterwashes, certain walls have appeared which may represent the missing inner line. Judgingby the extant remains the outer and inner walls have a thickness of m, with the spaceof the casemate in between reaching . m. On the western side of Area L are anumber of stone-lined silos which do not appear on Free’s plans and these may havebeen cleared by clandestine excavators. On the east side of Area L are some house variantsof ‘four-room’ type, notably ‘House .’ Nearby is a large stone-lined silo. To the north-west are a number of buildings which appear to have had industrial or agriculturalfunctions.

The main building uncovered on the southern side of this area was labelled ‘House ’; itwas identified by Free as an ‘administrative building’ in which taxes were collected in the formof wheat, olive oil, and other commodities (Free , –; , –; Master et al. , ).Hundreds of distinctive handless jars were found, a few of them with signs they had been usedto store grain and olives. A series of radiocarbon dates obtained at Geochron Laboratoriesfrom carbonised materials derived from the floor levels confirmed that the entire buildingwas overwhelmed by a massive destruction at the end of the th century BCE (Master et al., –, figs. .–.).

Fig. . Aerial view of Tel Dothan (photograph courtesy of Richard Cleave).

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. ‘ ’This specific building was uncovered in the season. It was a substantial building that wasunlike anything else excavated at Dothan dating from the Iron Age, with a range of smallrooms on the west and north surrounding a large open courtyard with built and stone-cobbledinstallations, a series of long chambers to the south, and a complex of rooms of different sizes tothe west (Fig. ).

More than years have elapsed since the excavations at Dothan were closed down, withthe result that many of the architectural features, previously exposed by Free in Area L, havebeen destroyed by natural elements or through neglect. Moreover, illegal excavations haveresulted in walls being pulled down, stone-cobbled floors being removed, and installationsbeing cleared. Clandestine digging has also taken place in previously unexcavated parts ofthe area with the result that certain features have come to light that were definitely not appar-ent to the original excavators, as for example the walls now visible on the west side of ‘House.’ Our reconstructed plan (Fig. ) differs from the published version (Master et al. , fig.), not in terms of the building’s general layout, which, as one can see, has stayed moreor less the same, but in terms of the details and additions, some of which are quite importantfor understanding the original function of this building complex, as we shall show. Hence, ourreconstructed plan of ‘House ’ is based on the examination of () wall foundations and pavedsurfaces, and collapsed features, seen during our cursory visits to the site;3 and, more impor-tantly, () Free’s photographs from the time of the excavations, depicting important details thatwere not always shown or perhaps were even deliberately left off his original surveyed plans.4

The building ‘House ’ was evidently pre-planned, with a range of small single roomssituated on the west (Rooms , , , and ) and north (Rooms a, b, , and ), opening on

Fig. . Map showing Iron Age II remains at Tel Dothan (Areas A and L) (a combined drawing based onMaster et al. , figs. ., . and .; courtesy of Daniel M. Master and Wheaton College).

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two sides of a large open courtyard. Rooms a, b, , and consist of small broad rooms.5

Rooms , , , and consist of small long rooms. The joint western wall of Rooms , , and (Wall ) clearly extended northwards in one continuous line and not as was depicted onFree’s plan of the building (compare this plan with the photographs of the wall in Masteret al. , figs. . and .). Room is an attached chamber with an entrance on theeast close to the doorway to Room . Two steps are visible and it is conceivable that thisroom served as the base for a flight of steps leading to a second storey or to roof level;perhaps during a later building phase the full flight of steps was dismantled. Free believedthis building originally had two or perhaps even three stories (Free , ), but additionalflights of steps were not found by the excavators in other parts of ‘House ,’ as far as onecan tell. The walls of the buildings were built of varying sizes of fieldstones, with well-dressedrectangular ashlars keyed in at corners and entrances, clearly to provide the building withgreater stability. Some of the walls of this building were thicker and more substantial,notably those on the north, west, and south sides.6 Floors within the rooms were plastered.The western wing of the building would have been accessed from the main courtyard viaRoom . Only Rooms and , and parts of Rooms and , were uncovered by the exca-vators. Some of the walls shown in the western wing of our reconstructed plan of ‘House ’ arevisible in Free’s photographs (e.g. fig. . in Master et al. ). Room seems to have had asunken ‘basement’ which may have been an installation connected to the stone-coveredchannel running southwards in Room between Walls and . An entrance to a cave isvisible in the room west of Room . Another cave entrance is visible in Room and it wasdepicted as a silo (perhaps incorrectly) on Free’s plan.

Fig. . Plan of Iron Age II remains found by Free in Area L (Master et al. , fig. .; courtesy ofDaniel M. Master and Wheaton College).

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A series of parallel chambers were uncovered by the excavators on the southern side of thebuilding (Rooms , , , and ). The excavators identified four chambers, but a carefulexamination of the original documentary evidence and the remains still visible, wouldsuggest that Room originally consisted of two chambers (Rooms a and b) separatedby Wall .7 Access to the principal chamber (Room ) was from the main courtyard ofthe building via Room . A substantial drainage channel (more than m in length) ranfrom the courtyard and extended through Rooms and , and outside of the building tothe south. The source of the drain we believe was from the rectangular platform on thesouthern side of the courtyard (see below). Access to Room , which had a cobbled floor,was made either from Room or directly from the main courtyard (Master et al. , fig..). Access to Room b, which also had a cobbled floor, was made via Room . Itwould appear that the two unpaved chambers (i.e. Rooms a and ) were accessed internallyfrom Rooms b and respectively. Various suggestions have been made by scholars regard-ing the general function of such chambers at other Iron Age II sites, as stables, storerooms,sleeping dormitories, etc. (Herzog , –; Cantrell , –).

Access to the main courtyard of ‘House ’ was from the east. It measured approximately. m from north to south, and . m from east to west, and it had a plastered surface. On thenorthern side of the courtyard are two built features that were added to the south side ofRooms and apparently during a later construction phase of ‘House ’ (Master et al., fig. .) (Fig. ). An installation made up of ashlars (. × . m; depth . m) wasattached to the southern end of the easternmost of these two features (Wall ), outside the

Fig. . A plan of ‘House ’ as found by Free in Area L (Master et al. , fig. .; courtesy of DanielM. Master and Wheaton College).

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doorway to Room (Fig. ). It was labelled as a ‘storage pit’ in one of Free’s original field plans(Fig. ). The collapsed debris of this installation, which includes a fragment of a stone basin, isvisible today; the horned altar stone (see below) was evidently one of the stones in secondary useoriginating from within this feature (Fig. ).

On the south side of the courtyard is an interesting low rectangular platform-like feature,with an area of stone cobbling curbed by retaining walls to its north (Wall ), east (Wall ), andsouth (Wall ) (Fig. ). One may suppose that a similar retaining wall existed on its westernside, i.e. running between Walls and , but it has not been preserved. The drainagechannel seen in Rooms and probably originated from the western side of this platform.The rectangular area may be estimated as measuring m from east to west, and . mfrom north to south (extending up to Wall ) or . m (up to Wall ). A gap seen inFree’s plan in Wall next to the east wall of Room (Wall ) would seem to indicate apassage extending to the south and giving access to a room (Room ), but the actual preser-vation of Wall today would not support this. The original dig photographs (Figs. and a)clearly indicate a large standing stone in situ approximately midway along the northern edge ofthe rectangular paved platform, with a fallen carved stone (perhaps originally another standingstone) further west. These stones are probably masseboth (Graesser ; Lewis , ). In thecentre of the rectangular platform is a built feature (a kerb) extending for a preserved length of. m from east to west (Wall ), and it served to retain a higher stone-cobbled elevated area to

Fig. . A reconstructed plan of ‘House ’ based on the original map by Free (Master et al. , fig..; courtesy of Daniel M. Master and Wheaton College), with additions based on Free’s photographs

from to , and on observations made by the authors at the site (drawing: S. Gibson).

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its south (. m in height). It probably originally had a length of m from east to west. In frontof this wall on the north is a step which does not appear on the published plan, but it is clearlyvisible in Free’s photographs. The retaining wall (kerb) was built with two courses of narrow

Fig. . ‘House ’ in a photograph taken between and , towards the west (from an originaltransparency of the Dothan expedition; courtesy of Daniel M. Master and Wheaton College).

Fig. . A plan showing the later features in Rooms and of ‘House ’ (Master et al. , fig. .;courtesy of Daniel M. Master and Wheaton College).

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stretchers and with one upper course of much thicker headers, clearly built this way to facilitatethe elevation of the higher platform to its south. Today, only a few stones of the lower course ofthis wall have been preserved. We suggest that this two-level rectangular platform had a culticfunction, probably serving as a bamah.

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The four-horned altar fragment was clearly not recognised for what it was at the time of Free’sexcavations in the area, which were closed in . Since then the site has seen many changeswith the collapse of walls and installations, and illegal excavations. The altar fragment was seenby us next to a tumble of stones which we believe may be identified as the collapse of Wall towards the east. This location matches well the position of the rectangular installation made oflarge smooth ashlars (labelled ‘storage pit’) that was seen by Free attached to the southern endof Wall and in front of the entrance to Room (Master et al. , fig. .) (Fig. ). Thisinstallation was constructed during a later phase of ‘House ’ and was attributed by Free tothe th century BCE at which time he believed renewed building activities took place in thearea, with the addition of new rooms (especially on the west side of the building), various struc-tural alterations, the raising of floors with the addition of stone-cobbling (such as in Room ),and the construction of stone-lined silos.

The date of the later phase of ‘House ’ is uncertain as Master et al. (, ) have madeclear. There are a number of possibilities: () that these structural changes reflect a later build-ing phase occurring within the original th century BCE building; () that these activities tookplace after the destruction of the building and belong to an early-to-mid th century BCE

Fig. . The altar within the courtyard of ‘House ,’ towards the north. Note the wall (W) behind andthe rubble pile of a wall (W) on the left (photograph: J. Kramer).

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partial rebuild or squatter’s phase; or () that these remains are contemporary with the scattersof late th to early th centuries BCE potsherds found in the surface fills of Area L. The thirdpossibility we think is unlikely because none of the potsherds were found in association with anyspecific built feature or installation. Moreover, human burials had been uncovered in Area Lattributed to the th to early th centuries BCE, and these were clearly intrusive to the earlierarchitecture (Master et al. , –). Hence, following Master et al. (, ) one shouldargue for ‘a continuous (but greatly diminished) occupation in this area’ during theearly-to-mid th century BCE. One of the features belonging to this late phase was undoubt-edly Wall with its ‘storage pit’ built of hewn stones in secondary use. We surmise that amongthese hewn stones was the altar fragment and that together with the other ashlars they weremost likely retrieved from the debris of the preceding ‘House ’ building that had beendestroyed in the late th century BCE.

The four-horned fragment clearly represents only the upper part of the altar: . × .m (Figs. –a, b). It was made of local limestone and has a total thickness at its centre of .m. We assume that its lower parts were built of ashlars in block form, and that its originalheight came to at least . m.8 Only one of its horns was in good condition (with a heightof . m from the top of the slab), two were badly preserved and one has been broken off.The shape of the best preserved horn resembles the shape of the horns on an altar from Build-ing at Megiddo (Ussishkin , , Pl.:C), and on the small altar from Dan (Biran). Flat-blade chisel marks were evident on the extant horn, on the rim of the stone, andon the underside. The top surface of the altar was roughly cut, without signs of hollowingor any kind of depression. Altars of this kind would have been used for the burning of

Fig. . The courtyard of ‘House ’ as it was uncovered in –, seen looking towards thesouth-east from Room (from an original transparency of the Dothan expedition; courtesy of Daniel

M. Master and Wheaton College.

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Fig. . A side-view of the altar from Tel Dothan (photograph: S. Gibson).

Fig. . A plan of the courtyard of ‘House ’ and its courtyard made by the Free expedition on May (courtesy of Daniel M. Master and Wheaton College).

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Fig. . A top-view of the altar from Tel Dothan (photograph: S. Gibson).

Fig. . (a) A drawing and side-views of the altar and (b) a suggested reconstruction (drawing:S. Gibson).

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incense, or possibly some other substance (Gitin , and n. ), but it is unlikely theywould have been used for sacrificing small animals or for holding burnt offerings (Fowler, ).

The altar from Dothan may now be added to the growing assemblage of altars knownfrom the Kingdoms of Israel, Judah, and Philistia. The subject has been dealt with extensivelyby Seymour Gitin in a number of studies (Gitin , , , ). Recently, an unusualplastered and horned altar was found at Ashkelon dated to c. BCE (Master and Aja ).A stone altar, but apparently with only two horns, dated to the late th century BCE, was foundat Tell es-Safi/Gath (Hitchcock and Maier , –, fig. ; Maeir, Hitchcock, and KolskaHorwitz , –, fig. ). The principal earlier horned altars known from the area of theKingdom of Israel (see Gitin ; idem , , for a comprehensive bibliography)include: fromMegiddo ( dated to the th century BCE; from the th/th century BCE; and from a pre-th century BCE context); from Dan (th/th century BCE); from Kedesh (th

/mid-th century BCE), and from Shechem (th/th century BCE).9

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The importance of the four-horned altar from Dothan is that it was found within a buildingcomplex (‘House ’) which we suggest had a very definite ceremonial cultic functionduring the latter part of the th century BCE. The focus of the building was undoubtedlythe large central courtyard, which had an elevated stone-cobbled platform to its south. Astep gave access from the level of the platform to a higher raised area (bamah) which was bor-dered by a kerb of ashlars. We follow here Vaughan’s definition of the bamah as ‘a constructedstone platform used for cultic rites’ (Vaughan , ; similarly this is defined as an ‘open cultarea’ in Haran, , ; cf. discussion in Fried ). Associated with the northern edge of thisplatform is a standing stone (massebah); this feature does not appear on the original plan of theexcavations, but it is extremely prominent in the photographs that were taken in the late s.The covered channel extending from the courtyard to the area outside the building may havebeen used for cleansing the sacrificial areas on the bamah. Although we lack clear evidence for awider cultic function for the rest of the building, the discovery of the four-horned altar frag-ment strengthens our suggestion that ‘House ’ had a religious rather than administrativefunction.10 Indeed, four-horned altars are usually taken to be clear indicators of sacredspace (Fried , ; Gitin , ). Not enough is known about th century BCE culticceremonial places in the Kingdom of Israel (Zwickel ; Elkowicz ; Mierse ; andsee the critical approach taken by Faust , ), but in general terms the Dothan religiousprecinct may be compared to the larger one known at Dan (Biran , –, figs. –).11 The building complex at Dothan was evidently destroyed in a major destruction inthe late th century BCE, which is not surprising, since, historically, Dothan played apivotal role in the Northern Kingdom’s wars with Aram-Damascus over trade routes, andthe site defended the northern gateway into the hilly country, as we learn from biblicalsources (e.g. Kgs : –).

The four-horned altar fragment was accidentally discovered during an excursion to the site by TitusKennedy and Joel Kramer in April . Notification of the find was made to Dr Hamdan Taha ofthe Palestine Department of Antiquities. We are grateful to Prof. Seymour Gitin for reading this manu-script and providing comments. We are also grateful to Dr Daniel M. Master for allowing us to reproduceoriginal photographs and plans, courtesy of the Dothan excavation archives located at Wheaton College.Additional thanks go to the PEQ’s anonymous reader for astute remarks regarding the chronology of the

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late phase architectural features of ‘House ,’ and to PEQ Editor, Prof. David Jacobson, and AssistantEditor, Dr Jonathan Stökl, for their valuable comments.

1 Today the spring has dried up, but circular built

shafts and other installations are still visible. A lot ofByzantine pottery is visible on the ploughed surfaces ofthe ground surrounding the area of the spring.2 One complete fired brick was visible during our visit

measuring . × . m, and . m thick. Anotherfragment was visible with an x-mark on its side. Itseems more likely that these bricks were used for thewalls of the upper storeys of the houses, as Master et al.(, –) have rightly pointed out.3 A properly organized survey should be made by

an archaeological team to record the new details ofthe building that were not visible to Free and hiscolleagues.4 We are grateful to Daniel M. Master for his

generosity in providing us with a set of original colourtransparencies made by Free in the area of ‘House .’They helped us enormously in making this newassessment of the courtyard of ‘House .’5 A wall is now visible separating Room into two

parts (a, b); it was evidently not seen by Free.6 This may explain the substantial robbing of the

northern wall of the building (as seen on the northernside of Rooms a, b, and ), which was clearly evidentat the time of the excavation (compare figs. . with. in Master et al. ), and the wall-robbing

activities that clearly took place on the western andsouthern sides of the building.7 Free’s plan would preclude the possibility of two

parallel chambers because the stone cobbling in thefloor of Room seemingly extends across the line ofthe possible southern extension of Wall . However,an examination of photographs taken at the time of theexcavations (given in Master et al. , figs. .,., and .) shows quite clearly that the southerncontinuation of Wall runs southwards with the stonecobbling of Room b abutting it from the east. Thepublished plan is therefore incorrect.8 It probably looked like a smaller version of the

Beersheba altar: Aharoni ().9 Another fragment of a horned-altar has been

observed by one of the authors (SG) in secondary usewithin the wall of a Byzantine church uncoveredrecently at Shiloh (Seilun).10 The unique jars (lacking handles) found in thisbuilding—hundreds of which were found—may havebeen manufactured specifically to hold offerings, morespecifically grain and olives as the excavators discovered.11 A cultic building with a four-horned altar wasuncovered at Kedesh (Stratum IV), but it is toofragmentary to be able to assess its layout: Stern andBeit Arieh (), figs. –.

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Herzog, Z., . ‘Administrative structures in the Iron Age’, in A. Kempinsky, and R. Reich (eds.), The Architecture ofAncient Israel: From the Prehistoric to the Persian Periods: In Memory of Immanuel (Munya) Dunayevsky, Jerusalem; IsraelExploration Society, –.

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