This Week in the Ancient Near East

A new collection of radiocarbon dates from Jerusalem has clarified the westward expansion of the city in the Iron Age and helped archaeologists overcome the Hallstadt Plateau. You know, that dull and listless part of the radiocarbon curve? So why are we arguing so much? It’s a regular three ring circus, but with a shoutout to the real king of Jerusalem, B.B. King!

This week we’re talking about the discovery in Iran of a carved stone tube containing glittery red lipstick. Was it for women or men? Was it for fancy people or regular folks? Was it garish or tasteful? Who are we to judge? One way or another, pop is the word of the day!

Today we’re talking about the possibility that the famous site of Dura Europos – you know, the giant Hellenistic multicultural walled city with a synagogue, church and temples etc., had a twin, just six kilometers down the Euphrates River. A twin in Bucks County, Pennsylvania would be more surprising but you take what you can get.

The Late Bronze Age temple at Tell Azekah in the Judean Shephelah has us wondering, why does it face the sun, why is it so small, how often was it used, and how could you possibly have a wedding there? Not that we’re looking for a place, mind you. With an obvious and well deserved shoutout to Timbuk 3!

Today we’re talking about efforts to recreate woolly mammoths, apparently in order to 1) combat climate change, 2) cure cancer, and 3) re-wild the tundra. Our first reactions are, what? But our second reactions are a deep dive into the ethics of paleo-genomic research. Finally, there’s a shoutout to everyone’s favorite giant armadillo tank, Tarkus, and a rare reference to Tasha Yar. So there’s som...

A Roman medical office in southwestern Turkey has us talking medicine. Were the same instruments used for cataracts and hemorrhoids? What kind of insurance did gladiators have anyway? Our contestants are concerned about sanitary conditions, however. With an inevitable shoutout to Theodoric, Barber of York.

What was sleep like in antiquity and was it really that different from today? Aside from all the sheep next to you, the guy knapping flint at midnight, and having to climb a ladder and run across the rooftops in order to go to the bathroom, that is. 

A temple dedicated to Alexander the Great at the Mesopotamian site of Girsu has us asking questions. Was this the meta-crossover event of the century or just some guys in an office making some plaques for a foreign chump passing through? Our contestants disagree but give a special shoutout to Molly Pitcher, heroine of the New Jersey Turnpike!

Plant remains from the Philistine temples at Tell es Safi (aka Gat) have us asking questions. Sure they’re lovely seasonal items but were they tastefully displayed? How about those strong parallels in Greece? And for the very first time the listener stops by with an unexpected tale of a visit to tunnels beneath Nineveh, newly liberated from ISIS!

Today we’re talking about what it means when dogs wags their tails, and then working backward about 15,000 years to the question of their domestication. Sure dogs help, herd and guard us humans, but in the process did they help us learn to love? If Scooby and Shaggy are any indication, then the answer is clear. With a special shoutout to Tucker, ace goldendoodle of the Upper West Side!

The growing ability of Artificial Intelligence to transliterate and translate Mesopotamian texts has us asking questions. Will AI be a force for good, putting texts into the hands of the people or will it throw folks out of work and let charlatans push out nonsense? You're asking us? Anyway, as a bonus, our contestants offer touching memories of their first encounters with Assyriologists!

Psychoacoustic search at the Sanctuary of Zeus on Mount Lycaion shows that the builders constructed an entire site around sound. You could hear everything from the cheap seats, but was the experience really social rather than acoustic? With special shoutouts to The Who, Emerson, Lake and Palmer, and Boston area favorite, Human Sexual Response!

Like most people, the find of an obsidian core on the seafloor off Capri has us asking, how did a chunk of the Neolithic period’s favorite shiny stone get to the bottom of the Mediterranean and, was a sunken canoe involved? After answering “who knows,” our (non-sailing) contestants are left to ponder the bravery of those who sailed in the Neolithic and ask, was it such a big deal?

In our triumphant return we’re laser focused on new radiocarbon dates from destructions at Late Bronze Age and Iron Age Gezer in Israel. These destructions might be the doing of better dated Egyptian kings like Merneptah, and could link back to events described in the Bible. So not really like a laser, more bouncing around like a ping pong ball.

This Week in the Ancient Near East is taking a short break while one member of our plucky band recovers from a nasty illness. We’ll be back soon with all new episodes and the same old schtick!

A burial cave on the Western Mediterranean island of Minorca dating to 1000 BCE contained 200 individuals and wooden boxes of dyed human hairs. The hairs were full of drugs, which leads our contestants to ask just what kind of parties were going on down there and why we weren’t invited. A few flashbacks to the 1970s result.

Excavation of Iron Age cesspits in Jerusalem has us thinking many things. These include 1) wow, they actually recovered protozoa that caused dysentery, how’d they do that, and, 2) umm, Jerusalem elites were really unhealthy. Our contestants try to keep the juvenile humor to a minimum.

A new article suggests that an elite Copper Age burial in southern Spain belonged to a young woman, not a man, and that society was a matriarchy. Our contestants are a little conflicted about reconstructing society starting with a single tooth, but it sounds a bit like Barbie Land, which is cool with us.

A cave near Beth Shemesh in Israel seems to have been a Late Roman portal to the underworld. How do we know? Did the detached skulls tell us? Our contestants take pro and anti-necromancy stances, but in a good way.

A new report on Natufian aerophones from Eynan-Mallaha has us wondering, what’s an aerophone? It’s a bone with holes, sort of like a flute or a bird call. So are humans replicating bird sounds to catch birds or to make music? Is all this ritual or is it just hunting? All the same, really, isn't it? 

A new inscription from Jerusalem’s Pilgrim’s Road looks like a receipt from the Early Roman period. It’s also on a piece of stone, which seems difficult to file. We’ve got Emily Dickinson and emojis, religious observance, and the suspicious relationship between writing and literacy. With a special shoutout to Major Deegan and his expressway!

Pits with dismembered hands at the Hyksos site of Tell el Dab’a/Avaris have us asking, what is it with ancient Egypt and dismemberment? Sure the king wants to permanently defeat his enemies – really, who doesn’t want that - but isn’t all this hand chopping business just, well, performance art? It’s our most hands on episode yet!

The discovery of grapes pips at Late Antique Avdat in the northern Negev has us asking questions, like who makes wine in the desert anyway, and how do you get the wine from the desert to the people? Is this a story of wine fancying monks or Breaking Bad style middlemen? Pour a glass and settle in with our contestants!

A new report on Iron Age temples in Jordan has us puzzled. How different are the cults to national gods and their shrines on both sides of the Jordan River, you know, really? And if a Moabite walked into a Judean bar, would you know? Watch us go from a very small building to huge questions about world religions!

The discovery of a tavern at Early Dynastic Lagash has us asking questions. Who drank there, who ran the joint, and how did you pay come to mind, along with the obvious problems of drunks and pickled eggs. With a special shoutout to wise bartenders everywhere from Siduri to Sam Malone!