Tel ‘Aroer 2004 Overview

Tel ‘Aroer: an Iron Age II Caravan Town and Roman Fort in the Negev
David Ilan and Yifat Thareani-Sussely

The aim of this project is a final publication of the Iron Age II strata of Tel ‘Aroer, Israel. Tel ‘Aroer is located on the banks of the ‘Aroer stream in the southernmost part of the Beersheba-Arad Valley, about 22 km southeast of modern Beersheba (map reference 1479.0623). The site was first excavated in 1975 under the direction of Avraham Biran director of the Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology (NGSBA), Hebrew Union College and Rudolf Cohen of what was then the Israel Department of Antiquities and Museums (IDAM). Additional short seasons took place between 1976 and 1978 and between 1980 and 1982, under the direction of Biran alone.

With an area of two hectares, approximately 1500 m2 of which were excavated, ‘Aroer is one of the most important Iron Age sites in the Negev. Three strata have been identified, dating from the 8t" to early 6"' centuries BCE. The architecture is well preserved and, while terraced, clear enough to allow stratigraphic separation. The ceramic and small find assemblage appears to be extraordinarily rich, including large numbers of complete vessels, figurines and several inscriptions. The good state of preservation and documentation will allow us to publish accurate inventories and to suggest reconstructions of spatial and social organization. Initial analysis of the material culture indicates a variety of social elements ("ethnicities") and wide-ranging connections with Assyria, Edom, Judah, Israel, south Arabia, Egypt and the Mediterranean littoral.

The importance of ‘Aroer derives from its strategic location, on the trade route that ran from South Arabia through Edom, the `Arava, the Beersheba Valley, the western Negev, and on to the coast. Publication of the ‘Aroer data will provide a large corpus of well-preserved artifacts from good contexts, facilitating comparison and relative chronology for, and with, other sites in the region (Tel Sheva, Tel Malhata, Tel ‘Ira, Tel Arad, Horvat Qitmit and Horvat Uza) and farther afield (‘Ein Hazeva, Qadesh Barnea, Tell el-Kheleifeh).

On the one hand ‘Aroer was a desert town, probably accommodating desert natives adapting to conditions of aridity and distance from centers of population. But ‘Aroer was also a center of commerce and administration and, as such, represents an island of social complexity and multi-culturalism. Our research will emphasize both aspects. The inquiry will operate within a cultural ecology framework, which sees environment as a central factor in human behavior. Core-periphery relationships will be investigated as will the question of social identity in a multicultural, yet somewhat isolated context. We will be looking at ethno-historical parallels from the Early Bronze Age and the Roman-Byzantine period as a means of arriving at more general, theoretical understandings about human adaptations to arid environments and social interaction in such conditions. Finally, we wish to reach understandings of how social and political life ebbed and flowed in a political landscape of changing imperial rule.