The Iron Age lower settlement at Kabri revisited

ABSTRACT

During the 2017 excavation season at Tel Kabri, Iron Age remains were found cutting into the western part of the Middle Bronze Age palace. These remains consisted of a segment of a large structure and a series of sizable pits. Similar Iron Age remains were unearthed during previous soundings in Areas D and F of the excavation and were loosely dated to the Iron Age II. The ceramic assemblage from these soundings demonstrated a disproportionate number of imports and cooking pots, which prompted the excavators to suggest that the lower settlement was engaged in the processing of agricultural products connected to the nearby forts located elsewhere on the tell. A recent re-examination of the pottery from the previous excavations suggest that the forts could have only existed during the Iron Age IIA and IIC. Our examination of the pottery indicates that the imports can be dated to the Iron Age IIA, while the large number of cooking pots should mostly be dated to the Iron Age IIC. We would therefore like to suggest a new interpretation for the function of the lower settlement at Kabri during the Iron Age II in relation to the forts and the political reality in the Galilee at that time.     

ISOLATING CONNECTIONS – CONNECTING ISOLATIONS

The varied and distinct ways we connect can facilitate or impose isolation, our own or someone else's. Different forms of isolation are themselves interconnected and sometimes enrich our connecting. The relation between isolation and connection, we argue, is one of complementarity, like Calvino's ‘two inseparable and complementary functions of life …syntony, or participation in the world around us … [and] focalization or constructive concentration.’ Solitude sought can enhance connections. Imposed isolation weakens connections in ways both obvious and subtle. This contrast between sought and imposed underscores the influence of hierarchy and socially produced inequities, excesses of which fragment the social ties that could constrain or diminish these same inequities. Deep inequity degrades the quality of both connections and isolation, at significant costs to our health, ecology, economy, cultural diversity, and political vitality. From this vantage point, we cull ways to improve our syntony and our focalization, fulfilling by expressing those shared egalitarian moral sentiments that motivate connections of solidarity partly in the interest of being “left alone”.