Thursday 18/06/2026

09:00 – 10:45 * Archaeological Innovations during the Byzantine, Early Islamic and crusader Period

An Early Islamic Farmhouse at Migron

In a salvage excavation conducted on behalf of the Staff Officer for Archaeology at Migron farmstead, an architectural complex was uncovered comprising a longhouse with four rooms, subsidiary rooms attached to the central structure, and two caves. In the rooms of the structure, pottery was found, including approximately ten complete vessels, most of them storage jars, as well as several metal objects, a few glass vessel fragments, and coins. It may be assumed, based on the site’s finds and parallels to similar structures at other sites, that the complex uncovered at Migron is an agricultural farmhouse from the Early Islamic period.

The prevailing view in research is that farmhouses of this type begin to appear in the Umayyad period and express a change in the family and village structure, possibly hinting at a change in the demographic composition and the settlement of a new population with a different social structure than before. The Migron farmhouse is the northernmost example to date of this type of agricultural farm.

Thursday 18/06/2026

16:30 – 17:45 * Archaeological Sites in Transition: Between Periods, Kingdoms, and Regions

The Agricultural Hinterland of Horvat Livnim and a Segment of a Roman Road

During a salvage excavation near Horvat Livnim, hewn installations were identified, including a winepress, agricultural walls, massive land-clearing and field-preparation works, clearance heaps, and road segments, among them an imperial Roman road. These finds attest that the area served as an agricultural hinterland over an extended period, which apparently began in the late Iron Age and continued through the Persian, Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman periods.

During the excavation, three road segments were exposed: two of them were identified as rural roads and the third was part of the Jerusalem–Eleutheropolis (Beth Guvrin) road. South of Horvat Livnim, land-clearing and agricultural preparation operations of a unique scale were exposed. Over the surface of a rocky slope near the ruin, a massive quantity of small fieldstones was deposited, which in parts of the slope created a leveled agricultural terrace upon which a layer of local soil was laid, several tens of centimeters deep. Due to the scope and uniqueness of the phenomenon, OSL sampling was conducted. The preliminary findings indicate that at least part of the fills were executed within a short period of time and in a concentrated manner. Moreover, most of the pottery vessels exposed in these assemblages were dated to the late Iron Age and the Persian period.

The excavation findings demonstrate how human activity throughout history shaped the local landscape and adapted it to changing social and economic needs.

Wednesday 17/06/2026

09:50 – 11:30 * Between Judea and Idumea during the Persian Period 

The Hebron Hills in the Persian Period: An Updated Perspective

The archaeological data from the Persian and pre-Hasmonean Hellenistic periods in the Hebron Hills is based primarily on the emergency survey conducted after the Six-Day War and the Judean Hills survey carried out in the 1980s. Alongside these, excavations were conducted over the years that were not always fully and adequately published. The limited information led some researchers to place the southern boundary of the province of Yehud near Jerusalem. The lecture will present a re-examination of the findings from the old surveys, alongside the results of additional surveys and excavation findings from the past and from recent years. This examination enables the compilation of an updated settlement picture of the various parts of the Judean Hills throughout the Persian and Hellenistic periods. It transpires that the settlement patterns and ceramic profile are consistent with the traditional approach that views the northern Judean Hills as part of the Beth-Zur district within the province of Yehud, while the central and southern parts of the highlands constituted part of the developmental sphere of Idumea.

Thursday 18/06/2026

09:00 – 10:45 * Archaeological Innovations during the Byzantine, Early Islamic and crusader Periods

The Ma’ale Adummim Fortress – Discoveries and Insights Following the First Excavation Season

The Ma’ale Adummim Fortress is located on a commanding hill, midway between Jerusalem and Jericho, near the “Good Samaritan” complex and the Herodian villa. The fortress was established by the Templar Order in the 1160s CE with the aim of protecting and assisting Christian pilgrims on their way to the holy places. The site is mentioned in ancient sources under various names and was surveyed several times by Western scholars in the 19th and 20th centuries. In 2024, excavations at the site began within the framework of a project for the preservation of the fortress and its conversion into an archaeology and heritage center for Judea and Samaria.

The excavations at the Ma’ale Adummim Fortress enabled the reconstruction, for the first time, of its plan and the identification of its various components. It became clear that the fortress has a concentric plan, characteristic of the architecture of the military orders. The outer enclosure of the fortress was apparently an operational area comprising stables, storerooms, and various installations. The inner enclosure, which includes a paved courtyard with a drainage channel system for rainwater, a large vaulted structure, and a tower of strength (donjon), most likely served as the living quarters for the knights, sergeants, and chaplains. It is possible that the guests’ rooms for pilgrims, the refectory, and the chapel of the fortress were also located there.

Moreover, during the excavations finds were uncovered that can reinforce the hypothesis previously raised by various scholars regarding the existence at the site of a fortress from the Late Roman-Byzantine period, mentioned in the Onomasticon of Eusebius. The most important find in this regard is a section of colorful mosaic discovered in the inner enclosure of the fortress, clearly attesting to the existence of some structure at the site during the Byzantine period. Continued excavation of the fortress will enable completion of its full plan and shed light on the history of the site in the Roman-Byzantine period.

Thursday 18/06/2026

16:30 – 17:45 * Archaeological Sites in Transition: Between Periods, Kingdoms, and Regions

Shifting Foundations: Settlement Dynamics in Judea and Samaria’s LBII/Iron I Transition

The central hill country of Israel, which had been full of sites in the Middle Bronze Age, suffered a significant loss of sites at the end of the period and the beginning of the Late Bronze Age. Thus, by the Late Bronze Age II, the region was characterized by few sites, but ideally located ones, since only the best sites survived into the Late Bronze Age. During the transition from the Late Bronze Age II to the Iron Age I, the situation changed once again, and a surge of new small sites appeared. 

The appearance of many small sites in the Iron Age I is a well-documented phenomenon. However, a recent meta-analysis of the settlement pattens in the central hill country of Israel allows for a broader view of this settlement event, which in turn provides a more nuanced and complete understanding of this transitional period. 

This presentation examines data from 233 Late Bronze Age II and Iron Age I sites in the central hill country. It looks at the shift from urbanism to small, decentralized sites; the timing of the settlement process; the reverse correlation between the number of sites and their size; the directionality of the settlement event; and the possibility of a nomadic presence in the central hill country.

Thursday 18/06/2026

14:15 – 16:00 * Innovations in the study of Tel Shiloh

Preliminary Results of the Archaeobotanical Finds from Tel Shiloh

Recent archaeobotanical investigations at Tel Shiloh provide new perspectives on agricultural practices in the central highlands of Israel during the Early Iron Age. Sediment samples collected during excavation campaigns between 2017 and 2024 were analyzed in order to explore the crop economy of settlement and the role of cultivated plants in local subsistence strategies.

Although the analyzed samples are generally small and contain relatively low densities of plant remains, the recovered assemblage offers valuable insights into the agricultural basis of the site. The plant remains include cereals, pulses, and fruit crops such as olive, grape, and fig, indicating a diversified agricultural system combining cereal cultivation with legume production and arboriculture. The presence of arable weeds further provides limited indications of the surrounding agricultural landscape.

By integrating the archaeobotanical data with the broader archaeological context of the site, this study aims to contribute to current discussions on farming strategies and plant-based economies in the Early Iron Age highlands. The results highlight the potential of even modest archaeobotanical assemblages to inform on agricultural organization and crop exploitation.

Thursday 18/06/2026

11:15 – 13:15 * Innovations in the study of Qumran

Qumran – A Renewed Interpretation Following Conservation Works in Recent Years

The site of Qumran, in whose immediate vicinity most of the known scrolls were found, attracts scholars’ attention away from the site itself. Qumran was excavated in the 1950s by Roland de Vaux, a French Dominican priest who conducted an excavation covering nearly the entire complex, including the cemetery and the adjacent site of Ein Feshkha. In his wake, during the 1960s, conservation and especially extensive restoration work was carried out by the Antiquities Authority of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, work easily recognizable due to the extensive use of modern cement applied to nearly all the walls visible on the surface. Regrettably, the ravages of time and sustained neglect over decades have caused extensive damage to the site. Fortunately, de Vaux left a very large quantity of photographs from the excavation stages, with which it has been possible to reconstruct how his findings appeared at the time of excavation. 

Following a request of the Natural Parks Authority, the Staff Officer for Archaeology undertook to assist in the conservation of the site, which was carried out over four work seasons (2020–2023). Prior to the conservation works, access was given to de Vaux’s photographic archives and those of others, with which a multi-year plan was built. That plan included the restoration of the enclosure walls, the reconstruction of the baking and grinding installations, the rehabilitation of the cemetery, and especially the reconstruction and rehabilitation of the numerous water installations — namely the aqueduct, the channels, the cisterns, and the impressive ritual baths. In the course of the works and the accompanying research interesting discoveries were encountered, such as the presence of several enclosures at the site that indicate a communal hierarchy, a hierarchy described in the writings of Josephus. In the cemetery, an orderly burial and uniquely built and plastered tomb was uncovered by Evgeni Aharonovich. I will also briefly describe the project for draining the floodwaters of Nahal Qumran that fed the water installations at the site.