The

BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIS
.or-

Published by

THE AMERICAN SCHOOLS OF ORIENTAL RESEARCH

126 Inman Street, Cambridge, Mass.

Vol. XXXIII February, 1970 No. 1

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Fig. 1. Jewish ossuary from Jerusalem (18" long, 10" wide, 10?" high). The gabled lid bears
the inscription f'wl 'Sheol,' and the decoration between the familiar rosettes is remin-
iscent of the entrances to tombs in the Kidron valley. From Rahmani, Israel Exploration
Journal,XVIIH(1968), P1. 23.
2 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII
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PETERBOROUGH. PRI•TING

Contents

Secondary Burials in Palestine, by Eric M. Meyers ...................................... 2

Cum ulative Subject Index to BA 29
.................................................................................
Archaeological N ews and Views
............................... ..............................................29

Secondary Burials in Palestine

ERICM. MEYERS
Duke University

One of the most prevalent and yet least understood of ancient Palestin-
ian burial customs is that of ossilegium, or secondaryburial. Such a practice
is characterizedby the collection of skeletalized remains at some point after
the flesh had wasted away and by their deposition in a new place of repose.
This type of burial contrasts with the more familiar primary inhumation
which transpiresshortly after death and remainsundisturbed.
By and large the frequency with which secondaryburials appear in the
long history of Palestinian tombs has been overlooked. Perhaps this over-
sight derives from the traditional view which held such a practice alien to
the spirit of Semitic peoples, for whom disturbing the repose of the dead
was thought to be so repugnant. Such an attitude is reflectedin the biblical
statement of Numbers 19:15: "Whoever in the open fields touches one who
is slain with a sword, or a dead body, or a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be
unclean seven days (RSV 19:16)." Thus it is striking to note the repeated
occurrence of second burials which could only be effected by human trans-
fer. This apparent contradiction no doubt explains why so many elaborate
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 3

theories have arisen to interpret this custom, which seemed to indicate a dis-
respectful treatment accordedto the dead. However, because of the scholarly
focus on bone containers themselves, ossuary burials have often escaped such
theorization.
Palestinian archaeologistshave usually regardedsecondary burial as cal-
lous and primitive despite the often elaborate tombs in which these burials
are found. By way of explanation they relate them to nomadic peoples whose
wanderings would have required two burials: at the time of death and then
a later transfer to the family or tribal burial ground. Building on the re-
searches of classical scholars, others have maintained that once the corpse
was devoid of flesh it was no longer in need of care, the "soul" being no
longer sentient.
This study will attempt to offer a new perspective which will allow for
an understanding of all forms of secondary burials; the weaknesses in the
above theories will hopefully become apparent. We shall also attempt to re-
late the practices of ossilegium to notions of afterlife in ancient Palestine.
This is a somewhat hazardous task because of the absence of written doc-
uments in the earlier periods. However, the biblical evidence is extremely
helpful in explaining a good deal of the material in somewhat later times
and may well provide insights into the meaning of the earlierpractices.
Secondary Burials from Earliest to Biblical Times
It is not impossible that the Neolithic plastered skulls of Jericho repre-
sent one of the earliest stages in the development of secondary burial prac-
tices. The choice of the skull as an object of veneration is quite understand-
able: the ancients must have already concluded that the intellectual powers
of man resided in the head. In wanting to retain and preserve the skull,
they hoped to keep nearby their ancestor'swisdom. This would indicate the
existence of a belief in the intimate connection between the corpse with
flesh and the corpse without flesh. Why else the preservationor treatment
of skeletal remains?
In attempting to understand the Jericho skulls and other tomb materials
from high antiquity we turn to the evidence from (atal Huyiik, the largest
Neolithic site in the Near East. This site covers the millennium from ca.
6500 to 5600 B.C. and provides some most startling discoveries. What is
most impressive is the fact that secondary burials are entirely normative for
that community.' Moreover, the marvelous wall paintings found in homes
and in sacred shrines offer a fruitful avenue of interpretationsince they por-
tray various phases of a burial procedure which is quite obviously of singu-
lar importanceto the community.

1. J. Mellaart, Catal Hiiyiik (1967), pp. 204ff. For more detailed reporting on the burials
one may consult Mellaart's preliminary reports in Anatolian Studies, XII (1961), 41-65; XIII
(1963), 43-102; XIV (1964), 39-119.
4 'THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

The techniques of ossilegium found at Qatal Hiiyiik are not unlike

those attested in Palestine in various periods. Disarticulated burials were
found beneath the floors and sleeping platforms, though care was taken to
preserve the skeleton in its anatomicalposition. Such burialswere also found
in the so-called vulture shrines over a period of a century and a half. In
House E IV, 2, three skulls were found in a shallow grave beneath the floor

Fig. 2. Transcript of a wall painting from Catal Hiiyiik, Shrine VII, 21 (ca. 6200 B.C.). This
is part of a great frieze showing six human beings undergoing excarnation by vultures.
From Mellaart, Anatolian Studies, XIV (1964), P1. XIIb.

and piles of disarticulated bones were found beneath the platforms. This
suggests a strong sense of kinship with the dead such as is found at pre-
pottery Jericho.
The presence of ochre-burialsperhaps can be compared with the plas-
tered skulls of Jericho. Aside from ochre being applied to the bare skull, as
for example was the case in House E VI, 8, the bones of the trunk and arms
were also coated. In some cases green and blue paint was applied. This type
of procedure, however, proved to be the rare exception. Some of the skulls
were preservedin cloth bags while other bone piles were preserved in their
original parcels of cloth or skins.
The wall paintings from the two vulture shrines (Fig. 2) indicate that
the dead bodies were taken away from the village where they were cleaned
of their flesh in a process of excarnationcarried out by birds of prey. After-
wards the bones were collected and reburied. Mellaart believes that this
took place during a spring festival when funeral rites were held. Another
painting in Shrine VI. B. 1 (Fig. 3), shows the objects familiar from the
excavations under the sleeping platforms, namely human skulls with gaping
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 5

mouths and empty eye-sockets. The excavator conjectures that this painting
represents metamorphosis for emergence from the grave. Also pictured are
gabled houses which probablyrepresentthe house of excarnation.
Whatever conception of afterlife may lie behind such practices, we may
emphasize the very real sense of continuity that was felt between the realm
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Fig. 3. Polychrome wall painting from the north wall of a Catal Hiiyiik shrine. The upper
register probably depicts a mortuary structure in which the dead were placed for ex-
carnation, which is suggested by the skulls shown in the lower register. From Mellaart,
Anatolian Studies, XIII (1963), P1. XXVIb.

of the living and the realm of the dead. In requiring excarnation as a pre-
liminary to final interment, the inhabitants of Qatal Hiiyiik preshadow the
much later practice of the Persians and the Parsees who after excarnation
preserved the bones of the dead in astodans or ossuaries. In being brought
back to the houses of the living the deceased as it were continued to par-
take of the experiences of the living, while living could enjoy the near-
ness of the dead. ,the
In turning to Palestine, the evidence for secondary burials in
the Chalcolithic period is considerable and is known usually because of the
domiform ossuaries found in the coastal region in such places at Hederah,
Benei Beraq, Givatayim, Azor, Ben Shemen, and Tel Aviv. While many of
these ossuaries are house-shaped,others are in the shape of animals. Although
the bones were collected into individual ossuaries, in several instances some
bones were merely laid in bundles or were laid out in piles alongside the
ossuaries.That these cases are contemporarydemonstratesa relationshipamong
6 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

these several variations in the technique of ossilegium. Thus it is unlikely

that those buried outside the actual ossuary were to share any lesser future
than those buried inside the ossuaries.
Because no such individual ossuaries have been found in the south
some scholars have believed that the custom of bone-gatheringwas restricted
to the coastal plain. It is just as important to note, however, that secondary
burials without ossuaries do occur as far south as Beersheba. This suggests
that there is no real discontinuity between the northern and southern cul-
tures as has often been thought. Most recently the possibility has been rais-
ed that the coastal cemeteries may well have served the so-called Negeb cul-
ture as well because of the presence of secondaryburials in the south.
With the demise of Chalcolithic culture and the beginning of the Early
Bronze age or Proto-Urbanperiod, communal burials were established along-
side the nomadic encampments which dotted Palestine at strategic locations.
Not surprisingly many of the collective burials made in artificial caves are
secondary. Tomb A 94 at Jericho is a case in point. Though all but the
skulls were subsequently cremated, the bones in the tomb had been collect-
ed and brought to the communal burial place. It is intriguing to speculate
that secondary burials were directly related to a semi-nomadicway of life,
but the attestationof such a custom in settled periods as well shows the need
for caution in such speculation.
One of the characteristicsof these early secondary burials is the fre-
quent absence of long bones. In Jericho tombs A 94 and K 2, they have
been cremated or discarded to make room for careful preservation of the
skulls.2 At EB I Gezer jars not nearly large enough to hold all of the disarti-
culated bones were utilized for the secondary burial of human skeletalized
remains.3 These examples need not astonish, since the preservationof only
part of a skeleton is a regular feature of secondary burials in Palestine. It
is apparent that all the skeletal remains of a deceased person did not require
preservation in order for future life to be achieved. When we take into ac-
count the nature of mythopoeic thought, which provides a very good frame-
work for understanding the practicesof high antiquity and where the differ-
entiation between death and life was not accentuated, it is not strange
at all to find only part of a body standing for all of a man.
The recent excavated cemetery at Bab edh-Dhra' has brought to light
further evidence for disarticulatedburials in the period between the great
nomadic intrusions. These burials provide one of the most exciting archaeo-
logical discoveriesin recent years. Secondaryburials are found in all but the
final phase of the cemetery, which extends roughly from 3200-2200 B.C.
2. K. Kenyon, Jericho I (1960), 4, 22-25; cf. also her later views in Jericho II (1965), 3,
11, 550. For a general discussion of secondary burials in this period see D. Gilead, Palestine
Exploration Quarterly, C (1968), 16-27.
3. R. A. S. Macalister, Gezer I (1912), p. 78.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 7

The earliest or shaft burial phases of Bab edh-Dhra' have close affinities to
burials of the Proto-Urban period at Jericho. The picture of the neat little
piles of skeletalized remains with the skulls separated from the long bones
is most impressive (Fig. 4). One is no less impressed with the great care
that was lavished on the tomb and with the quality of the tomb furnishings
themselves. Collected remains were placed on a mat or platform rather than
left on the floor. Several figurines have been found in some of the bone
piles, an occurrence which makes the existence of a belief in a life beyond
-the grave all the more probable.4

..
.

lot:; Iall
.
,5w

Fig. 4. Undisturbed chamber of Tomb A 69 at Bab edh-Dhr '. Note the basalt cup at left,
the disarticulated bone pile on a mat in the center (skulls separated from long bones),
and part of the tomb's pot group at the right. From Lapp, Jerusalem Through the Ages,
P1. 1:2.

The charnel houses date to the third phase of the cemetery, which cor-
responds to EB II-III. These funerary buildings are rectangular mudbrick
structures and contained huge quantities of disarticulated remains and pot-
tery. Some of the pottery contained bones. Most likely the great cemetery
served as a burial ground for the Cities of the Plain. It seems unlikely, how-
ever, that before transfer to the cemetery these groups of deceased were de-
carnated by boiling as the excavator suggests. Perhaps at this time excarna-
tion was still practiced. This could accoun't for the delicate bones of the
skull being well preserved as they were at ?atal Hiiytik. The fact that the
4. For the most recent discussions of this material see P. W. Lapp, BASOR, No. 189 (Feb.
1968), pp. 12-41; Jerusalem Through the Ages (1969), pp. 26-33.
8 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

biblical writers so strongly threaten excarnation by birds of prey and or

beasts as a severe punishment for sin suggests that excarnationwas still known
in biblical times (Deut. 28:26; Jer. 7:33, 16:4, 19:7, 34:20; Ps. 79:2).
The final phase of the cemetery at BAb edh-Dhra' is marked by the
appearanceof cairns and by the absence of secondaryburials. The cairn bur-
ials are presently attributed to the post-urbanphase or to the destroyersof
the fortified town in the 23rd century.

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Fig. 5. One of the charnel houses from Bab edh-Dhra'. Disarticulated bone piles and quantities
of pottery appear on the cobbled floor. Photo by Paul WV. Lapp.

The collective secondary burials of the Middle Bronze I period have

long been recognized and interpreted as representing a semi-nomadiccul-
ture. Indeed at a first glance it seems quite compelling to explain such a
phenomenon in terms of the tribal burial area associatedwith such a group.
However, one of the weaknesses of this theory, which certainly does not
apply to the Bab edh-Dhra' material or to the settled culture of the Chal-
colithic period, is that it cannot be applied to the Dagger Tombs or articu-
lated burial groups at Jericho which are contemporarywith the disarticul-
lated groups of Jericho.
Secondary burials of varying sorts are now well attested in a variety of
locations in MBI Palestine: 'Ain es-Simiyeh (Mirzbaneh), Jericho, Lachish,
Megiddo, Tell el-'Ajjul, el-Jib, Khirbet Kuifin, Hablet el-'Amid, and most
recently Tiberias and el-Fil.5 Through the excavations at el-Fl (Jebel Qa-
5. For Tiberias see V. Tzaferis, Israel Exploration Journal, XVIII (1968), 15-19; for el-Fill see
provisionally W. G. Dever's Hebrew Union College Jerusalem School Newsletter of January,
1968. For further references consult P. W. Lapp, Dhahr Mirzbdneh Tombs (1966), pp. 40ff.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 9

'aqir) reiterate what has long been known about such burial customs, they
do provide some additional information(Fig. 6). Unusual features in a num-
ber of the tombs at this site are the body-recess,lamp niche, and panels with
graffiti on them. The last of these suggests a rather vivid conception of aft-
erlife and provides important new data. The beautifully preserved tombs
probably were cut by professional grave diggers, and it is amazing to find a
single disarticulatedburial in such an elaboratesetting.

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Fig. 6. Interior of a shaft tomb from cemetery B, Jebel Qa'aqir, ca. 2000 B.C. Note two dis-
articulated burials, part of a sheep or goat carcass (even the animal burial is secondary!),
the single grave offering and small amphoriskos. Photo by T. A. Rosen, courtesy of
William G. Dever.

At Mirzbineh, too, the carefully hewn tomb chambers in most cases

contained only the remains of a single adult. One of the curious character-
istics of this cemetery is that no group of bones or particularbone such as
the skull was required in the secondary deposition of the remains. Another
common feature is that a layer of soft lime was built up under the bone
piles. Some of the bone piles seem merely to have been dumped from a con-
tainer to the floor. In Jericho Tomb J 21 one of these textile containers was
partially preserved. In contrast to this is the example of secondary articula-
tion of bones in Mirzbineh Tomb B6 where the skull was laid topmost over
a pair of femurs. This parallels very closely the later Jewish custom of laying
10 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

out neat little bonepiles with the skull topmost.In still othertombsat Mirz-
baneh a mat replacedthe beddingof lime, a practicewhich is also attested
in late Hellenisticbone chambers.Paul Lapp, the excavatorof the Mirz-
baneh tombs, notes that such practicescontinue among some local Arab
groupseven today.Similarcustomshave alsobeen observedby P. Bar-Adon
among contemporary PalestinianBeduin.6
Given the widespreadprovenanceof secondaryburialsin this period
and the existenceof a native traditionof ossilegium,we find it difficult
to accept the argumentfor the particularorigins of Lapp'sIntermediate
Bronzeage peopleon the basisof similarsecondaryburialcustomselsewhere.
Moreoverit is reallynot surprisingto find secondaryburialsalsoin the MB II
periodin Palestine.Severalexampleswill suffice.
In the MB II cemeteryat Munhatain the upperJordanValley there
are collectivesecondarypit burialsin all the tombs.This is quite unlike the
usual MB II B customof reusingMB I shaft tombs.Most of the human
skeletal remainsare skulls with a disproportionately small numberof long
bones. The potterywas mostlywhole or smashedin situ, indicatingdeposi-
tion at the time of collectivesecondaryburial.7The closestparallelto the
MunhatamaterialcomesfromJerichoTombA I where thereare preserved
eight or nine craniabut only a smallnumberof long bones.Perhapsslightly
earlierthan this tomb groupare the 1\B II A tombsat Ras el-'Ain,where
rectangularstone-linedpits are coveredwith slabs.In the walls of the tombs
are recesseswhich evidentlyservedas ossuaries.8These burialsthus repre-
sent yet anothertypeof tombin whichsecondaryinhumationoccurs.

Secondary Burials from Biblical to Hellenistic Times

With such a lengthy traditionof bone gatheringin Palestineit is not

strange to find this practice continuing into the Iron age. Certain typolo-
gical features of Iron age tombs have long been a puzzle to archaeologists
and only recently have there been attempts to understand them in terms of
the customof ossilegium.L.Y. Rahmaniof the IsraelDepartmentof Anti-
quities has greatly enhanced our understanding of a number of these fea-
tures.9 Perhaps the most outstanding characteristicof Iron age tombs to be
viewed in light of secondary burial practices is the communal ossuary or
repositorywhich was adoptedto insure the safekeepingof the bones of
formerburials.

6. E. Stern, ed., Bulletin of the Israel Exploration Society, Reader A (1965), pp. 70-71 (Hebrew).
7. See provisionally J. Perrot, Syria, XLIII (1966), 50, and the forthcoming article of A. Fursh-
pan of tie University of Connecticut to whom I am indebted for this information.
8. J. H. Illiffe, Quarterly of the Department of Antiquities in Palestine, V (1936), 113-126;
J. Van Seters, The Hyksos (1966), pp. 45ff.
9. Notably in Israel Exploration Journal, VIII (1955), 101-105 and XVII (1967), 67-100.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 11

Unlike secondary burials in the earlier periods, primary and secondary

interments often occur in the same tomb chamber in the Iron age. When a
corpse became decarnatethe bones were simply swept into the communal os-
suary or removed to a repository.Also, Jewish law enjoined a speedy burial,
usually on the day of death. It is virtually impossible, however, to determine
the place of initial burial even when the tomb is undisturbed.The deceased
who died far away from the family tomb had to have a temporarytomb at
the location of death until decompositionwas complete. Only then were his
bones gathered and transportedto the family tomb. One of the most inter-
esting examples of such a case is found in the story of the reburialby Dav-
id of the bones of Saul (and his sons) and of Jonathan (II Sam. 21:13; cf.
I Chron. 10:12 and another source in I Sam. 31:11-13) and the vigil of
Rizpeh over their remains. The II Samuel account is the only case in the
Bible where the period of decomposition is noted. From 22:10ff. It may be
deduced that this period took approximatelyeight months, from May until
December, after which the bones of Saul and Jonathan were interred in the
family tomb of Kish in Benjamin. The excarnation motif, so prominent
in a positive way at Qatal Hilyiik, also clearly underlies the statement in
Jeremiah 7:33. "And the dead bodies of this people will be food for the
birds of the air, and for the beasts of the earth; and none will frighten
them away." Without someone like Rizpeh to ward off the flesh-eating birds
and animals it would become virtually impossible to effect a proper second-
ary burial by Israelitestandards.
The non-Palestinian tomb group of Hadhramaut in southwest Arabia
has typological affinities to numerous Palestinian tombs and also to the
Transjordaniancemeteries of Sahab B and 'Amman. We discuss this tomb
group out of chronological sequence since it offers strong albeit indirect
evidence that many Iron age tombs contain secondary burials, the bones of
which had been brought from afar.
Tomb A5 at Hadhramautis a single chamber, horseshoe in shape, with
a solitary bench cut into the eastern side. The entrance fill and interior de-
posits were undisturbed at the time of excavation. The skeletal remains were
incomplete yet neatly piled up with the crania lying on their bases separated
from their skeletons. The burials were apparently brought in at intervals in
their disarticulatedstates. Tomb A6, although disturbed, presents some note-
worthy features which may shed some light on similar Palestinian tombs. The
characteristicfeature here is the recess, six of which are cut into the north-
ern and western arcs of the horseshoe-shapedchamber. The presence of
disarticulatedbone piles again leads to the conclusion that this chamber was
intended for secondaryburials only and that the recesses were used as bone
depositories as they were, for example, in Gezer Tombs 58 and 59. Though
12 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

these tombs date to the late Iron age, they at least raise the possibility that
many Palestinian tomb features represent the second burials of those who
died elsewhere rather than of those whose first and second burials were in
the same tomb.10
In turning to the Palestinian evidence from the Iron age we may ob-
serve a number of tomb features which become fairly standard by Iron II
and continue into the later periods. The rectangular tombs of the Sea Peo-
ples (900 Cemetery) and of the Philistines (500 Cemetery) at Tell Fara'

Nib-,

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Fig. 7. Terra-cotta Mycenean larnax from Crete, definitely used as a bone chest, and in the
shape of an ordinary dwelling. After Tsountas and Manatt, The Mycenaean Age. p. 137,
Fig. 51.

(south) exhibits several of these features, namely, the bone chamber, the pit
repository, and the central depression;" these are best understood in the
context of secondary burials. Aside from their rectangularity, only recently
observed as being influenced by the Aegean world, these features are also
associated with secondary burials in Aegean tomb groups. This coincidence
raises the question of the circumstancesof their introduction into Palestine.

10. G. Caton-Thompson, The Tombs and Moon Temple of Hureidha (Hadhramaut) (1944),
pp. 81ff., 90ff.
11. W. M. F. Petrie, Beth Pelet I (1930), Pls. XVIII-XIX; cf. J. Waldbaum, American Journal
of Archaeology, LXX (1966), 331-340.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 13

The elaborateLB II tomb at Ras Shamra ascribedto the wealthy

Aegean elementof the populationmay well providea clue in what appears
to be a culturalborrowingat Tell Fara'.12That at Ugarit there are second-
ary burialsinto a family tomb is not to be dismissedtoo lightly since eco-
nomics did not dictate the propensityfor bone gathering.In Mycenean
tombssimilarto the Ras Shamraones, numerouslarnakes(Fig. 7) or bone
chestshave been found.'3Only recentlysomelarnakeshave been excavated
at Arkhanesin Crete in which only the skullswere reburied.14 In somein-
stanceslarnakesoccur alongsidethe simplertype of secondaryburial into
bone piles,offeringa parallelwhich supportsour interpretation of the Chal-
colithicmaterialswhere both simplesecondaryburialsand secondaryburials
into house-urnswereattestedsideby side.
The 900 Cemetery Tell Fara'containedno Philistinepotterybut
a't
includedwaresvery close to those in the 500 Cemeterydatedto the end of
LB II. Tomb 934, the largestof this complex,gives some evidencethat its
centraldepressionwas used as a sortof communalossuary.Off the central
depressionwhat appearto be two repositories are cut into the side. Though
the rest of the tomb group shows no clear indicationof secondaryburial
but only the movingaside of earlierinterments,it is quite easy to under-
standhow separatecompartments, featureof this tombgroup,
a characteristic
came to be used in secondaryburials.Tomb 542 of the 500 Cemeteryin
facthasa compartment thatis laterusedas a bonechamber.
Still more evidencefor the customof bone collectingcomes from the
200 Cemeteryat Tell Fara',which also dates to Iron I and is attributedto
the influence of the Sea Peoples. The type of grave here is the cist grave
of the much earlier type known from the micro-dolmeniccist cemetery of
Ghassul.In Tomb 201, the largestof this group, 126 skeletonswere recov-
ered;in Tomb 239 twenty-sixskullswere uncovered.These burialsthen are
best understood as secondary. Also at Tell Zeror secondaryburials into cist
graves are found where it appears that other Sea Peoples (possibly Tjekker
warriors) were buried.'5
In short, it is a distinct possibility that many of the innovative features
associatedwith secondaryburialsin Iron age Palestinemay well be derived
from Aegean prototypes already known in the Levant by LB II-Iron I. The
strong Israelite attachment to the family tomb and the well-established cus-
tom of secondaryburial doubtlesslyfacilitatedthe processby which such
architecturalfeatures were adapted; the bone gathering practices of the Ae-
gean peoples could only have reinforced the correspondingIsraelite customs.

12. See C. F. A. Schaeffer, Ugaritica I (1939), pp. 77ff., 90ff. and Figs. 60-71.
13. See A. J. B. Wace, Archacologia, LXXXII (1932), 1-146, and E. Vermeule, Journal of
Hellenic Studies, LXXXV (1965), 123-148.
14. A. Sakellarakis, Archaeology, XX (1967), 276-281.
15. K. Ohata, ed., Tel Zeror 11 (1967), pp. 35-41.
14 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

There are a number of other tombs which also seem best understood
in terms of the !traditionof ossilegium. Tomb 58 at Gezer (Fig. 8) offers
convincing proof that Iron age recesses were used for storing collected re-
mains. The sunken rectangularrecessesmost closely resemble those in Tomb
A6 at Hadhramaut. Tomb 58 is a single-chamberedbench tomb dated to
Iron I. Macalister correctly identifies the circular cells as ossuaries for bone
piles. Moreover, both tombs conitainedPhilistine ware. Tomb 59 was pro-
bably used for secondaryinterments. Many human bones were collected into
vessels, some into large sherds, small jugs, bowls, and flat saucers. This is
precisely the type of veneration for human remains one would expect in a
secondary burial.

::
:::
:::
::::
::,
I--~-:i::::::--~ ~L
Is:::
---:::
:::::j-::::-
:::::::::::
:::: -:::i:::
::i:::: -...:
::?____:::::-:_---
:?a,::

::::

~iiiiiii-i::
.:.iii ::::::-:
W- ..-...:.

:::::i::::
:::_ ~--i:--:--:- :::::::::
:
:::::
:-:-_
:_:_--::_-::i
:i:8-:-
-::_:::a::::
::::i::
:--:::-:
::::: . ?:::::~r:
-:-:::::i:::::::_
i-;iiiiiiiDiii~i::i'~
':'::: ::::::
- ...:....
:::::::::i::
:::
::: :
::_::-~a-:::::-:i-:i:-:i:__-:

Tomb 58 Tomb 59
Fig. 8. Gezer tombs. After Macalister, Gezer III, P1. LVI.

Tomb 96 from Gezer dates somewhat later, to ca. 975 B.C., and is ty-
pologically closer to Tomb 58. Unlike the benches in Tomb 58 and 59, which
were roughly rectangular, the benches in Tomb 96 follow the natural con-
tours of the chamber. At the south end are two small recesses below the
floor level. They were probably intended to be used as ossuaries, for they
contained over 200 burials. This type of recess may well be the typological
link between the earlier material and the later 10th century repository.16
Tomb 54 at Tell en-Nasbeh with its discoid recess at the east end is
also probably related to these innovative features. Though disturbed, fifty-
four jawbones were discovered,strongly suggesting that this recess also may
have been used as an ossuary for human remains. Similarly, Tomb 5 gives
some indication of being used for secondary burials. The ledges apparently
were used for the primaryburials and the chamber at the rear for collection

16. For all this material see Gezer I, pp. 321-325; 336-337.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 15

of skeletal remains.17 This arrangement,which is highly reminiscent of the

Aegean tomb models at Mycene and Tell Fara', foreshadows the later Pales-
tinian bone chamber.
The more standardIron II repositoriessuch as are found in Tombs 120,
218, 219, and 223 at Lachish or in Beth Shemesh Tombs 2, 3, 4, 7 and 8
clearly were designed to provide a compartment for storing earlier burials,
though it is difficult to ascertain with certainty the place of primary burial.
As more and more family members came to be interred with their fathers,
their remains were gathered into the communal ossuary. The pushing aside
of former burials indicates that primary burial did occur in the same tomb
but it need not be interpreted as harsh treatment of the dead, as has often
been suggested, since the emphasis is on joining one's fathers in the very
same grave.
The Relation of Secondary Burials to Israelite Conceptions of Man and of Sheol
Viewed against the background of secondary burials in Palestine, the
biblical idiom "to be gathered (n'sp) to one's fathers" takes on new mean-
ing. In this expression may be discerned the echoes of a time when second-
ary burial was practiced in pastoral Palestine. Surely this is one of the most
striking of all idioms for death in the Bible: "The Lord said to Moses, 'Go
up into this mountain of Ab'arim, and see that land which I have given to
the people of Israel. And when you have seen it, you also shall be gathered
to your people, as your brother Aaron was gathered' " (Num. 27:12-13). Of
all the patriarchsonly Moses and Aaron are buried outside of Palestine, but
it may be assumed that neither was denied entry into Sheol. Moses' denial
of entry into the promised land is taken by P to be the result of his own sin
of pride (Num. 20: 10-14), while the Deuteronomic account explains this
punishment as a consequence of the sinfulness of the people (Deut. 1:37;
3:26; 4:21). Whatever the reason for not reaching Palestine, it may be stress-
ed that the punishment was not to be carriedover in death. Moses and Aaron
are gathered to their poeple in a larger sense and the justification for using
the "gathered"idiom with reference to them is thus telling.
Because of ancient Israel's hesitancy about physical contact with the
defiling dead, her preoccupation with ossilegium must necessarily reflects a
distinct theology of afterlife which made care of the bones take precedence
over the reluctance for touching them. The Israelite view of the individual
as nephesh must constitute the basis for such a theology. According to that
view man is seen as a solitary unit even in death, when the bones of a man
possess at least a shadow of their strength in life. The body in the Israelite
conception is merely the soul in its outward form while the bones of a dead

17. W. F. Bad6, Some Tombs of Tell en-Nashbeh Discovered in 1929 (1931), pp. 18-33; C. C.
McCown, 'ell en-Nasbeh 1: Archaeological and Historical Results (1947), pp. 82ff.
16 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

man represent a manifestation of that soul in a weakened state. After all,

the dead still mutter as shades (Isa. 8:19; 29:4) and feel the worms gnawing
at them (Job 14:22; Isa. 66:24). Hence the soul retains a very intimate con-
nection with whatever may constitute the physical remains of the dead. Even
in death, the unitary quality of the individual is not destroyed. The sugges-
tion that the bones once devoid of their flesh are no longer in need of care,
therefore, must be rejected. Death merely indicated a diminution rather than
a cessation of the power to exist.
Such a unitary conception of the individual and a preoccupationwith
the remains of men only reinforcesour understandingof the thought patterns
of the ancients. One of the most peculiar aspects of ancient thought is the
notion that a part can stand for a whole, pars pro toto.18 It is precisely this
notion which gave rise to the proverbial expression: "The memory of the
righteous is a blessing" (Proverbs 10:7), the most common of all Jewish
epitaphs. Indeed, the force of a name in ancient society was very great. There
is a coalescence between the symbol and what it stands for. Hence, the most
important thing of all was that the names of the dead be recalled by the liv-
ing. Even today when memorialservices for the dead are held in synagogues,
the names of the dead are read aloud emphasizing their continued presence
among the living. The same applies to the bones of the dead. However in-
complete they may be, they represent the full significance of that man and
it is hard to imagine the callous treatment in a family tomb of the beloved
departed whose names were in a very real sense a potent force in the present.
Ossilegium thus harmonizes with the attitudes of the ancients toward death,
which did not mark in a strict sense an end to life. The practiceof secondary
burial, therefore, supports the Israelite conception of the totality of the in-
dividual.
There are numerous biblical passages which suggest the potential that
man's bones possessed in death. Most notable perhaps is the resurrectionof
an unnamed man who comes in contact with the bones of Elisha (II Kings
13:21) or Ezekiel's vision of the resuscitationof the dry bones (Ezek. 37).
If we cannot take Ezekiel's vision literally we can at least appreciateit either
as an eschatologicalpoetic vision of the realizationof the potential which the
bones of Israel possessed in Sheol or as a dramaticpresentationof the return
of exiled Israel to the Holy Land such as Moses and Aaron were promised
when they were denied burial there. Perhaps we may now speculate that
the bones of Saul and Jonathan were in fact buried in a communal ossuary.
In addition to this, the very idea that the deceased could interfere in
the course of events of the living (I Samuel 28) is proof of a rather lively

18. H. Frankfort et al, Before Philosophy: The Intellectual Adventure of Ancient Man (1961),
p. 21.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST 17

conception of Sheol. The biblical phrase "to be gathered to one's fathers"

thus means to die and to descend to Sheol where the family of all Israel was
assembled. The idiom may also reflect rather literally the MB I tombs dis-
cussed above. It would elucidate Abraham'spreoccupationwith proper bur-
ial; and it would explain the Iron Age innovation of the communal ossuary,
the actual means by which one was joined to the common soul of his ances-
tors. In death and reburial the deceased gained a sort of corporateexistence.
No doubt the prevalence of subterraneantomb chambers also reflects the
Israelite view of Sheol, often described as a nether world located beneath
the earth (Num. 16:20), or in the cosmic waters (Job. 26:7), or under the
"rootsof mountains" (Jonah 2:6), or more frequently as "pit" (Pss. 16:10,
30:10). These images and metaphors are adapted from ancient Canaanite
and Mesopotamian mythology, and there is no reason to doubt that the Is-
raelites drew from this language of mythology. For it was in the language
of myth that Israel came to understand the full meaning of history which
had been oversimplifiedby some of the historicalwriters.
The biblical conceptions of man and of Sheol thus do not conflict with
Israelite burial customs. Though the equally important practice of single
inhumation existed alongside secondary inhumation, there is no reason to
believe it presupposed any different theological framework. In Israel where
there is some cause ito question such activity as would be involved in a sec-
ond burial, namely corpse defilement and opening a tomb, it is all the more
significant to find such correspondencebetween customs and views of man
and afterlife. It may be that the Levitical laws which relate to treatment of
the dead indeed may constitute an attempt to combat a cult of the dead.
After all, of all the nations of the ancient world Israel alone emphasized the
defiling nature of the dead.

Secondary Burials in Hellenistic and Roman Time3

Just as earlier discussions of the Chalcolithic tomb materials focused

on the phenomenon of ossuaries,so too have most of the discussions of Jew-
ish tombs in the Roman period centered about the problem of Jewish os-
suaries. Indeed, the most expert commentatorshave remarked:"It is not clear
from whom the Jews took this strange custom, which is indeed alien to
the spirit of the Semitic peoples to whom disturbing the deceased was prohi-
bited;"or "no proper interpretationhas been given on the religious-historical
plane of this burial-custom which is alien to the Jewish tradition."'9It is
our belief that it is precisely the failure to note the continuity in the custom
of bone gathering in Palestine that has occasioned such views.

19. M. Avigad, Sepher Yerushalayim (1956), p. 321 (Hebrew); P. Kahane, Israel Exploration
Journal, II (1952), 127, n.2.
18 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

During the Second Temple period the diversity in the kinds of sec-
ondary burials which characterizedearlier periods persists. It therefore be-
comes increasingly difficult to single out the Jewish ossuary (Fig. 1) as some-
thing which signals a change in belief and we are accordingly skeptical of
those attempts at relating a given variant of ossilegium to a specific socio-
economic stratum or to a particular religious sect.20 Since the evidence for
the later period is so considerable, we can only highlight it and allude to
the new theological implications which become attached to this ancient and
venerated practice.
It is significant to note the presence of secondary burials without os-
suaries in Kokhim or loculi in the Hellenistic-Roman tombs of Marissa and
Beit Jibrin. These tombs represent the earliest of this sort in Palestine. It is
of crucial importance to find such attestation in that the innovation of the
loculus grave itself may be a result of foreign influence. So determined were
the owners of these tombs to utilize the kokhim for collected remains that
very often the walls between loculi were taken down so that the area could
be used as a sort of bone chamber.2"Secondary burials into smaller kokhim
and niches are attested in the Roman tombshere as well.
The adoption of the loculus grave pattern thus seems only to have re-
inforced a native propensity to gather and preserve skeletal remains. Though
this peculiar tomb arrangementmay have come to Palestine via Egypt, where
Hebrew and Greek names are found in such tombs as early as the 3rd cen-
tury, it seems more probable that this pattern was ultimaitelyborrowed from
the Greeks.22Both the Jews and the Phoenicians by the end of the 3rd cen-
tury B.C. in Egypt and Syro-Palestineemployed this pattern. Since the Pho-
enicians were inhumators and the Jews practicedboth primaryand secondary
inhumation, it is apparent once again that a typological feature has been
adapted to the peculiar customs of a given people; and its adoption is ample
testimony to Jewish borrowingin the Hellenistic period.
Separate bone chambers or charnel houses, similar to the Iron age bone
chambers of Tell Fara' and Tell en-Nasbeh, turn up with increasing fre-
quency in the late Hellenistic period. By far the most impressive of these
is Jason's Tomb, which is dated to the Hasmonean period and is one of the
most elaborate tombs of that period. Room A, a smoothly-hewn rectangular
chamber with ten kokhim, evidently served as the place of primary inter-
ment until decomposition. Room B was the charnel house, since numerous
piles of skeletalized remains numbering twenty-five burials were found along

20. L. Y. Rahmani, 'Atigot, III (1961), 93-120; M. Avi-Yonah, Oriental Art in Roman Pales-
tine (1961), pp. 25-27.
21. E. Oren, Archaeology, XVIII (1965), 218-224.
22. So I. Noshy, The Arts in Ptolemaic Egypt (1937), pp. 19-20; cf. N. P. Toll, The Excava-
tions at Dura-Europas, A Preliminary Report of the Ninth Season of Work, 1935-36, Part II:
lhe Necropolis (1946), p. 7, who argues for a Syro-Phoenician origin.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST 19

the wall of the chamber. Proof of transfer was established when pottery frag-
ments from Chamber B were matched with pottery fragments from the
kokhim.23
Several generations, the earliest of which dates to the time of Alexander
Janneus, are represented here. The manner of transfer, alluded to in the
tannaitic tractate On Mourning (Semahot 12.8), was by means of a sheet
or mat. From a somewhat later period comes a reed bag, preserved in the

XW M::::

t 4 .p
_~4_ox
Vil-:a~

~ L
140.7.,: ~: t

Fig. 9. Basket with skulls from Locus 2, Bar-Kokhba cave. From Yadin, Finds from the Bar-
Kokhba Period in the Cave of Letters, P1l. 6.

Bar-Kokhbacaves (Fig. 9), which was used to collect or transfer the bones
of the dead.24The similarity of these examples with the practice of earlier
periods is obvious and striking.
An important parallel to Jason's Tomb comes from the southern cham-
ber of a tomb in the Romema Quarter of Jerusalem (Fig. 10). It consists of
two adjoining rectangular chambers. The one for primary burial contained
two kokhinz. The bone chamber had three small niches or kokhim for the
collection of skeletal remains while the floor chamber was covered with a
layer of earth on which bone piles were laid out on mats. In a later period

23. Rahmani, Israel Exploration Journal, XVII (1967), 61ff.

24. Y. Yadin, The Finds from the Bar-Kokhba Period in the Cave of Letters (1963), pp. 30-31,
Pls. 6-7.
20 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

the bone chambercame to be used as a depositoryfor ossuarieswhich be-

came much more frequentby the Herodianperiod.25
Anotherfeatureof Iron age tombswhich continuesinto later periods
is the communalossuaryor centraldepressionin the rectangular
bench tomb.

Fig. 10. Tomb from the Romema Quarter, Jerusalem. Room A, disturbed northern chamber;
Room B, southern chamber for primary interments; Room C, bone chamber with small
niches for ossuaries. After Rahmani, Eretz Israel, VIII, 186, Fig. 1.

It now is certain that such a cavity was not purely functional, viz., to fac-
ilitate the burial process made difficult by the limited height of the cham-
ber, as some have argued. Corroborationof this comes from a late Hellenistic
tomb at Ramat Rahel.26In burial hall A there was a central depression and
five kokhim. The kokhim with ossuariesbelong to the Herodian phase while
the secondary burials in the depression belong to the earlier phase. In the
depression three skulls were found separated from the rest of the bones,
which were carefully arrangedinto neat little piles. Once again a much ear-
lier practice occurs in a later context. The emphasis on the importance of
skulls is not at all surprisingand is now well-documentedin the later periods.
Such skulls are reburied, for example, in some Jewish ossuariesfrom Jericho
in Tomb K23.
A tomb at Wadi Yasul, Jerusalem, is extremely interesting because it
shows secondary burials occurring both in kokhim and in the central depres-
sion without any trace of ossuaries.27The pottery is inconclusive and it is

25. Rahmani, Eretz Israel, VIII (1967), 186-192 (Hebrew). A summary of the finds in this
tomb appeared earlier in Israel Exploration Journal, XIII (1963), 145.
26. M. Stekelis, Journal of the Jewish Palestine Exploration Society, III (1934-35), 25ff. (He-
brew).
27. Avigad, Eretz Israel, VIII (1967), 133-135 (Hebrew).
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 21

impossible to tell which of the two variantsof the custom is earlieror whether
indeed they are contemporary.The important factor to be observed here is
that two different typological features are being employed in the custom of
ossilegium.
Another tomb from Jerusalem, called the Mahanayim tomb, suggests
that in many instances the communal assembling of bones predated the ap-

~I

Fig. 11. Rectangular bench tomb from Rehov Nisan-Beq in Jerusalem. After Rahmani, 'Antiqot,
111, 109, Fig. 8.

pearanceof individualossuaries.In chamberno. III, the introductionof

ossuarieson ithe farthestbench causedthe remainsof earlierburialsto be
pushedaside.28A similarsituationobtainsin the Jerusalemtombon Rehov
Ruppin.This tombis a reotangular chamberwith seven kokhimand a cen-
tral depression.Only kokh no. 1 was found undisturbedwith its sealing
slab still intact. Within the loculus the remainsof three individualswere
found inside a single ossuarywhich was situatedin front of a heap of dis-
articulatedbones in the corner.Here is an excellentexampleof the loculus
being used for a simplesecondaryburialand also for a secondaryburialinto
28. Rahmani, 'Atigot, III (1961), 105-107.
22 THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

an ossuary. It is quite possible that in this particularinstance the introduction

of the individual container replaced older techniques of secondary burial
though the tomb features themselves were utilized in both cases.
In yet another Jerusalemtomb from the late Hellenistic period on Rehov
Nisan-Beq (Fig. 11), the older Iron age pattern of a rectangularbench tomb
with central depression occurs together with four long kokhim and four
smaller ones. The latter perhaps may be called repositoriesand might well
descend from Iron age prototypes. The smaller ones could serve either for
the collection of bones or for the deposition of a single ossuary. In kokh
no. 2, one of the larger ones, a pit as wide as the loculus itself was cut at the
rear and was used as a repository for human remains.29It is quite clear
that the owners of such a tomb went to considerable length to insure the
proximity of the mortal remains of their family; and it is in such a light
that we have viewed similarIron age tomb features.
It has been observed that secondary burials into kokhim without os-
suaries occur at the time of the adoption of the loculus pattern. This practice
continues throughout the Hellenistic-Roman period and is also found at
Beth She'arim, which is our latest major site for the study of Jewish tombs
in ancient Palestine. This accords well with the view derived mainly from
linguistic evidence that the term kokh itself, an eastern Semitic loanword
into western Aramaic, is regularly associated with secondary burials.30We
need not be impressed by those who are hesitant to accept ossuaries as a
Jewish phenomenon because of the Greek term glossokomon, which inci-
dentally is not attested until a period after the adoption of the convention
of the individual bone container. Jews did not lack a Semitic vocabulary
appropriateto secondaryburials.
Even at Qumran, where the vast majority of graves thus far excavated
have been primary inhumations in shaft graves with a recess at the bottom,
there are several examples of secondary inhumation. In a period when the
loculus pattern was in wide usage, it is not strange to find the sectariancov-
enanters employing a different burial pattern to emphasize their separateness.
For a community to which ritual purity meant so much, however, the oc-
currence of even a few secondary interments is all the more noteworthy."'
It is quite possible that these burials belong to those Essenes who lived away
from the settlement by the Dead sea and who desired to be gathered to their
true brethren at Qumran in death.
Considerationof the great necropolis of Beth She'arim (Sheikh Ibreiq)
is an appropriateway to end this brief survey. A careful reading of all the

29. Ibid., pp. 108-109.

30. Y. Kutscher, Eretz Israel, VIII (1968), 279 (Hebrew).
31. R. de Vaux, L'archeologie et les manuscrits de la Mer Morte (1961), pp. 37f.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 23

-r

Ago-
" "
lo, .a...

V,.

J.I u.
.0?

?.r ,
"Y.•. o

, ,-
w
A
r r
...
,r

N A' !
~ I,

dib
' "" .
,. ':.

Fig. 12. Room VII of catacomb I at Beth She'arim: arcosolia, kokhim, and pit graves. From
Mazar, Beth She'arim I, P1. XVI.
24 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

excavation reports will reveal that secondary burial was in fact the domin-
ant mode of inhumation there.32 Catacomb no. 1 offers by far the most
variegated picture of burial customs with arcosolia, kokhimn,and pits all in
simultaneous use (Fig. 12). The arcosolium,the most frequent type of bu.r-
ial in catacombnos. 1-4, was used for both primary and secondary inhuma-
tion and even for the deposition of ossuaries.
The kokhim at Beth She'arim are smaller than the longer Hellenistic
ones, ranging from approximately two to four feet in length. Again many
were used as repositories into which bones were collected and in many
instances more than several individuals were interred. Whole chamberswere
also used to store collected bones (room 2 of catacomb no. 1) or to store
ossuaries or coffins. The inscriptions, moreover, leave no doubt that the
necropolis served as a center for reburialof Jews from all over the Diaspora.
One of the inscriptions bears directly on 'the problem of the use of the
sarcophagusas ossuary. It is inscribed on sarcophagusno. 11 of catacomb20
and reads: "This is *the sarcophagus of the three sons of Rabbi . .
.33
This confirms the view that coffins were indeed used for the collection of
bones as it is impossible to assume that all three bodies were interred intact
in one coffin. A wooden coffin, dated to late Hasmonean times, found in
burial cave 4 of the Nahal David in the Judean desert (Fig. 13), also seems
to have been used as an ossuary, for it contained seven skulls.34
Given our broad understandingof secondary burials it is now apparent
why we cannot accept the overemphasis on the individual ossuary which
represents only a single variant of the custom of ossilegium. The very fact
that ossuaries have turned up in the Diaspora at Alexandria and Carthage
and in Spain in the late Roman period gives some indication of how im-
portant this mode of inhumation was.35Though individual ossuaries dimin-
ish in number in Palestine after A.D. 70, the attestation of diverse second-
ary burials and individual receptacles in various parts of Palestine in addi-
tion to Beth She'arim gives further reason to use caution in restricting so
distinctive a burial custom to a short period. In the view of most scholars
ossuaries appear ca. 40 B.C. and disappear after A.D. 70. Indeed, it would
be most strange to find any burial custom as striking as this limited to so
short a time span. Once we have a view which allows us to consider all var-
iants of secondary burial on the same continuum, the necessity for determin-
ing precise dates for ossuariesis substantiallyreduced. To be concerned about
whether the first Jewish ossuariesdate to 100 or 50 B.C. is to miss the point.

32. B. Mazar, Beth She'arim, Report on the Excavations during 1936-40, 1: The Catacombs I-IV
(1957), p. viii of the English summary
33. Avigad, Israel Exploration Journal, VII (1957), 241ff.
34. Israel Exploration Journal, XII (1962), 181ff.
35. fIor Jewish ossuaries in Alexandria see E. R. Goodenough, Jewish Symbols in the Greco-
Roman Periol (1953-69), Vol. I, 115; Vol. II, 63; and Vol. II, Fig. 113; for Carthage see
J. Ferron, Cahiers de Byrsa (1956), pp. 105-17; and for Spain see H. Beinart, Eretz Israel, VIII
(1967), 298-305 (Hebrew).
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 25

:.;;

~ ~ ~ ??G

.:?, i
•.'~....:2-...

ii

i
.x?i ....

Fig. 13. Wooden coffin from Nahal David in The Judean desert. Note the gabled lid and its
resemblance to that of the ossuary in Fig. 1. This wooden example may be the proto-
type of limestone ossuaries. From Avigad, Israel Exploration Journal, XII (1962), Pl.
22A.
26 THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

Theology of Jewish Ossilegium

As we move on to consider the theological ramificationsof this custom
in Jewish sources it needs to be stressed that the sources do not differentiate
between burial in an ossuary and any other type of secondary burial.
The ossilegium of two corpses may take place at the same time, as
long as the bones of the one are put at one end of a sheet and those
of the other at the other end of the sheet. So Rabbi Johanan ben Nuri.
Rabbi 'Akiba says: In the course of time, the sheet will waste
away; in the course of time, the bones will intermingle. Let them
rather be gathered and placed in ossuaries. (Semnahct12.8.)36
In the first half of this mishnah we can imagine the deposition of skeletaliz-
ed remains in a variety of ways, while in the second half the convention of the
individual ossuary is required. Though there is a disagreement here on the
manner of second burial, both techniques of ossilegium are acknowledged.
In the former instance we can also imagine the disarray that would occur
in effecting a transfer by means of some sort of bag.
The custom of secondary burial carries many theological implications
in addition to those in the biblical writings which have already been indi-
cated. Of signal importance is the persistence of the conception of man as
a unitary individual whose mortal remains constitute the very essence of
that person in death. It is no wonder that men desired to be buried or re-
buried with their fathers. It is difficult to pinpoint exactly when burial in
Palestine took on new and added meaning that would cause Jews in the
Diaspora to desire burial in the Holy Land. However, it is clear that from
the turn of the common era until the 4th century A.D. Diaspora, Jews bur-
ied the remains of their dead in Palestine. This fact is established by an
examination of the ossuary inscriptions from Jerusalem and the sepulchral
inscriptionsfrom Beth She'arim.
It was not long before the rabbis understood final interment on holy
soil as having special atoning values; they took Deuteronomy 32:43 as the
proof-text for this notion.37Such a conception met with a good deal of hos-
tility amongst those who lived their lives in Palestine and saw their breth-
ren return to Eretz Israel in death. Still another interpretation was given
by the rabbis on the benefits which accrued to an individual after burial
in Palestine: "The dead of Eretz Israel will be the first to be resurrectedin
the days of the Messiah."38

36. The translation is that of D. Zlotnick, The Tractate Mourning (1966).

37. See in the Babylonian Talmud, Kethuboth 111a and Berakoth 18b; in the Jerusalem Tal-
mud, Kethuboth 12.3 = Kiliam 9.3.
38. Genesis Rabbah 96.5.
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 27

It was the positive value given to the period of decomposition, how-

ever, which best explains why secondary burial was so important in the
later period. Both the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds are most explicit
regarding decay of the flesh as necessary to the forgiveness of criminals:
Both death and [shameful] burial [i.e., in the criminal'sgraveyard]
are necessary [for forgiveness]. R. Adda b. Ahabah objected: They ob-
serve no mourning rites, but grieved for him, for grief is borne only in
the heart. But should you think that having been [shamefully] buried,
he attains forgiveness, they should observe mourning rites: The decay
of the flesh too is necessary [for forgiveness].39
In time this view, coupled with the view of the special effects of burial in
Palestine, came to provide the conceptual frameworkfor all secondaryburials
in rabbinic times and was no longer confined to criminals alone.
Closely related to these ideas is the concept of damnatio memnoriae.
The parade example in rabbinic literature is the notice of the exhumation
and dragging of the bones of king Ahaz by his son Hezekiah in order to
cancel the evil decrees of his father with regard to idolatry and also to ex-
piate his father's sins by degradation of his remains.40Perhaps the reinter-
ment of the bones of king Uzziah around A.D. 50 as recordedin the Uzziah
inscription, ("Hither were brought the bones of Uzziah, king of Judah -
Do not open."), is more than a prohibition against disturbing the second
burial of the leper king and reflects more than a growing reverence paid
to both graves and relics. It is possible that Uzziah was denied burial in the
"sepulchersof the kings" (II Kings 15:7; II Chron. 26:23) because he was
a leper or for some other reason not understood by a later generation. The
desire of the pious to bring his remains to their rightful place thus is in
harmony with the whole complex of ideas associatedwith secondary burials.
Though the archaeologicalevidence for the custom of ossilegium sug-
gests its discontinuance at Beth She'arim in the 4th century, the ongoing
desire of pious Jews to be buried in Israel or even to have a clod of heavy
soil thrown on their coffins, symbolic of their return to Zion, provides vivid
attestation of continuation of this tradition in modern times.

Conclusion
To be sure, the placing together of human skeletal remains in a com-
mon pit or chamber might at first glance seem to be an indiscriminate or
harsh way of joining one's family in the hereafter. It might seem that sec-
ondary burial stands in contradiction to the frequent maledictions against
disturbing the dead or in violation of the ordinances that relate to ritual

39. Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 47b (Soncino Translation).

40. Mishnah Pesahim 4.9; Babylonian Talmud, Pesal.zim 56a and Berakoth 10b; Jerusalem Tal-
mud, Pesa~lim 9.1.
28 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

purity. Analysis of all the data, however, now indicatesthat such a procedure
for the disposition of human remains is far more common and in keeping
with Semitic thought than has heretofore been recognized. In a secondary
burial the emphasis is on the safekeeping of remains within the precincts
of the family tomb, and this seems to be in close harmony with the Semitic
conception of the nature of man. In light of this the biblical idioms for
death and burial are quite apt.

i.

::

4M 6;b:

ii
.........

Fig. 14. Charnel-house at St. Catherine's Monastery in Sinai. From Rothenberg, God's Wilder-
ness, P1. 64.

Despite the apparent silence of the New Testament in regard to ossile-

gium, the preservationof a martyr'sremains or the veneration of a Christian
saint in a relic chest seems best explained as an outgrowth of ancient Near
Eastern burial customs. Dramatic evidence that secondary burial continues
in precisely the form in which we have described it comes from the monas-
tery of St. Catherine's in Sinai (Fig. 14)41 There the monks first bury their

41. B. Rothenberg, God's Wilderness (1901), p. 159.

1970, 1) THE BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGIST 29

dead in a beautiful garden cemetery just outside the monastery wall. After
a year the bones and skulls are gathered up and piled separately in the
charnel house. In areas where conservatism runs deep, it is not strange to
find the practices of a later period rooted in the warp and woof of ancien:t
tradition.

Cumulative Subject Index to The Biblical Archaeologist

Professor John McRay of David Lipscomb College has produced

a cumulative subject index for the first thirty volumes (1938-1967)
of The Biblical Archaeologist. Many readers who possess a complete
set, and many libraries, may find this a very useful index to have.
Dr. McRay prepared it for his use in classes, but he has decided to
have it printed for wider dissemination with the approval of the
Publications Committee of ASOR. The index is offered at a cost of
$1.25 prepaid, and that will cover mailing cost. Orders are to be sent
directly to
Professor John McRay
David Lipscomb College
Nashville, Tennessee 37203

Archaeological News and Views

The two latest issues of the ASOR newsletter have just come to my
desk. Robert G. Boling, my colleague at McCormick Seminary and in 1968-
69 a fellow at the Jerusalem School, has taken over the job of editing the
newsletters, and he has added to their interest by including photographs
and a little sparkle to the news items.
Of special interest in the current letters is a report on two campaigns
at a low mound called Tell el-Fakhar in upper Iraq, about twenty miles
from the famous site of Nuzi. Here Iraqi archaeologistshave found, be-
tween 1967 and 1969, the remains of two stratified towns belonging to the
second millennium B.C. The upper one dates near the end of the millen-
nium, and the lower, more impressive, to the fifteenth century. From the
ruins of the lower layer have come about 1000 tablets, at least some of
which are contracts and business documents very much like those found at
Nuzi of the same period. That is, here is more evidence for the application
of Hurrian law and custom. The Nuzi tablets, as is well-known to BA
readers, provided a flood of light on customs assumed in some of the patri-
archal narratives in Genesis. A fuller report on the finds at Tell el-Fakhar
is to appear in the journal Sumer, in the course of this year.
30 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

Another very interesting report comes from Professor Roger S. Boraas

of Upsala College, on a sounding conducted at Rujm el-Malfouf during
the summer of 1969. The site is a tower-fortressand adjacent building lo-
cated at the west edge of modern Amman, Jordan. The tower was assumed,
on the basis of surface finds, to have been one of a series of borderfortresses
for the Ammonite kingdom of the same period as the Israelite divided mon-
archy (9th to 6th cents., B.C.). George Landes fit the story of these towers
into his article on :the Ammonites in BA, XXIV (1961), 65-86, esp. pp. 70ff.
(reprinted in BA Reader, 2, pp. 69-88). Boraas'group, which is a faculty
and student team from Upsala College, have clearly established that this
one tower aitleast is not Ammonite at all, but belongs to the Roman period!
So now it becomes imperative to excavate some of the other proposed Am-
monite towers, with their megalithic stone structure, to see if perhaps the
long-standing hypothesis about their Ammonite provenance is wrong over-
all. We live and learn!

A flyer has arrived concerning the Volunteer Programat the Gezer dig
for 1970. We have announced this programbefore, and many readershave
taken advantage of it. The sixth season at Gezer will take place between
June 21 and August 7, 1970. For the volunteer program, that seven week
space is divided into two sessions, the first of four weeks and the second of
three. Some few volunteers will be taken for the whole seven weeks. Costs
for this opportunity, which include round trip group transportationfrom
New York and tuition for courses given in connection with the program,
come to $625 for two academic credits, $665 for four credits. Room and
board during the five-day work week is at dig expenses, but volunteers are
on their own on weekends. Details and application forms are available from
Mrs. Norma E. Dever
Gezer Volunteer Program
3101 Clifton Avenue
Cincinnati, Ohio 45220

Doubleday Anchor books will publish, before our next issue appears,
the third Biblical ArchaeologistReader. It is expected that this will be the
last in the series, the first two of which appeared in 1961 and 1964. Includ-
ed are some of the most important articles ever to appear in BA, notably
the three famous ones of George E. Mendenhall, two on covenant forms
and one on the conquest of Palestine. Companion to these three in a group-
ing on backgroundsof Israelite institutions are articles by Rainey on Ugarit,
Fensham on the Gibeon covenant, Mendelsohn on slavery and family, Mal-
amat on the institution of monarchy in Israel after Solomon, Huffmon on
the Mari prophets, and your editor on the Amarna letters. In a second
1970, 1) THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST 31

grouping on manuscripts and coins, Cross' article on the Samaria papyri

joins Skehan on the present state of Dead Sea Scroll studies, Yadin on the
Bar Kochba finds from Nahal Hever, Filson on the Nag Hammadi papyri,
and the important article of Kanael on Israelite coinage. A final grouping
of articles about special methods applied to archaeology includes Thompson
on scientific techniques, Swauger on dolmens, Gold on the Madeba map,
Smith on the Tomb of Jesus, Snyder on Peter's bones, and a completely re-
written presentation of R. B. Y. Scott's lifelong work on Israelite weights
and measures. This volume is a fine collection for a low price, and should
appeal especially to relatively new subscriberswho would like to have under
one cover some of the cream of the BA crop.

Upcoming in the 1970 issues of the BA is a long-awaited article from

Victor Gold on Serabit el-Khadem, the center for iturquoise mining in the
Sinai peninsula where inscriptions of great importance have been found
and now successfully deciphered; by David Ussishkin on the Silwan ne-
cropolis (tombs of the Iron age on the east flanks of the Kidron valley op-
posite Jerusalem); and we hope by Professor Mazar on his work adjacent
to the temple walls in Jerusalemand by geologist-archaeologistReuben Bull-
ard on the relation of geological studies to archaeology. Subscribersat col-
leges and universities across the country are encouraged to remember that
a group rate for the BA is available if ten or more subscriptionsare mailed
-to the same address for 'the entire calendar year. Refer to the masthead for
details.

We welcome with enthusiasm two new journals which are of interest

to those who study biblical and Palestinian archaeology. The first is The
Australian Journal of Biblical Archaeology, Vol. 1, No. 1 of which appeared
in 1968 but reached this country not until well into 1969. It is a publica-
tion of the Australian Society of Biblical Archaeology,which came into being
as the brain-child of the Department of Semitic Studies at the University of
Sydney. The editor of the journal is E. D. Stockton, and the first issue
includes an introductoryeditorial and also a brief article on the Shechem
temple by him. Other contributorsinclude Yigael Yadin, A. Douglas Tush-
ingham, G. R. H. Wright, A. Storme, and W. Culican, the last-named
contributing a lengthy article in which are published a number of new seals
and seal impressions from Phoenicia, and their iconography scrutinized.
Book reviews by Judy Birmingham of the University of Sydney round out
an issue of 107 pages.
The other new journal is Levant, an impressively laid-out publication
of the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem. The editor is P. R. S.
Moorey of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. The journal takes its place
32 THE BIBLICALARCHAEOLOGIST (Vol. XXXIII

beside the Palestine Exploration Quarterly, and will turn its attention to
*the specifically archaeologicalmatters formerly included in the PEQ. Space
becomes available for longer and more detailed studies, and the editor has
even planned one part of each annual issue for brief notes on artifacts and
-the like which might otherwise not seem worthy of a long journal article.
The first issue features J. Basil Hennessy's preliminary report on the 1967
campaign at Ghassul, a long study of the Middle Bronze and Late Bronze
age strata at Megiddo by Miss Kenyon, and other articles by R. W. Hamil-
,ton, G. L. Harding, and E. J. Peltenburg. Volume I, for 1969, costs $10.50,
but the Palestine Exploration Fund is offering a reduction to people who
already subscribe to PEQ or are members of the Fund. Information about
this and subscription information is available from The British School of
Archaeology in Jerusalem,2 Hinde Mews, Marylebone Lane, London, W.1.
E. F. CAMPBELL, JR.

STATEMENT OF OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT AND CIRCULATION

(Act of October 23, 1962; Section 4369, Title 39, United States Code)
1. Date of Filing:
October 1, 1969
2. Title of Publication:
The Biblical Archaeologist
3. Frequency of issue:
Quarterly - February, May, September, December
4. Location of Known Office of Publication:
6 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
5. Location of the Headquarters or General Business Offices of the publishers (not printers):
126 Inman Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139
6. Names and Addresses of Publisher, Editor, and Managing Editor:
Publisher: The American Schools of Oriental Research, 126 Inman St., Cambridge,
Massachusetts 02139
Editor: Professor Edward F. Campbell, Jr., McCormick Theological Seminary, 800
West Belden Avenue, Chicago, Ill. 60614
7. Owner (If owned by a corporation, its name and address must be stated and also immed-
iately thereunder the names and addresses of stockholders owning or holding 1 percent or
more of total amount of stock. If not owned by a corporation, the names and addresses of
the individual owners must be given. If owned by a partnership or other unincorporated
firm, its name and address, as well as that of each individual must be given.)
Archaeological Service Organization with no owner
President - G. Ernest Wright, 6 Divinity Ave., Cambridge, Mass. 02138
Secretary - James B. Pritchard, University Museum, 33rd & Spruce St., Philadelphia,
Pa. 19104
Treasurer - Thomas D. Newman, 121 Carleton St., Brookline, Mass. 02146
8. Known Bondholders, Mortgagees and other security holders owning or holding 1 percent
or more of total amount of bonds, mortgages or other securities (If there are none so state):
None
9. The purpose, function, and nonprofit status of this organization and the exempt status for
Federal income tax purposes have not changed during preceding 12 months.
10. Extent and Nature of Circulation Average No. Copies Single Issue Nearest
Each Issue During To Filing Date
Preceding 12 months
A. Total no. copies printed 7150 7000
B. Paid circulation 1) sales through
dealers, vendors, counter sales none none
2) mail subscriptions 4938 5035
C. Total paid circulation 4938 5035
D. Free distribution 225 260
E. Total distribution 5163 5295
F. Office use, left-over, unaccounted,
spoiled after printing 1987 1705
G. Total 7150 7000
I certify that the statements made by me above are correct and complete.
T. D. Newman, business manager