Bones unearthed in Ashkelon at only known Philistine cemetery may reveal ancient mystery

[mitty14u2]

Source: Jerusalem Post

They were enigmatic and idiosyncratic Mediterranean tribe, noted in the Bible for their hatred of the ancient Israelites.

Now, following the analysis of an unprecedented 30-year excavation in the port city of Ashkelon of the remains from the only Philistine cemetery ever discovered, one of the biggest mysteries in archeology and academia may finally be solved.

“Archaeologists and scholars have long searched for the origin of the Philistines, and the discovery of the cemetery is poised to offer the key to this mystery,” the Leon Levy Expedition to Ashkelon announced on Sunday.

“Findings from the cemetery, dated from the 11th to the 8th centuries BCE, may well support the claim – long inferred and recorded in the Bible – that the Philistines were migrants to the shores of ancient Israel who arrived from lands to the west around the 12th century BCE.”

During an exhibit of the findings from the Leon Levy Expedition to Ashkelon at the Rockefeller Museum in east Jerusalem Sunday morning, the archeologists and scholars who led the excavation said new answers are beginning to emerge, redefining old theories.

Read more: http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Bones-unearthed-in-Ashkelon-at-only-known-Philistine-cemetery-may-reveal-ancient-mystery-459973

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Very interesting when then get DNA results, should make history.

[still_one]

1. wonder if they will find Samson

[Cirque du So-What]

2. Or Goliath

He'd stand out, for sure.

[still_one]

3. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++

[jberryhill]

4. My favorites are the Amalekites.

The Bible states that the Amalekites were so completely demolished, that their name has been erased from history!

So, to this day, no one remembers the name of the Amalekites!

[Cirque du So-What]

5. Nobody,huh?

YOU do, obviously

[jberryhill]

6. No, nobody remembers them

Exodus 17 records them being wiped out and the Lord says,at verse 14

"And the LORD said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua: for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven."

http://biblehub.com/kjv/exodus/17.htm

Hence, they have been utterly forgotten.

[Javaman]

18. ...

[Cirque du So-What]

19. Ohhh, Daveee!

[nightbloomer]

7. I dug in Ashkelon in the early 90's

A fascinating and beautiful site and a wonderful experience. I saw that they sat on this for 3 years so as not to inflame the situation there. This year is the last year of the dig at this site.

[Igel]

8. Luwians, perhaps.

That's one idea.

[Codeine]

16. I'd always assumed they were Pelesets.

So much of the ancient world is supposition; it will be nice to actually have some factual building blocks to add to the story.

[Alameda]

9. but didn't Golda

tell us there were no Palestinians?
"There were no such thing as Palestinians . When was there an independent Palestinian people with a Palestinian state? It was either southern Syria before the First World War, and then it was a Palestine including Jordan. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country away from them. They did not exist."?
I note a linguistic device....call them Palestineian sometimes...but that word derives from الفلسطيني and that translates as Filistine.

[closeupready]

10. An Israeli official also stated the same thing recently. Seems as if

some Israelis, particularly fundamentalists, have created a vocabulary that deliberately fails to account for inconvenient truths. How different is that from fundamentalists of any other kind? Not at all. To the contrary, willful ignorance is a hallmark of any and every kind of toxic fundamentalism.

[MousePlayingDaffodil]

13. Are you asserting that today's Palestinians . . .

. . . are the ethnic/historical descendants of the Philistines? If so, I am afraid that you are gravely mistaken.

Following the Roman suppression of the second Jewish revolt (under Bar Kochba) in 135 C.E., the Emperor Hadrian applied the term "Provincia Syria Palaestina" in place of "Provincia Judea,” the intent being to blot out the name and identification of the now destroyed Jewish province, replacing it with a mocking reference to the Jews' ancient (and long ago extinguished) enemies. In this regard, "Palaestina" was a Latinized version of the earlier Greek label "Philistine Syria," which referred to the Mediterranean coast area once occupied by the Philistine people noted in the Bible. Those "Philistine" people have no relationship at all to today's Palestinians. They were not, for instance, of Arabic extraction.

Facts matter.

[Alameda]

14. I suspect...

present day Palestinians are an amalgam of all the ethnic groups that have been in that land throughout the years...groups like the Nabataeans, Canania, Hebrews...and a long list

it is suspected present day Ashkenazim Jews actually have less genetic material that ties them to the land.


Yes, facts matter

http://mondoweiss.net/2008/09/israeli-historian-palestinians-are-biological-descendants-of-bibles-jews/

[thesquanderer]

20. re: "actually have less genetic material that ties them to the land."

If that were the sole criteria for land rights, this country goes back to the native Americans.

But so much land on this planet has been occupied by different people over the millennia. Even if you decide that the "first" occupiers (and by extension, either their real or apparent descendants) are the rightful ones, you can't necessarily determine who those people were.

Ultimately, borders/occupation are determined by politics and power. So in a sense, in reality, some facts don't matter.

[closeupready]

17. Yes, living humans don't dis-exist because Golda Meir said so.

Facts matter.

[Akicita]

11. Good read. Thanks for posting it.

[Yupster]

12. I always assumed them to be a Greek colony

We'll see soon.

[Igel]

15. That seems unlikely.

Mercenaries from the Sea Peoples also appeared at about the same time in Egyptian records, and they're color-coded as neither being Upper Egyptian (black), lower Egyptian (they distinguished the two ethnically), nor Semitic.

Those in the Egyptian records appear to be Indo-European names, but aren't clearly Hittite or Hurrian. Not Greek, either. Might be Anatolian, might be some tribe that hopped over the Greeks. We know there were Indo-European languages/groups that were swamped and wiped out during the waves of expansion out of the steppes and arboreal lands to their north.