Three Finds and a Greeting.

2008 was a great year for Archaeology in the Holy Land. Various expeditions investigated many ancient sites, and some key sites were developed very nicely for tourism. Caesarea has a multi-media center in its harbor; Masada now includes a new museum for its small finds, and more. For me this has been a very fruitful year as well. I guided numerous groups and private orders, all over Israel, and was privileged to teach and guide growing numbers of tour guide students.

To demonstrate the nature of finds made this year, here is a report on three of them.

A. The Exciting Find
In the ongoing project of sifting the debris from the Temple Mount, I was privileged to share an exciting moment when visiting the site. On the very day I brought a nice Canadian couple to volunteer in the project, we were very fortunate that Dr. G. Barkai, co-director of the project, presented to us a very special silver coin that was discovered by another volunteer a few weeks earlier. It turns out that on the day we came, the coin came back from the labs, after the cleaning process. It proved to be a "Rebellion Shekel" coin. Such coins were minted when the Jews rebelled against the Romans in the years 66-70 CE, and they were used for paying the "temple dues" in Jerusalem. The fact that this very coin actually came from the Temple Mount in Jerusalem was an amazing coincidence, and holding it in my hand, I was very excited!.

B. The Golden Find
Not too far from the sifting project, on the western side of the City of David, another expedition proved to be very fruitful. In December 2008 Dr. Doron Ben Ami and his team discovered a hoard of 264 gold coins from the 7th century CE. They were discovered in a niche of a wall, and I believe they were hidden by a Christian resident of Jerusalem just before the Parthian invasion of Jerusalem in 614 CE. The resident probably perished in the Parthian attack, and his hoard waited patiently for nearly 1300 years to be discovered by a young British volunteer participating in the excavation.

C. The Puzzling Find
No doubt the most famous find made in Israel in the last few years was the discovery of the tomb of King Herod "the Great" in Herodium. I have been following this discovery from its first announcement, and participated a few times in these excavations.
When Prof. Netzer made the first announcement of the discovery, he presented several fragments of a well decorated stone coffin (Sarcophagus). Although he failed to recover an inscription among the remains, his contention was that this can only be of King Herod himself, because Herod was buried in Herodium, and this is the only coffin found. But in November 2008 Netzer presented at a press conference more finds from Herodium, including fragments of not one Sarcophagus - but three (!).
As long as no inscription is found, the basic question of who was buried in these coffins remains a mystery. Netzer believes they were indeed of Herod, and two of his family members, but until an inscription is found this remains as an unsolved riddle.