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Fig. 4. Map of the PrincetonUniversityExpedition. government shifted to Baghdad under the Abbasid Caliphs. Most visitors to Umm elJimal are surprised to learn that its ancient citizens were not Roman or Greek, but Arab. Numerous gravestones, although written in the Latin and Greek scripts, have given us acatalog of names of the inhabitants which indicates that the residents were local Arabic nomads who settled in this region and built Umm el-Jimal under the security provided by the Roman Empire - a process that has been repeated by their modern descendants under the security of the Jordanian government. Perhaps even more impressive than the building skill of these people was their excellent water

52

engineering. Because rainfall is minimal and sporadic in the region, it was necessary to collect and store every drop of winter rain to see the population of five to ten thousand people through the long dry season. A dam in the adjacent wadi provided irrigation water for the surrounding fields, while a groundlevel aqueduct many kilometers long collected the runoff from the sloping terrain to the north. A number of branch channels directed the water into large open pools throughout the city as well as to smaller roofed-over cisterns adjacent to nearly every house and public building. The supply thus created should have been ample for the people and their numerous domestic animals except

in a succession of extremely dry winters. Study of this ancient water system leads one to believe that similar systems could easily be designed and built to support the growing populations and increasing agriculture in the village settlements of Jordan's semi-desert regions today. The author began his work' in 1972 with an architectural survey that involved the mapping of the entire city, including its numerous buildings, defensive walls and water reservoirs (figs. 2 and 3). This survey was designed to complete and update the mapping done by the Princeton University Expedition directed by H. C. Butler in 1905 and 1909 (fig. 4; see Butler 1913).

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Fig. 5 The barracksviewed from the north. In July, 1974, the author and James Sauer, Director of the American Center of Oriental Research, conducted a preliminary excavation in order to verify the periods of occupation of the city as they appear in the architectural remains above the surface. The four

1 m x 2 m soundingsyielded

Roman, Byzantine, and Umayyad pottery in successive strata of occupation. This pottery collection is the first from the Southern Hauran

BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST

region that has been studied systematically. In July, 1977, the author returned with a team of fifteen American archeologists and students to excavate some of the key structures at Umm el-Jimal. These included the Barracks (fig. 5), the Pretorium (fig. 6), a private house (figs. 7 and 8), the so-called Nabatean Temple, and two segments of the city wall, all located in the southern half of the city. In general, the dates of construction and occupation of these buildings proved to be later than

has usually been thought. The 5thcentury A.D. building date of the Barracks was confirmed; both the Pretorium and the private house contained good Byzantine and Umayyad occupation levels, and the two city wall segments were built in the Late Byzantine period. The entry porch of the Nabatean Temple (thus identified by Butler in 1905) was founded on debris dated to the Byzantine period (fig. 9). In spite of the discovery of a good Late Roman Fig. 6. View of the praetorium from the south.

53

Fig. 7. East facade of House XX. occupation layer in the 1974 soundings, the 1977 excavation uncovered Roman and Nabatean artifacts only in loci which also contained later (Byzantine and Umayyad) objects. Perhaps the most surprising result of this excavation was the discovery that Umm el-Jimal was not only a Nabatean, Roman, and Byzantine city (as previously thought), but also a significant Umayyad city. Because several Umayyad occupation levels were found (fig. 10), it is expected that the study of the pottery from these will contribute significantly to a refinement of the distinction between the cultures of the Early and Late Umayyad periods. Fig. 8. Double windowof House XX at Umm el-Jimal.

54

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From September 1 to December 8, 1977, the author worked with the Department of Antiquities of Jordan on the consolidation of the walls of the Barracks. This involved the force-filling of its rubble core walls with cement in such a way that it does not show on the exterior of the walls. The Department plans to continue this work at the rate of one building complex per year (a formidable task, considering that over 150 buildings have walls one or more stories high). Fig. 9. Stub wall and stone sill which H. C. Butler identifiedas the porch of a Nabateantemple, but which were actually founded on a Late Byzantinesoil layer. Fig. 10. Umayyadcobble stone floor in the atrium of the Pretorium(Square B.1I). NOTES 'Detailed reports on the research described below will be included in a monograph on Umm el-Jimal scheduled for publication in 1979. Two additional seasons of fieldwork to be completed by 1982 are planned to finish the author's current investigation of the site. 2The core staff included Tom Parker, stratigrapher and ceramicist; Robyn Brown, stratigrapher; Hugh Haggard, pottery registrar; Jennifer Groot, object registrar; Mike Toplyn, physical anthropologist; and Paul McDermott, epigrapher. Seven students participated for course credit given at Calvin College. The project was done jointly with the Department of Antiquities of Jordan and in affiliation with the American Schools of Oriental Research. Grateful acknowledgment is due these individuals for the quality of their participation and these organizations for their technical, logistic, and financial support.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Butler, H. C. 1913 Umm idj-Djimal. Division II, Section A, Part 3 of Publications of the Princeton University Archaeological Expedition to Syria in 1904-1905 and 1909. Leiden: Brill.

BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST

55

A

TRIBUTE

TO

JAMES

DR.

DAVID

W.

LEON

KELSO

MCCREERY

James L. Kelso, for many years Professor of Biblical Archaeology at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary (and its earlier incarnations), was a faithful supporter of the work of the American Schools of Oriental Research. An early follower and later collaborator of the late W. F. Albright, he worked diligently in many fields, and assiduously on the publication production line. Throughout his long life he instructed and inspired the many students who came his way, and a goodly number have been added to the rolls of archeological investigators and excavators. It is altogether fitting that a former student, representing others, should write an affectionate memorial notice and tribute to Professor Kelso for the BA.

"One of the most unusual men in American theological education of the mid-twentieth century, . . . Known to his wife as 'Jimmy,' to a few close friends and colleagues as 'James' or 'Jim,' and to his students simply as 'Kelso,' he won the hearts and devotion of all with whom he worked" (Coughenour 1972: 1). Thus begins the biographical essay in the festschrift published in honor of James Leon Kelso.' On 28 June 1978, Dr. James L. Kelso, noted archeologist and Professor Emeritus of Old Testament History and Biblical Archaeology at BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST

Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, passed away at the age of 85. In light of Dr. Kelso's enthusiasm for and multifaceted contributions to the field of biblical archeology, a summary of his life and work in a journal whose title exemplifies his consuming interest seems timely. James Leon Kelso was born in Duluth, Minnesota on 21 October 1892, the only child of Evan Edward and Bertha Walle Kelso. Early in his childhood, the family moved to southwestern Idaho and then to Portland, Oregon, where James attended high school during the day,

pharmacy school at night, and worked in his "spare time" to supplement the family income. He graduated from Portland High School in 1912, enrolled the following fall at Monmouth College, Monmouth, Illinois, and received his Bachelor of Arts degree in June 1916. He completed his theological studies at Xenia Theological Seminary in Xenia, Ohio within two years and received his Th.M. degree from that institution in the spring of 1918. Upon graduation from seminary, Kelso was ordained and became

57

pastor of the United Presbyterian Church at Bloomington, Indiana, where he served the local and university communities until 1923. In 1920 Reverend Kelso married his high school sweetheart, Adolphina Pearson, who for the next 58 years was to share not only his joys and sorrows, but the burden of his heavy work load as well. Besides his accomplishments as a successful pastor and suitor while at Bloomington, he completed an M.A. degree and began to work on a doctorate in the Classics at Indiana University. His studies were interrupted, however, when in the fall of 1923 he was called to become professor of Old Testament at Xenia Theological Seminary, which since his graduation had moved to St. Louis, Missouri. Up until this time, Kelso's interests had concentrated on Classical History and New Testament Theology, but this emphasis was soon to change as he came under the direct influence of two pioneers in the field of Palestinian archeology, Melvin Grove Kyle and William Foxwell Albright. In light of the tremendous influence these two men had on Kelso, a brief description of their friendship and the development of their working relationship is helpful in understanding the historical context from which Kelso's career as an archeologist emerged.2 Kyle, who began his teaching career at Xenia Theological Seminary in 1908, first became interested in the study of archeology while visiting mission projects of the United Presbyterian Church in Egypt in the 1890s. Encouraged by his friend Max Mueller of the University of Pennsylvania, Kyle soon became a competent Egyptologist and developed a personal friendship with one of the fathers of modern archeology, Sir Flinders Petrie. The influence of Petrie, as well as Kyle's orientation as a biblical scholar, inevitably led him north to Palestine where he hoped that his knowledge of Egyptology might help him to shed light on the early biblical periods. In Jerusalem he met the brilliant young field archeologist,

58

William F. Albright, who shared his conviction that archeological research would prove to be a valuable tool for establishing the chronological and cultural context of various biblical traditions. In February 1924 Kyle and Albright mounted their first joint expedition, an archeological survey of the southern Dead Sea Basin, in an attempt to locate remains of the cities of the plain mentioned in Genesis 14. This was the first joint undertaking of the American School, an experiment that was to set a pattern that would be followed for years to come. The expedition was somewhat of a disappointment with most of the finds dating to the Byzantine and Islamic periods, but the discovery of the Early Bronze site of Bab edh-Dhrac on the last day of the survey was truly significant, the importance of which was not fully realized until 41 years later when Paul W. Lapp conducted the first scientific excavations at the site. In 1926 Kyle returned to Palestine in order to organize with James Leon Kelso (1892-1978)

Albright the first campaign at Tell Beit Mirsim, tentatively identified by Albright as the biblical site of Kiriath-sepher. It was on this campaign that Kyle's young protege, James L. Kelso, gained his first experience as a field archeologist, an experience that was to change his life and influence hundreds of his students. Kelso returned to Tell Beit Mirsim in 1930 and 1932, serving as an excavation supervisor and assistant to the director, Dr. Albright. With the death of Kyle in 1933, Pittsburgh-Xenia's close ties with the American Schools of Oriental Research and involvement in Palestinian archeology might well have come to an end; but with Kelso's appointment to Kyle's chair of biblical archeology (the first chair of biblical archeology to be established in an American Protestant seminary), the seminary's involvement in the field for the next 30 years was assured. In the spring of 1934, Kelso returned to Palestine intending to carry on work with Albright at Tell Beit Mirsim, but a 50% devaluation of the dollar in the mid-Atlantic dealt a heavy blow to the excavation funds he was carrying. Once in Jerusalem, Kelso and Albright decided that a campaign at Beitin would be a convenient and economically feasible substitute for the remote site of Tell Beit Mirsim, so they embarked on the Kyle Memorial Excavation at Bethel with Albright serving as director of the expedition and Kelso as assistant director and president of the staff. The tense political situation of the late 1930s and the outbreak of World War II temporarily grounded Kelso's aspirations to continue field work in Palestine, but they failed to dampen his will to delve more deeply into archeological research. From 1934 to 1948, he published 32 articles dealing with the excavations and pottery of Tell Beit Mirsim, Bethel, and Bab edh-Dhrac, as well as describing the light that archeological expeditions were shedding on biblical studies in general. Not only did Kelso take seriously his responsibility to publish the fruits of

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1979

his research as quickly as possible, but he was also concerned to achieve as wide a readership as possible. The subjects and style of his articles and books testify to his desire to inform the laity as well as fellow scholars of recent developments. When in recent years terminology such as "biblical archeology" came under sharp criticism, Kelso persisted in using such language to characterize his work, taking pride in and defending the validity of the term rather than being embarrassed by it. Prone to express his opinions in colorful, hyperbolic fashion, Kelso sharply critiqued those "nuts" who searched for Noah's ark, attempting to prove the eternal truths of the Bible, as well as literary critics who refused to take the archeological data seriously and thus dismissed out of hand the historical basis of many of the biblical traditions. Although Kelso took great pains to express his theologically conservative views simply and clearly, his understanding of biblical history and theology was not simplistic. Compelled by a strong conviction that archeological research was a less speculative and more reliable tool than higher criticism in the realm of biblical studies, he worked to promote the cause of biblical archeology while carefully avoiding the extremes of trying to prove the truth of theological statements by means of archeology or by discounting altogether the contributions of higher criticism. In 1949 Kelso returned to Jerusalem on a sabbatical year to resume his archeological fieldwork.

served as the President of the Board of Trustees of the Palestine Archaeological Museum. Early in 1950 he mounted archeological campaigns at Tulul Abu el cAlayiq (NT Jericho) and Khirbet en-Nitla. In 1954, 1957, and 1960, Kelso returned to Beitin to direct excavations aimed at further illuminating the history of the site while providing his students with archeological in-field training. In 1964 Kelso served as president (along with Paul W. Lapp as director) of the excavations at Tell el-Ful. Although he never returned to Palestine after 1964, Kelso kept abreast of the ongoing work through the literature and personal contacts, and he provided encouragement and financial support for numerous excavations on the West Bank and more recently in Jordan. The KyleKelso Excavation Foundation under the management of Robert A. Coughenour continues to provide

financial backing for projects in which Kelso himself was keenly interested. Aside from his accomplishments as a field archeologist, perhaps Kelso's greatest contribution to the field of biblical archeology was his emphasis upon interdisciplinary cooperation in the study of archeological material. Working with J. Palin Thorley, a ceramics expert from the University of Pittsburgh, he authored a study of the Tell Beit Mirsim pottery praised by Albright as being "an unequalled monograph . . . by far the best study of the technology and craftsmanship involved in ancient pottery" (Coughenour 1972: 15). In his studies of ancient metallurgy, he aroused the interest and called upon the services of professors at Carnegie Institute, the University of Pittsburgh, and chemists with United States Steel for analysis of copper, bronze, and iron artifacts. When failing health in his

Staff of 1926 Tell Beit Mirsim excavation: Kelso-center; Kyle-third from right;

Albright-second from right;the identityof the other four men is uncertain.

Shortly after his arrival he replaced Ovid Sellers-who had been injured in an airplane crash-as the Director of the American School of Oriental Research. In spite of the sporadic fighting that persisted throughout their stay from 1949 to 1950, Kelso successfully pursued a rigorous schedule of archeological research and diplomatic missions while Mrs. Kelso took charge of remodeling the school and patching up the bullet holes. From 1949 to 1950 Kelso

BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST

59

later years impeded his ability to continue his own research, he maintained his involvement with his typical interdisciplinary emphasis by supporting the work of Robert H. Johnston, an expert in ceramic technology at Rochester Institute of Technology, Robert A. Coughenour, director of the excavations at the iron mine and smelting site of Warda in Jordan, and the author, who is presently working with the botanical material from the Bab edh-Dhrac and Numeira excavations. Space does not allow an inventory of all the individuals and archeological projects Dr. Kelso helped in one way or another over the years. Although James Kelso is best known as an archeologist, he also built a strong reputation as a dedicated churchman, as is evidenced by his 40 years of distinguished service as a seminary professor and his election to the position of Moderator of the United Presbyterian Church of North America in 1952. The frequency with which he conducted Bible studies in various local churches and delivered lectures on biblical archeology while raising money for upcoming excavations made him a well-known and popular personality in the Pittsburgh area. The influence he exerted on his students, friends, and the scholarly world can easily be detected but is, of course, impossible to measure. That his contributions to the church and scholarship have not gone unnoticed is attested by the fact that in 1975 the archeological museum at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, comprised largely of material from excavations in which Dr. Kelso was involved, was renamed the James L. Kelso Bible Lands Museum. The occasion of his eightieth birthday was marked by the publication of a festschrift in his honor, comprised of articles written by his former

students and entitled, For Me To Live, an apropos characterization of Kelso's life and the theme that permeated his teaching. Upon his retirement from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, William Foxwell Albright characterized Kelso as, "A man who believed that the aim of theological training is to make us better Christians, more honest, more honorable, and more productive, each in his own field" (Coughenour 1972: 15). His untiring promotion of such values and their incarnation in his person are no doubt what he will be remembered for by most people. But for those who knew the man best, his most endearing qualities were his tenderness and unrestrained generosity. An extremely sensitive person, the loss of his mother in childhood and his daughter at the age of seven seemed to have increased his capacity to empathize with the suffering of others and his willingness to offer a helping hand. With the constant support of his unassuming wife "Dollie," Kelso practiced the ideals of the "social gospel," which for theological reasons he rejected in theory. He seldom discussed the theological or philosophical bases of moral or ethical conduct, but when he did, he would come up with a statement like, "Ninety percent of what we call Christianity is just decent paganism" (Coughenour 1972: 100). Still, the vacations the Kelsos forfeited so that students could travel to the Holy Land, their work with Palestinian refugees, and the door of their home that was closed to no one are indicative of the code by which "Jimmy" and "Dollie" lived. With the passing of James Leon Kelso, the field of biblical archeology has lost one of its last remaining charter members, the Christian

church has lost another saint, and all those with whom he came in contact have lost a friend. If it had not been for Dr. Kelso's tenacious desire to be of service and seemingly inexhaustible energy, the most recent generation of theological students, including the author of this tribute, might never have come to know and to admire this unique character. But following his retirement from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary in 1963, he continued to lead an extremely active life: coaching graduate students in his home, occasionally lecturing and working in the museum at the seminary, writing books and articles that summarized his years of experience as an archeologist and biblical scholar, and constantly reading. His keen wit and sharpness of mind stayed with him to the end, and three days before entering the hospital on June 21, he delivered his regular hour-long lecture at the Beverly Heights Adult Sunday School Class. My wife and I, having just returned from a fellowship year at ACOR in Amman, Jordan, were called upon by Dr. Kelso to give a full report on present archeological activity and cultural changes in the country that were being brought about by modernization. After he entered the hospital, I was instructed to come to his room each day and talk for a couple hours about the year's experiences. My suggestion that he relax and sleep as much as possible was never, I am afraid, given serious consideration. In spite of his weakened condition, the oxygen mask, and all the rest, whenever I stopped talking, thinking he had fallen asleep, he would turn his head and tell me with his eyes to continue. Such was Kelso's enthusiasm for archeology and the Holy Land.

NOTES 'The Kelso Festschrift: For Me To Live - Essays in Honor of James Leon Kelso (ed. R. A. Coughenour. Cleveland: Dillon/ Liederbach, 1972) contains the best biographical sketch available as well as a comprehensive annotated bibliography of Kelso's works. 2The most comprehensive history of Pittsburgh Theological

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Seminary's archeological involvement and Kelso's place in that history are contained in an article by Howard M. Jamieson, "Pittsburgh Theological Seminary and Archaeology," in Pittsburgh Perspective 4.5: 5-16, a publication of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.

1979

Finally Moore surveys the Christian material, contrasting East and West in the earlier periods, Protestantism and Catholicism in the later. He includes a particularly interesting discussion of the indigenization of Christian art in "mission"countries, especially in India. The book ends with the chapter "The End of Iconography?". Moore sees individualism, the impact of the mass media and the growth of scientific technology as Iconography of Religions, by Albert C. Moore. 337 pp. and the felt need for religious 248 illustrations. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1977; driving out symbolism of sort ongoing demythologization iconography-a $25.00. process. Ultimately, however, he has some optimism for In this handsome volume Moore, associate the future: "Does man ever transcend the use of all professor in religious studies at the University of Otago, visual images?. . . Icons in religion derive from the basic New Zealand, presents a brief but clear introduction to fact that man has a body while seeking to transcend the the whole nature of religious symbols, images and idols, body. Even when he transcends the image he still needs and then leads the reader through an analysis of the the image." iconographies of several diverse religious traditions. WILLIAMJ. FULCO, S.J. In each case the implicit questions he addresses are of California, Berkeley University the same: (1) What are the gods or powers believed in and what "theology" is expressed in cultic images? (2) What is the iconography of the images and how did it develop? (3) What is the context of the image in its religious setting? (4) What is the experience of the The Natural History of the Land of the Bible, by Azaria worshipper? Moore is interested above all in the Alon. 276 Garden City, NY: Doubleday & pp. psychology of the worshipper as he or she relates to a Inc., 1978; $12.95. Company, given iconographic representation. He makes his discussions easy to follow, since most of the items he This is a photographic reproduction of the 1969 uses as examples are illustrated in the text, either with edition (Jerusalem Publishing House), but the author line-cuts or photographs. has been ill served by his present publisher. The Moore first examines "primal religions," choosing reproduction has been done poorly. The photographs as types the Upper Palaeolithic of Europe (cave art and are less clear, the color values less accurate, and too the "Venus" figures), Australian Aboriginal (with a fine many pages are disfigured by smudges and even excursus on the "Dream Time"), Melanesia (masks) and fingerprints. This is unfortunate, because the book is an Polynesia (wood carving). Although there is a special excellent and well-illustrated introduction to the fauna difficulty in interpreting the prehistoric material, all of and flora of the Palestine area, providing a wealth of these religious expressions are "primal in the sense that information in nontechnical language. After four they are basic and persist in a variety of forms in the introductory chapters special attention is paid to the iconography of religions found in the great civilizations vegetation of the deserts, the forest country, the Jordan of world history." Valley and the flowering plants; then to invertebrates, Ancient Egyptian and Greek iconography are reptiles, birds, and mammals. Less satisfactory are the contrasted as types of the "polytheistic"--the Egyptian captions to the often superb photographs. Dr. Alon is being enduring, static, nation-oriented, suggesting too fond of the "pathetic fallacy" and frequently fails to otherness, while the Greek is changing, supranational, give to the general reader, who cannot himself supply what is missing, the exact information needed. It is not anthropomorphic. In the largest section of the book which is devoted helpful to say that crows "have to keep up their to the Asian subcontinent and east (Hinduism, reputation" for being clever (p. 218), nor sufficient to Buddhism in its various forms, Shintoism, etc.), Moore indicate that an otherwise unidentified wall was built by carefully traces the subtle changes in iconography from King Uzziah (p. 27). Again and again there is no clear their most ancient manifestations, showing how the indication of the place where the picture was taken, various traditions have influenced one another. Many information very necessary to the stranger. It would also will appreciate especially the lucidity Moore brings to have been valuable to point out that the Jordan was these very complicated data. photographed in the flood season (p. 134). Dr. Alon is curiously misleading about the climate. He classifies the Judaic and Islamic traditions as "prophetic iconoclasm," a phenomenon he attributes It is only partly true that "the climate of the mountains largely to the primacy of the word in these religions; but of Transjordan resembles that of the west bank of the he notes that this tendency "has been periodically river" (p. 54). It is incorrect to describe the Palestinian winter as merely "drizzly" (p. 59) and say that "the modified by man's need of the visual element."

Book Reviews

BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST

61

the needs of Layard who, nonetheless, was compelled to accept its financial arrangments. The daily challenges were compensated by the breathtaking discoveries, among them the large ceremonial hall to a palace whose entrance was framed by gigantic winged bulls and lions. When he left Mosul in 1851, never to return, Layard calculated that at one mound alone, Kouyunjik (Nineveh), he uncovered nearly two miles of bas-reliefs. The remaining chapters are devoted to Layard's career in England, and his indirect involvement with Assyrian archeology. The controversial Rassam affair remains the most intriguing. Layard, now in his waning years, had become entangled in the scandalous business. A full discussion of the events that led to Rassam's successful suit against Budge, keeper of the Department of DENISBALY Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities in the British Kenyon College Museum, is presented by the author. A useful commentary appears at the end of the book. It explains why the author felt the need to prepare this biography, to "hopefully restore Layard to his true The Luck of Nineveh. Archaeology's Great Adventure, place in history" (p. 326). This section is replete with by Arnold C. Brackman. 349 pp. New York: McGrawinformation and provides a concise but documentary Hill, 1978, $14.95. well-stated assessment into the development of Few visitors to the Assyrian galleries in the British Assyriology to the present time. The reviewer must note one displeasure about the Museum are aware that the recovery of the monumental art works on display is due in large measure to the book: the emotionally worded and biased versions of untiring efforts and accomplishments of one man, Assyrian history that comprise Chapters I and II do a Henry Austen Layard. The biographic account under disservice to the historical veracity. The reader who review retells Layard's many adventures and the seeks a clear account of the history and culture of political intrigues surrounding them, his spectacular Assyria must turn to other books on the subject. discoveries in the mounds of Mesopotamia and, lastly, PAULINE ALBENDA his political and diplomatic career in England. In the The Museum of Archaeology at Staten Island words of the author, Layard's story is "the tale of the greatest adventurer in archaeology" (p. viii). Before the 19th century there was no tangible proof that an Assyrian empire existed. Europeans passing Ebla, un impero ritrovato, by Paolo Matthiae. Torino: through Mesopotamia reported on the existence of Giulio Einaudi editore, 1977; $12.50. "strange mounds" and some returned home with curious relics consisting of burnt bricks or clay tablets inscribed The excavations at Tell Mardikh, undertaken by with wedge-shaped signs. Not until 1840 was any serious the Italian Archeological Mission in Syria of the attempt made to discover what lay under the mounds. University of Rome, have now revealed sufficient data Layard, a young man on his eastward journey to on third-millennium Syria to make an organic Ceylon-he never reached his destination-became description of its culture at least feasible. Paolo deeply moved and impressed by the vast mounds Matthiae, Italian archeologist and art historian who situated near Mosul in modern Iraq. He felt an intense directed the project at Tell Mardikh since its inception longing to dig into them. Five years later, with the in 1964, has attempted a description by relying on the assistance of the British ambassador to Turkey, Sir internal evidence unearthed at the site with special Stratford Canning, Layard initiated exploration on the reference to architectonics and the illustrative arts. Most mound of Nimrod (that is, Nimrud, the location of the outside data is confined to Chapter I in which Matthiae ancient city of Calah). Layard eventually spent the next reviews the more noteworthy achievements of excavaseven years among the ruins of Assyria. tions at such ancient Syrian sites as Tyre, Sidon, Ugarit, In the course of several chapters the author unfolds and Carchemish, as well as the western outposts of the myriad of difficulties encountered by the young Mesopotamian culture like Mari and the northern tells English excavator, including recurring attacks of of the Lake Assad region. He claims that exploration in malaria. Fortunately, Layard recognized the need for Syria is now entering a stage of full maturity in which continual diplomacy aimed at maintaining friendly the precision with which questions can be asked is relations with the various tribes in the vicinity. The rapidly increasing. Also, the exploration in Syria allows author discloses the British Museum's insensitivity to the location of what otherwise might have been isolated tourist who comes for a quick visit to the holy places has little need to worry about the weather" in the rainy season (p. 257). A few other inaccuracies have crept into the text. The word "Sahara" does not come from the Arabic sakhra (rocky), but from sahra (to be tawny) and bordugal would be better than bordugan on p. 41. The name "Banias" is not a corruption of "Pan," but rather the Arabic pronunciation of the ancient classical name for the site, Paneas (p. 136). The honey found by Samson surely cannot have been from "domesticated bees which had left their hives in Timnah" (p. 182). These are, however, but minor blemishes in a book which can be warmly recommended to the biblical student, the pilgrim and the merely "armchairtraveler."

62

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archeological finds in their proper historical space and that the paleo-Sumerian cultural elements adopted by time. Ebla in the encounter did not displace Eblaite ones but The vast amount of information discovered at Tell were grafted onto the local cultural fabric as indicated Mardikh is promoting efforts to understand what a by the lingering distinction between remnants of the single cultural system of ancient times might have foreign culture and those of the local culture. The most looked like as an organic whole. The homogeneity, important borrowing was the cuneiform writing system, organicity, and antiquity of a local, urban cultural but Sumerian itself was used in Ebla only as a cultured system of a Northwest-Semitic civilization demand a language of administration and literature, thus affecting major restructuring of the very nature of our mainly the aristocracy of Ebla and not upsetting the understanding of Early Syrian history and culture. The Northwest-Semitic ethnic basis of the population and evidence that testifies to this need for reevaluation is the culture. The local resistance to the Sumerian influences is topic of the remaining six chapters of Ebla, un impero attested also by the complete rejection in Ebla of ritrovato. Chapter 2 discusses the early years of the dig at Tell Mesopotamian deities. Only gods common to the Syrian Mardikh and concludes with a detailed discussion environment-for example, Dagan and Kamishof the evidence supporting the identification of the site retained any religious significance. The king was not the as the ancient city of Ebla (second half of the third "god of Ebla" but was conceived of as "father" or millennium B.C.). The next two chapters are a "guide," in keeping with local tribal tradition. The open specialized, and often tedious, treatment of the cultures courtyard bespeaks a participative urban organization of Mardikh IIB (2400-2000 B.C.)and Mardikh 111(2000- in contrast to the closed urban organization of 1600 B.C.) with respect to architecture, figurines, Sumerian cities. Most of the people whose names survive were of (Northwest) Semitic stock; foreign glyptics, wood carvings, stone inlays of friezes, sculpture, and ceramics. Fortunately, the text is names are uncommon. The unique factors confirm what accompanied by 112 black-and-white photos and dozens the architectonic and artistic remains of early Ebla have of hand-drawn diagrams and reconstructions. Especially already indicated: the borrowings from the Mesopotastimulating are the discussions describing how themes mian world were ingrafted selectively according to the and styles of art forms and architectural design indicate functional needs of the Eblaite population and remained discrete shifts in taste due to economic or political distinct from the local Eblaite characteristics. The substantial independence of Early Syrian change. Such economic and political influences, especially culture from Mesopotamian influence is the fundamensuggested by the written texts of the Ebla state archives tal value derived from the recovery of Ebla (p. 249). Its (first discovered in 1974), are elaborated in Chapter 5. In contributions to the diffusion of the urban civilization in most cases the tablets cite dates, people's names, the Near East is now considered not so much as a toponyms and other items of indirect confirmation of conduit of Sumerian urban cultural forms as it is a deductions independently made from a systematic highly original, local, urban development that merely analysis of the architectonic and artistic forms about the benefitted from its contact with the East. Moreover, in extent of outside influences. Much of this information is its interaction with the worlds of Sumer and Akkad, already available in English (BA, May 1976; Sept. Ebla left its own mark on the Mesopotamian concept 1976), but the elaborations Matthiae makes are well of kings. Naram-Sin, who conquered Ebla around worth reading. 2250 B.C., took the title "king of the four regions," Certain fundamental elements of Ebla's political which, Matthiae hypothesizes, may refer to the four and economic institutions and nonsecondary aspects of universal realms. Though reinterpreted, this concept of its illustrative culture lead Matthiae to propose an early "four regions" was retained in the royal title of some relation of Ebla's culture with that of Mesopotamian succeeding Mesopotamian kings. Uruk of the late Uruk Period (3280-3080 B.C.)or at least Readers looking for the sensational in the pages of of the Jemdet Nasr Period (3080-2880 B.C.). There are this book will not be disappointed, but as the author no "hard facts" that testify to this connection, but the similarities between particular aspects of Ebla's and Uruk's urban cultural systems are undeniable. The means by which these elements were transmitted is uncertain, but Matthiae proposes that the urban culture of Uruk may have extended westward around 3000 B.C. to cities near Aleppo, a region which in ancient times was ecologically similar to the marshy environs of the Euphrates valley where Uruk was located. Ebla, in a nearby arid region, was attractive to the Mesopotamians because of its relatively high location in the otherwise mildly undulating horizon. Matthiae claims

BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGIST

warns, such ideas must not be abstracted from the space and time of the cultural whole of the city lest the concept be rendered meaningless. Matthiae shows great restraint in hypothesizing about connections of Ebla with the Hebrew civilization and its literary tradition. The value of this work is in its methodical examination of the internal evidence attesting the independent, systematic organization of Eblaite culture in three specific periods between 2400-1600 B.C. PETER J. MACDONALD

Jackson, Michigan

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64

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1979

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Easy If you let it grow and invite use, you create problems. That became obvious in the 2nd century B.C. when the scholar Callimachus decided to catalog some of the more than 400,000 scrolls and codices in the pigeonholes (nidi) in the Great Library of Ptolemy II at Alexandria, with its hordes of slave librarians. When that world was succeeded by the businesslike world of the Romans, record-keeping seemed so important that papyrus from the marshes of North Africa was worth carrying across the Mediterranean, the Alps, the Channel, and the length of today's England to the outposts on today's Scottish border in order that the written word and numeral stand guard against deceit and faulty memory. The penchant for putting things down on paper brings the need later to find the right piece of paper. A librarian is the person to facilitate that for both the scholarly and the business-minded library users, and there has been a tendency to emancipate librarians from slavery. Where once they saw themselves as guardians of paper, many now

way

to

run

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library

claim that in a library big, active, and complete enough to serve for more than casual browsing and relief from tedium, more and more paper must go and be replaced with microforms. "WHY?" bellow the users. Answer: Retrievability to fit the need. If all the literature or administrative records or whatever the library specializes in were microfilmed and the reels of microfilm were kept in old shoe boxes, it would save a lot of valuable space, but the users might be incensed enough to burn down the library, as Ptolemy's was (in 47 B.C. by Caesar, a practical man). At the other extreme, the users might be quite pleased with a system which instantly reproduces full-sized hard copies of the ten most recent works on any question that can be expressed to a computer-pleased until the inevitable announcement that there is no money left for salaries. Following are some retrieval techniques worthy of consideration in the light of an individual library's reason for existence, but if and only if they will

serve the user quicker or better (or both) than paper will:

ROLLMICROFILM FlashTargetIndexing EyeballCoding OdometerIndexing Code LineIndexing ImageControlIndexing MIRACODE Coding for KODAK and KODAK ORACLE Retrieval

Equipment MICROFICHE Title and Index Titleand Index,FrameEyeball Coding

ColumnEyeballCoding AutomatedMicroficheRetrieval The best way to understand what these terms mean is to let an up-to-date, emancipated librarian explain them and their relative merits. Librarians who want to check on whether they are up-to-date may wish to request "Retrieval Techniques" from Kodak, Dept. 55V, Rochester, N.Y. 14650.

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