Mount Adir: An Iron I Polity in the Upper Galilee?

Abstract

This is the final report of the excavations conducted at the site of the fortress of Mount Adir in two seasons separated by 43 years. In addition to summarizing the available data on the fortress, the study focuses on the broader context—the interconnectedness between the Iron IB settlement system in the Upper Galilee and the contemporaneous centres in the northern part of the country, especially in the coastal area. It seems that during the Iron Age IB a local political entity was established in the Meron Ridges—the ‘Upper Galilee Polity’—which controlled the entire Upper Galilee region. The fortress at Mount Adir played a central role in this entity and the ceramic assemblage that was found there indicates trade relations, mainly with the cities and ‘village-states’ of the northern coastal region. The end of the ‘Upper Galilee Polity’ was connected to the growth of political forces west and east of the Upper Galilee during the Iron IIA.

Keywords:

• Mount Adir
• Har Adir
• Iron I
• Upper Galilee
• Northern Israel

Notes

1 Composition of this article was supported by a grant from the Open University of Israel (grant no. 510189). The Mount Adir finds from Davis’s excavation (permit no. 626) are published here courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA).

In the past its elevation above sea level was determined to be 1007 m, yet when measured during the new excavation, its elevation was found to be only 1004 m.

2 For different opinions, see Kochavi 1984: 67‒68; Bloch-Smith and Alpert 1999: 78; Ben-Ami 2004: 207; Finkelstein 2011: 237; Gal 2014.

3 References to finds from the site are in Illan’s Ph.D. thesis, where he presents the plans that were kept in the archives of the IAA and thus survived, as well as drawings of vessels taken from find cards (Ilan 1999: 182‒184). The ceramic finds have only recently been analysed; see Katz 2020.

4 The excavation (permit no. J-7/2019) was part of the Meron Ridges project, directed by Hayah Katz of the Kinneret Institute for Galilean Archaeology. The excavation team included Michal Marmelshtein (supervisor, Areas B and C), Oz Kedoshim (administrator), Shay Halevy (photographer) and Benny Arubas (surveyor). The excavation was conducted with the help of volunteers.

5 A steel pick was found at level 1001.24 m—in the fill between the bedrock and the earlier floor (Davis et al. 1985: 41). In the years since its discovery, the pick has been regarded as one of the earliest iron objects unearthed in Israel (see, for example, Muhly 1982: 45). However, the absence of any tools of this type dated to the Iron I at any site throughout the country (as well as in the Levant in general) has given researchers cause to doubt the early dating of this object. Throughout the Iron II some picks were found; however, none of them is similar to this one (Dothan and Porath 1982: Fig. 12: 8; Curtis 2013: Pl. 1: 8). While the Iron II tools show only a partial similarity to the Mount Adir pick, nearly identical picks were discovered in the vicinity of the fortress—all dated to the late Roman or the Byzantine periods (Iliffe 1934: Pl. VIII: 14; Aviam and Getzov 1998: Fig. 16: 1‒4). These facts caused Eliyahu-Behar and Yahalom-Mack (2018: 460) to suggest a Roman-Byzantine date for the Mount Adir pick too. As steel is an iron- carbon alloy, it can be dated using ¹⁴C. This has been attempted for the pick by Prof. Elisabetta Boaretto of the Weizmann Institute. The analysis results indicated it to be no earlier than the 5th century BCE; however, organic tannin, used in the process of its preservation in the restoration laboratories of the Israel Museum, may have contaminated the tested sample, so the results cannot be relied upon for an accurate dating (E. Boaretto, personal communication). It seems that any attempt to date the pick raises difficulties and this matter is therefore unresolvable with the data at hand.

6 The walls of Stratum 2 indicate only the existence of an earlier structure below the fortress of Stratum 1. Nevertheless, the remains are so fragmented that the nature of this stratum cannot be reconstructed.

7 For full details of the assemblage, see Katz 2020.

8 Cypriot influence in the heart of the Upper Galilee is found in additional artefacts. One should note the bronze artefact manufactured in Cypriot traditions, which was found at Mount Adir Locus 8 (Fig. 20: 14). Additionally, the pattern of triangles incised on the rim of the unique bowl found during Aharoni’s excavation at Tell Harashim (Aharoni 1957: Fig. 4: 2) is identical to the ‘multiple zigzags’ motif common in the Late Helladic IIIC and Late Cypriot IIIA and IIIB periods (Kling 1989: 113).