what does the tel dan inscription say and how do we know it?

What Does the Tel Dan Inscription Say and How Do We Know It?The Tel Dan Inscription: A Reappraisal and a New Interpretation by George AthasReview by: Walter E. AufrechtBulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 345 (Feb., 2007), pp. 63-70Published by: The American Schools of Oriental ResearchStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25066990 .

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Review Article_

What Does the Tel Dan Inscription Say and How Do We Know It?

Walter E. Aufrecht

Department of Geography University of Lethbridge Lethbridge, AB T1K 3M4

Canada

[email protected]

The Tel Dan Inscription: A Reappraisal and a New

Interpretation, by George Athas. Journal for the

Study of the Old Testament, Supplement Series

360; Copenhagen International Seminar 12. New York: Sheffield Academic Press, 2003. xii + 331 pp., 30 figures, 42 tables. Cloth. $165.00.

It has been remarked that archaeologists in North America developed archaeological theory out of

necessity because they have so few artifacts to talk about. And while this statement has a grain of truth to it, it must also be remarked that because archae

ologists of the ancient Near East have so many arti

facts, they often devote little reflection to what an

artifact is or how they determine what they think it is. Epistemology, or the theory of knowledge, has

generally not been a focus of concern for Near East

ern archaeologists. Yet, if we are to answer the ques

tion posed by the title of this essay, it would seem that some reflection on epistemology is necessary. The following, therefore, is an attempt to discuss

epistemology, not abstractly, though this might be a useful exercise, but by reference to the remarkable new book by George Athas, The Tel Dan Inscription: A Reappraisal and a New Interpretation.1

It is not true that discussions of epistemology are

entirely lacking in Near Eastern archaeology. An

important article on the subject was written in 1987

by Frederic Brandfon, entitled, "The Limits of Evi dence: Archaeology and Objectivity." In an era in

IrThis book is a slightly reworked version of his 1999 doctoral

dissertation submitted to the University of Sydney, Australia.

which there is great dispute over the objectivity of

archaeological evidence, Brandfon's essay ought to be required reading. In it, he calls attention to the

important discussion in North American (and other)

archaeology about artifact typology, what it is and what it means. Particularly, he deals with the notion of a "mental template." This idea, mentioned as early as 1939 by Rouse and articulated among others by Gifford (1960) and Deetz (1967) is that,

[pottery] types are manifestations of ceramic ideas,

ceramic images, held originally in the minds of hu

man beings (Gifford 1960: 346);

and

The idea of a proper form of an object exists in the mind of the maker, and when this idea is expressed in tangible form in raw material, an artifact results.

The idea is the mental template from which the

craftsman makes the object (Deetz 1967: 45).

This means that an artifact?for example, a pot?is made by the ancient potter with an "ideal type" in mind. The goal of the potter is to reproduce in clay the mental image of the "perfect" pot. To be sure, no potter will ever achieve "perfection," but that does not stop the potter from trying. Indeed, it is the drive to achieve perfection that characterizes all

great artistic endeavor. The same is true with regard to ancient inscriptions. The ancient engraver, the pro fessional scribe, learned an "ideal type" for each let

ter, a type which he (less likely, she) committed to

memory at some point. The technique is illustrated

by reference to the average grade-school classroom

63



64 WALTER E. AUFRECHT BASOR 345

in North America. Above the writing board, there is a frieze listing the letters of the alphabet in both

printed and cursive forms, thus: K&Q,*,, Bb??/?, etc. The template is above the board, but unfortunately remains there, seldom entering the mind of the mod ern student. Thus, handwriting has devolved in North America. But in the ancient world, the template went into the mind of the student, where it became the par

adigm or model for all future writing, or he didn't become a scribe. The job of the archaeologist (or epigrapher) is to grasp and understand the ideal

"type" imagined by the ancient artisan (be it pot or

letter-form).2 This is very difficult and can never be

fully accomplished. In some cases it will be impos sible. But that is the goal. It is easier for archaeolo

gists to establish "ideal" types of pots than it is for

epigraphers to establish "ideal" types of letter-forms, because there are more data with which to work, but the job for both is essentially the same: put oneself, as much as possible, in the mind of the ancient potter or scribe.

As Willey and Sabloff have observed, nearly all

archaeologists "conceived types as models that once

existed in the minds of the makers and users of the

objects concerned" (1980: 143), but archaeologists tend to disagree on how one best understands cul tural change. In other words, how do types "evolve" or change? On this subject, students of the ancient Near East can avail themselves of another discus sion which ought to be required reading, the paper

by Frank Moore Cross entitled, "Alphabets and Pots: Reflections on Typological Method in the Dat

ing of Human Artifacts" (1982; 2003). Cross's two

part dictum is that (1) all human artifacts (whether they are pots or scripts or languages) are amenable to typological study (1982: 123), and (2) human ar tifacts of a given category or class change (develop, evolve, devolve) over time (1982: 124).3

2Often, the alphabet is not fully considered in discussions of

the creation of human culture, though of course, it is no less an

artifact than a stone scraper, potsherd, or grain silo (see Aufrecht

1997). 3There are some, no doubt, who have neither an eye nor mem

ory for form and cannot understand or grasp these notions of ty

pology and typological change. They are best directed to fields

of inquiry that are neither-archaeological nor historical. To put the

matter starkly: the work of any scholar who can see typological or

evolutionary change in a language, in art, or in history itself, but

which denies it as a basis for understanding alphabet scripts, pot

tery, or stratigraphy, is dishonest.

The Tel Dan Inscription is a good test case to il lustrate these more general remarks on epistemology.

Actually, the Tel Dan Inscription is three fragments of a shattered basalt stela that were found in Tel Dan, Israel, in 1993 and 1994, during the Hebrew Union

College excavations under the direction of Avraham

Biran, who had been excavating at the site more or

less continuously since 1966. (Full disclosure: I shall forever be grateful to Avraham Biran for the privi lege of working at Tel Dan for several seasons in the 1980s, and to him and his wonderful staff for their many kindnesses to me.) Less than a decade after the editiones principes of the inscriptions (Bi ran and Naveh 1993a; 1993b; 1995a; 1995b), over 200 articles discussing the inscription(s) have been

published. These articles may be divided roughly into two groups. First, there are those that deal with various epigraphic, linguistic, or historical features of the inscription as a means of understanding the

inscription as a whole. These articles are in the mi

nority. Second, there are articles that deal with individual aspects of the inscription, the vast major ity of which focus on only six letters of the fifth line from the bottom of the largest fragment: bytdwd. There is no disagreement about the reading of these six letters. Rather, what disagreement there is (indeed, it's more than a disagreement, it's a full-blown con

troversy) is about the translation and meaning of these letters. It is important, therefore, to recognize that the book under review is the first comprehen sive, systematic, and complete treatment of the Tel Dan Inscription as a whole.

Athas begins his book with a discussion of the

archaeological context of the fragments (pp. 5-17). He observes (p. 5) that when the fragments were first

published, the exact nature of the archaeological context for each was only partially known, and this

partial knowledge led to erroneous conclusions on the date of the fragments by early interpreters. Based on all the archaeological evidence available to him, Athas concludes that all three fragments were broken at the same time and can be dated archaeologically to the early eighth century b.c. (pp. 16-17).

He then turns to an epigraphical analysis of the

fragments (pp. 18-93). He describes in detail the

physical characteristics and the state of preservation of each. What is especially important about this book is that Athas has studied the actual inscriptions. This

may seem like a banal comment, but it is not. In fact, he points out?correctly?that until his publication,



2007 THE TEL DAN INSCRIPTION 65

there had been no full-scale epigraphical study of the fragments.4 The results of his analysis are pre sented with superb photographs and drawings. He is

able, through detailed descriptive work, to establish the direction of carving and establish where the en

graver was positioned in relation to the stone when he carved the inscription. "Knowing this piece of information will allow us to compare the mode and

method of engraving on the fragments and so aid us in determining whether a relationship exists" among the fragments (p. 24). He concludes that the engraver was positioned to the left of the inscription (p. 25), that the inscription was written and engraved prior to

being placed in is final display position (p. 26), and that the engraver likely worked from a chalk outline and need not have been literate at all (p. 26)! An

analysis of the slope of each textual line (pp. 27-30) supports these conclusions. Each line of the text is described and analyzed in exquisite detail, using the best available photographic techniques. Thus,

regarding the bet in line 2, he writes (p. 50):

One curious point about this particular letter is that

the spine of the figure does not quite meet the diag onal stroke of the "head" at the topmost point. The

outermost contours of the strokes meet, giving the

impression from a distance that the bottom of the

incision channels also meet. However, two deeply chiseled points are clearly visible at the top of each

respective stroke, showing that the bed of the inci

sions did not meet. This highlights the fact that, at the time and place in which the inscription was

carved, the letter beth was clearly written with a

pointed, rather than rounded, head?an important

epigraphical datum.

This letter-by-letter, line-by-line analysis is con

ducted for each of the fragments. Anyone who wishes to reject Athas's readings will have to refute the grounds on which they rest. This will be nearly impossible. Even where he is speculative (which he

acknowledges), as in his remarkable use of an elec

tronically altered image of a lamed in the letter

sequence ciby of line 4 (p. 57), he demonstrates

beyond any reasonable doubt that there is a very real epigraphical connection between the fragments.

4 Athas is not the only scholar, however, who has examined the

inscriptions first-hand and published the results. In addition to the

original editors, see Schniedewind 1996 and Schniedewind and

Zuckerman 2001.

Where necessary, he makes use of previous epigraph ical treatments of the inscription by other scholars,

accepting some, rejecting others. However, he re

futes, debunks, and otherwise dismisses treatments not based on direct observation of the stone, espe cially the views of the late Frederick Cryer (pp. 70

72) which cannot "be maintained with any sense of

sobriety" (p. 71): "the accusation of forgery against the Tel Dan fragments is groundless and should be

summarily dismissed" (p. 72). Athas's palaeographical analysis (pp. 95-174) is

even more stunning than his epigraphical analysis. Every letter is presented in an individual table which includes a photograph of each letter, the location of each letter in the fragments, and the word in which the letter occurs. Thus, in table 4:1 (pp. 97-98), we learn that yaleph occurs in Fragment A (the largest fragment) 13 times, and we see what each occurrence looks like. Table 4:2 (p. 100) gives the seven occur rences of bet in Fragment A, and so on through the

alphabet. This is repeated for Fragments B and C.

Following each table is a thorough discussion of the palaeography of the letter, drawing for com

parison not only on every major Aramaic inscrip tion, but where relevant, on other lapidary Northwest Semitic inscriptions in Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew,

Moabite, and Ammonite. Here is part of what he says about the palaeography of the bet (p. 101).

The beths [sic] of Northwest Semitic inscriptions may be put into two classes according to the form of

the letter's tail. The first form [the bets of Fragment

A] has a stem which curves neatly and uniformly into a tail without any sign of a vertex between the

stem and tail. The second type, though, does display a vertex so that a finite point can be assigned to

where the stem ends and the tail begins. The tail of

this second type also displays little to no curvature.

This second type is the more common among mon

umental lapidary inscriptions. Examples of it can be

found at Tell Fakhariyah, in the Mesha Stele and Panammu I.

He then proceeds to date these two forms of bet in the variety of inscriptions. But that is not all he has to say about the palaeography of the bet. He dis cusses the overall slant of the letter (p. 102) which

distinguishes it from Phoenician inscriptions. And this is all descriptive work, which can be checked and verified by anyone so inclined. In other words, his "experiment" in palaeography can be repeated and even refined should new inscriptions come to




light in an archaeological context, or new descriptive and analytical techniques be developed.

Epistemologically, he is on solid ground. In pass ing, I note one other extraordinary comment on the bet that made me sit up and take notice (p. 101): "Nevertheless, we must advise caution. It must be

remembered that we are dealing with only di frag ment of an inscription, not a whole inscription. As

such, what may appear to be a universal trend in a

fragment might not necessarily be a universal trend in a whole inscription." This could have been penned only by a fine scholar and a palaeographer who knows what he is doing. Letter by letter, through the whole

alphabet, this same careful description and analysis is presented. His conclusion for Fragment A is mod est and rests only on what the palaeographical data will support (pp. 135-36): Fragment A "should be dated on palaeographic [emphasis added] grounds to c. 800 BCE, with a margin of two decades either side of that date" (p. 136). Fragments B-C are subjected to the same treatment with similar results (pp. 137?

65). A comparison of the two sets of palaeographical analyses results in the following statement (p. 165):

We may thus talk of the fragments in the context of

one inscription, which we will henceforth term, the

Tel Dan Inscription. My palaeographical analysis also confirms the veracity of the date for the frag

ments yielded in our examination of the archaeo

logical context. As such, we may legitimately claim

that the Tel Dan Inscription was written at some

time close to 800 bce.

We are now halfway through the book! The next

chapter (pp. 174-91) deals with the arrangements of the fragments. The two smaller fragments (B and C) can be joined, an issue (as far as I know) with which there is no reasonable disagreement. The crucial is sue is the relationship of Fragment A to the joined Fragment B-C. Prior to Athas's work, I believed, like many others, that the fragments could be made to fit together. Athas has convinced me otherwise.

Indeed, he has demonstrated, simply and elegantly, that there is no physical join between the A and B C fragments. He does this on physical (no interlock

ing fit), epigraphical, palaeographical, textual, and

orthographical grounds. The consequences of this brief chapter are enormous. If he is correct (and there is an extremely high degree of probability that he

is), all previous restorations of the text and interpre tations based on them are void. There will be an out

cry from the "historians" who are squashed by the

weight of their elaborate (and fanciful) interpreta tions and reconstructions.5

The section on textual analysis (pp. 192-244) is followed by treatments of the language of the in

scription (surprise: it is Old Aramaic, pp. 245-46), its grammar (e.g., qoph, represents the phonemes q and d, pp. 246-52), and a glossary (pp. 252-54). Grammarians and linguists will appreciate these last

three, at least because they will not find themselves in the same (supine) position as the "historians."

Again the focus is on description, and the discussion contributes to our knowledge of the language and

grammar of the inscription. Appreciation of the textual analysis is another

matter. Generally, I found Athas's textual analysis to be judicious, controlled, consistent, sophisticated, and

really interesting. Many people will hate it. I liked it. Of course, like anyone else, I can find things to crit icize: e.g., line Al is taken to be direct speech "you

will rule ov[er]" (p. 195), but there is no other sec

ond person form in the inscription, so the suggestion, though plausible, to my mind is only possible, not

probable. Picky criticisms aside, however, I think the textual analysis is a clever, perhaps even brilliant, bit of reasoning. And that brings us to the heart of the matter, what the readers of this journal want to

know, "what about the sequence of letters bytdwdV Well, after reviewing all of the previous suggestions (which Athas takes far more seriously than would I), he argues for and demonstrates the probability that the phrase bytdwd "should be regarded as a toponym and not a reference to a Davidic dynasty" (p. 226). It is a geographical designation. (Cue howling from the "historians.") This notion is fully explained in the next chapter, the historical commentary (pp. 254-315).6

Here it is in a nutshell. Bar Hadad II of Aram Damascus "is the only real candidate for the author

5Athas's own positioning of the fragments (which is wildly

speculative) locating Fragment A far above Fragments B-C (pp.

189-91) does not contribute anything to our knowledge of the in

scription and is no doubt present because someone on his doctoral

committee insisted that it be there. It should have been omitted

from the book. Its presence, however, does not mitigate against his

demonstration that Fragments A and B-C cannot be joined. 6Reader alert: If only the historical commentary (chapter 7) is

read without understanding, really understanding, the content of

the previous six chapters, the historical reconstruction will make

no sense. Reader fun: Keep an eye open for reviewers who have

not read the whole book and discuss only what is in the historical

commentary.




of the Tel Dan Inscription" (p. 265). His predecessor was Hazael (p. 268). The king of Israel was Jehoash

(pp. 268-71). "... the toponym 'Bayt-Dawid (TniTO) as used in the Tel Dan Inscription, is the equivalent of the biblical 'City of David (TH m?)" (p. 280), and Joash is the king referred to (p. 281). Finally, based on synchronisms with historical texts (includ

ing the Bible), the production of the stela is dated between ca. 796 and ca. 791 b.c. (p. 296).

The suggestion that bytdwd is a toponym rests on the following: the noun c?r ('city' as in the He brew (?r daw?d, i.e., Jerusalem) is unattested in Old Aramaic. It is likely that the writer used the Old Aramaic word bayt to render the Hebrew cir of (?r daw?d.1 Furthermore, the interchange of c?r and bet "is certainly not unheard of": Athas cites Josh.

19:41, where the town of Beth Shemesh is referred to as c?r sms (p. 280). So the inscription is talking about a place which the Aramaic author knew as the

"city of David."8 I think this is a brilliant notion,

though I confess it took me two close readings of Athas's sometimes dense exposition to convince me.

Athas argues further that the author of the inscrip tion (Bar Hadad II ) thought that bytdwd was a city state, exactly like the one over which he reigned, one of the city-states that we call Aram (pp. 217-26).9 Bar-Hadad could not do otherwise: that was his model for a "state." So far, we are still on good epis temological grounds. The great leap in all of this is

that, if we think the author of the Tel Dan Inscrip tion really meant this and that he has correctly char acterized bytdwd, we must also be led to understand that the Jerusalem of ca. 800 b.c. was really a city

state, a notion that rests, in part, on the archaeologi cal record (pp. 278-81). Athas's view is that (pp. 278-79).

Should "historians" be upset that Jerusalem is por

trayed by Athas in this way, they need to explain the

following: how could the Hebrew-speaking peoples

7Athas speculates on why the writer didn't choose another

Aramaic word for "city" such as qryh, but speculation as to why

something is not there is ultimately useless and so he does not

spend much time pursuing that question. 8 Athas notes that the Hebrew name might have old historical

antecedents (p. 280): "It appears . . . that the name ciY dwd ('City of David') is associated with references to the early stages of

Jerusalem?namely the period before the end of the eighth cen

tury BCE."

9There was no such thing as Aram, but a collection of small,

occasionally and intermittently powerful, Aramaean city-states (Dion 1997; Lipi?ski 2000; Dion 2002). This, as far as I know, bothers no one.

have created a "state" which was different in struc ture from the state-structures of the other peoples of the Iron Age Levant? I, for one, would like to have it explained how it could even be known by us.10 In other words, no matter how "different" from other

peoples the ancient Hebrew-speaking peoples might have been in one particular or another, in the first in

stance, our knowledge of them must be based on their similarities with the rest of the world in which they lived, not their differences. The burden of proof rests

with those "historians" who want to exempt the an cient Hebrew-speaking peoples from sharing cultural

phenomena with the world roundabout them, not least of which is the phenomenon of the "city-state."

Hint: They will not receive much help from archae

ologists (Aufrecht, Mirau, and Gauley 1997).11 As far as I am concerned, Athas has solved the crucial and most contentious issue in the debate over the Tel Dan Inscription, the meaning of the letter-sequence bytdwd. And he has done it, by and large, on sound

epistemological grounds. By now, readers must have noticed that I really

liked this book. I would give a false impression of

my reaction to it, however, if I did not point out what I think are its weaknesses.

1. The price is truly outrageous. The people for whom this book is essential, graduate students in archaeology and in epigraphy/palaeography, will not be able to afford it without going hun

gry (though I am informed that a paperback edition will be significantly cheaper).

2. There are some typographical errors. P. 39, line 31: "IWn" should read, "IWH" P. 85, lines 26: "a ." should read, "a hehr P. 85, line 35: "the ." should read, "the hehr P. 90, line 32: "a ." should read, "a hehr P. 91, line 9: "Following the is" should read,

"Following the heh is" P. 100, n. 21: "This is not included" should

read, "This does not include" P. 194, line 8: "?[" should read "?]" P. 206, line 13: "3DUn" should read, "3DW"

3. There is a lot of dissertation "baggage" which should have been jettisoned. What might make

10 As Cross pointed out in his remarks on typology (1982: 128; 2003: 347), "radical innovation, in discontinuity with the past, if it

could take place, would produce the unrecognizable or unintelligi ble or unacceptable?and drop out of the typological sequence."

11 For the most recent and without doubt the best treatment of

the "state" in Western antiquity, see Routledge 2004.




this a good dissertation does not contribute to its quality as a book: the repetition and rehash

ing of previously established points, the dis cussion of obscure avenues which lead to dead ends but are treated as if they are important (and could be disposed of in a footnote), and the full discussion of even the palaeographic details when they are unnecessary.12 Why make the nonspecialist pay for and suffer though what amounts to a dissertation exercise?

4. The linguistic analysis should have been longer, with more attention paid to the scholarly de bate on the syntax and verbal forms and more

comparison with other lapidary Northwest Semitic inscriptions (both Aramaic and non

Aramaic). This would have rendered reference to other linguistic and grammatical studies less

necessary (but see now Athas 2006). 5. The palaeographical analysis would have been

clearer and more authoritative with compara

tive script charts.

6. The book presents no model of bibliographical completeness.

Here are the strengths of the book.

1. There is no analysis of the basalt, the patina or

non-patina, the dust in the letters, and the ma

terials used to clean the fragments. 2 There are no arguments based on or defended

by statistics. 3. It demonstrates clearly and decisively the im

portance and use of epigraphy and palaeogra phy. These are only two of the many tools in a historian's tool kit, with their own limitations to be sure, but their importance can be over

looked or dismissed only by crackpots. Epi graphical theory and practice has undergone a bit of a revolution recently, and the result is

12This last is best illustrated by Athas's discussion of the

lamed (pp. 153-54): a little more than a page of (excellent) com

parison, the conclusion of which is that the lamed is diagnostically

insignificant for this inscription. He could have just said that and

referred the reader to his summary (p. 167) for verification. To be

sure, palaeographers will love this discussion (I did) because they

(we) are interested in the history of the lamed; but palaeographers have their own script charts and will check out his treatment in

any case (I did). The lamed in the cursive series is another matter.

"Although it is normally argued that the lamed is of negligible use

in Phoenician, Aramaic, and Ammonite paleography, it is readily

apparent that the Old Hebrew lamed can be of some value for the

purposes of paleography" (Rollston forthcoming a).

that epigraphers have learned to be more care ful and better informed. Indeed, it is an ex

citing time to be an epigrapher, and there are new currents in Northwest Semitic epigraphy, which collectively I have begun to call the "New Epigraphy."13 In my judgment, Athas's work should be assigned to that category.

4. It is so elegantly written and presented that even the "boring" parts are readable. This is re

markable for a book, let alone a dissertation. 5. The method used is transparent, consistent, and

unambiguous. I suppose I should have put this

first, since it is, arguably, the most important feature of the book. The method proceeds from the known to the less well known in a straight line. Athas is candid about what he is doing,

why he is doing it, and how he is doing it. 6. It makes a significant contribution to knowl

edge. It is not the last word on the Tel Dan In

scription. Rather, in a sense, it is the second

(after the editiones principes). Its comprehen siveness and thoroughness make it now the

place to begin to understand the Tel Dan In

scription. There are many details in the book that can, should, and will be debated and cor

rected.14 Many of Athas's ideas may be modi fied or eliminated in the course of the debate. But at least from now on, the debate will rest on a common and solid foundation.

7. It demonstrates superlatively well the notions that typology is essential to the archaeological enterprise and that ancient writers (as well as

pottery makers) worked from a "mental tem

plate." This book takes seriously the notion that the ancient author intended to say something to the people of his time, and the first obligation of the modern scholar is to understand exactly what that was, insofar as possible. Among those who will not or cannot do this, or think it

irrelevant, are the "historians" I have men

tioned. By and large, they come in two colors: those who bend the Tel Dan Inscription to their

13 For articles that exhibit these new currents, see especially Rollston 2003; 2004a; 2004b; forthcoming a; forthcoming b; Zuckerman and Dodd 2003, and the essays in Hackett and Au

frecht forthcoming. 14I confess that I have my own list of picky criticisms which

might find their way into an article; but they are very technical in

nature, and as such, are inappropriate for a review for a general audience.




understanding of the Bible and those who reject the Tel Dan Inscription on the basis of their un

derstanding of the Bible. I say, a pox on all their b?ths.

So, what does the Tel Dan Inscription say and how do we know it? We know what it says because we can read it. And we can" understand and interpret what we read because we have the methods, tools,

ability, and will to do so.15

151 am indebted to Professors Jo Ann Hackett and Kevin M.

McGeough and to Mr. Patrick D. Sisk for their close readings of

the text of this essay and suggestions that have improved it. Alas, I alone am responsible for anything wrong with the essay.

POSTSCRIPT

Prior to the completion of this review, articles that refer to this book or reviews of it were brought to my attention. I purposefully did not read them. They are

Becking 2003; Schniedewind 2003; Healey 2004; Na'aman 2004; Hess 2005; and Sasson 2005.1 have read them now. The discerning reader will recognize points of disagreement among us. There is also a vast discussion of the Tel Dan Inscription on the World

Wide Web. That discussion should be taken cum

grano salis. Two important articles came to my at

tention after this essay was typeset: Athas 2006 and Pardee 2006.

REFERENCES

Athas, G.

2006 Setting the Record Straight: What Are We

Making of the Tel Dan Inscription? Journal of Semitic Studies 51: 241-55.

Aufrecht, W. E.

1997 Urbanization and Northwest Semitic Inscrip tions of the Late Bronze and Iron Ages. Pp. 116-29 in Urbanism in Antiquity: From Meso

potamia to Crete, eds. W. E. Aufrecht, N. A.

Mirau, and S. W. Gauley. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series 244. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic.

Aufrecht, W. E.; Mirau, N. A.; and Gauley, S. W., eds.

1997 Urbanism in Antiquity: From Mesopotamia to Crete. Journal for the Study of the Old Tes

tament Supplement Series 244. Sheffield: Academic.

Becking, B.

2003 Does the Stele from Tel Dan Refer to a Deity Bethel? Biblische Notizen 118: 19-23.

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what does the tel dan inscription say and how do we know it?

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