In a recent paper in Antiquity, Levy et al. (2004) publish what they claim are 'less biased' high-precision radiocarbon dates from Khirbat en-Nahas in southern Jordan, and on the basis of those dates make wider claims for the dating and development of the Iron Age of southern Jordan (the kingdom of Edom). However, there are serious problems with the dates they present and their methodology.

Levy et al. present two sets of data. The first set are the standard calibrated radiocarbon dates (using the INTCAL calibration curve), which are presented in a table (Levy et al. 2004: 870, Table 1). The second set, which is consistently referred to within their text, are Bayesian calibrated dates. The Bayesian calibration tool (Buck et al. 1996, http://bcal.sheffield.ac.uk/) has been developed as a means to combine calibrated radiocarbon dates with a priori chronological information such as stratigraphic sequences of layers, or absolute dating information from other sources (such as texts). Using this information the BCal program can narrow down or modify the radiocarbon ranges and make them more reliable.

Clearly, the results of the BCal calibration are completely dependent on the nature of the other chronological data, and the way they have been fed into the programme. A 'normal' result would be a narrowing down of the calibrated radiocarbon dates by the BCal tool. Even then, given the sensitivity of the programme, it is essential to specify which additional data have been used and how.

In the case of Khirbat en-Nahas, the BCal results are the opposite of what one would expect: not only are the BCal ranges wider than the 'normal' calibrated ranges, but they are also consistently earlier (see Table 1 here).

Take, for example, the 'fortress' in Area A: the calibrated 14C range of Stratum A4a, which predates the construction of the 'fortress', is 1010-920 BC. The BCal date range for Stratum A4a according to the text (Levy et al. 2004: 871) is 1130-970 BC, with a modal (highest probability) value of 1120 BC. This modal value is 110 years earlier than the earliest limit of the 'normal' calibrated radiocarbon range, with no explanation provided.

The earliest phase in Area S (S4), a cooking installation, has a calibrated 14C range of 1130-1015 BC. According to the text, the BCal results date this stratum to 1260-1240 BC and 1215-1012 BC, with a modal value dated to pre-1190 (Levy et al. 2004: 873), over half a century earlier than the earliest limit of the radiocarbon range. This phase is followed by a heavy layer of metal waste (S3), dated to 1005-965 (normal calibration) or 1055-915 (BCal). On top of this was a four-room building (S2b), dated to 905-830 (normal calibration) or 970-830 (BCal).

At each step, Levy et al. are attempting to push the dates as early as possible, on average about a hundred years or so earlier than the calibrated radiocarbon evidence allows for. They do not specify what additional sources they have used to reach these results, and the present authors are unaware of any reliable evidence that would allow such results.

Levy et al. (2004: 874-6) provide one clue as to what sort of data they used to enter into the Bayesian programme: they refer to scarabs and ceramics which they claim corroborate their early, twelfth century BC dates, although all this material was found in later contexts. They tentatively date two Egyptian scarabs from the twelfth century BC on, but accept that they are probably residual. This is likely to be the case, especially since much earlier, Middle Bronze Age scarabs were found in their own excavations at the nearby WF40 cemetery radiocarbon-dated to the tenth century BC (Levy et al. 1999). The scarabs should not, therefore, be used to amend the radiocarbon dates. The ceramic evidence cited by Levy et al. (2004) is the so-called 'Negebite Ware' and 'Midianite pottery' (the latter also known as Qurayyah painted ware). Although it is not disputed that these wares occur as early as the twelfth century BC, in fact both have long lifespans well into the Iron II period: 'Negebite Ware' continues at least as late as the seventh century BC, and 'Midianite pottery' has been found in a context at Barqa el-Hetiye, near Khirbat en-Nahas, radiocarbon-dated to the ninth century BC, and at Tawilan stratified with otherwise purely seventh/sixth-century BC material (Bienkowski 2001). Neither type of pottery can therefore be used to amend the radiocarbon dates, rather the reverse: the calibrated radiocarbon dates should properly be used to fix the precise dates of the pottery.

It is clear that any unbiased treatment of the evidence suggests that the calibrated radiocarbon dates should be taken at face value, and not pushed artificially to about a century earlier. Levy et al. conclude that there is radiocarbon and ceramic evidence for a main phase of metal production in the twelfth-eleventh centuries BC, preceding the construction of the 'fortress' in the tenth century BC. In our opinion, their own calibrated radiocarbon dates, and a proper reading of the ceramics, indicate instead cooking activity in Area S between the (late?) twelfth and tenth centuries BC (aceramic, non-settled, therefore possibly mining by pastoralist groups who are known to have inhabited the area at that time), and some mining activity at the very end of the eleventh century. The Area A 'fortress' was apparently an isolated, short-lived phenomenon, since it went out of use at the end of the tenth century, when the first building in Area S was constructed. This latter scenario is supported by all the other evidence from this region, and is nothing new, having already been discussed by the present authors in 2001 (Bienkowski & van der Steen 2001: 23, notes 2, 3).

What is puzzling is why Levy et al. feel the need to push the dates artificially earlier. Their paper clearly manipulates the dates according to chronological assumptions that are not articulated. Put simply: what is their agenda? They claim that their 'high-precision radiocarbon dating is liberating us from chronological assumptions based on Biblical research' (Levy et al. 2004: 865). This is demonstrably nonsense, since the conceptual and chronological framework for the Iron Age of southern Jordan is exclusively grounded in archaeological evidence, including the available radiocarbon dates, and the Bible is explicitly excluded as evidence (for example Bienkowski & van der Steen 2001; Bienkowski 2001). Ironically, it is Levy et al. themselves who consistently refer to 'biblical' Edom and claim that their work is of key importance for understanding Edom 'known from biblical sources' (2004: 866). This insistence on relating to the biblical sources may explain their need for earlier dates: pushing the archaeological dates back would link with the earliest mention of Edom in the Hebrew Bible according to the dating by conservative biblical scholars (based on their published Antiquity paper, Levy et al. issued a press release highlighting the links between their early dates and the Bible, resulting in the publication of newspaper stories in North America and Israel on the theme of 'Archaeology Confirms Biblical Edom', for example, Jerusalem Post, 22 February 2005, p. 6 (archived at http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/jpost/)).Paradoxically, for all their talk of general processes of social evolutionary change, it is Levy et al. who are unable to conceptualise Edom outside the biblical paradigm.

References

• BIENKOWSKI, P. 2001. Iron Age Settlement in Edom: A Revised Framework, in P.M.M. Daviau, J.W. Wevers, & M. Weigl (ed.) The World of the Aramaeans II: Studies in History and Archaeology in Honour of Paul-Eugen Dion: 257-69. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series 325. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
• BIENKOWSKI, P. & E. VAN DER STEEN. 2001. Tribes, Trade, and Towns: A New Framework for the Late Iron Age in Southern Jordan and the Negev. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 323: 21-47.
• BUCK, C.E., W.G. CAVANAGH & C.D. LITTON. 1996. The Bayesian Approach to Interpreting Archaeological Data. Chichester: Wiley.
• LEVY, T.E., R.B. ADAMS, M. NAJJAR, A. HAUPTMANN, J.D. ANDERSON, B. BRANDL, M.A. ROBINSON & T. HIGHAM. 2004. Reassessing the Chronology of Biblical Edom: New Excavations and 14C Dates from Khirbat en-Nahas (Jordan). Antiquity 78: 865-79.
• LEVY, T.E., R.B. ADAMS & R. SHAFIQ. 1999. The Jabal Hamrat Fidan Project: Excavations at the Wadi Fidan 40 Cemetery, Jordan (1997). Levant 31: 293-308.

Response to van der Steen & Bienkowski

Thomas E. Levy, Thomas Higham & Mohammad Najjar

Van der Steen and Bienkowski are most welcome to critique our paper (Levy et al. 2004) and the data therein, but we find the general tone of their response in poor taste. They accuse us of manipulating data, of having a hidden agenda, and they use disparaging language suggesting that the implications of our work are 'demonstrably nonsense'. We have at all times been open and true with our published data and conference presentations, and these accusations are demeaning both to the important issues being discussed and to the authors themselves.

Van der Steen and Bienkowski's views are shaped by a colonialist perspective on the Iron Age archaeology of Jordan. Accordingly, all culture change at this time is explained by the effect of the seventh - sixth century BC Assyrian Empire on its less developed periphery in what is today the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. This is the area that includes the regions of Edom, Moab and Ammon - terms that originate from the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) and are still used by archaeologists, scholars, the Tourist Board of Jordan (http://www.see-jordan.com/brochures/biblical_moses.html), and others for these regions in Jordan. Their view has been fundamentally influenced by the fact that prior to our research and the work of the German Mining Museum in the lowlands of Edom, most Iron Age excavations have taken place in the highlands where they and other scholars have linked the material culture to Assyrian influences (Bienkowski 1995, 2001, 2002; Porter 2004). Finally, we are accused paradoxically of being unable to conceptualise Edom outside the 'biblical paradigm' (whatever that means).

The central issue of their critique, that of the application of radiocarbon dating to Edomite archaeological contexts, has been debated in great detail in other published and online sources (the Wadi Arabah web site - http://www.wadiarabahproject.man.ac.uk/) and the recent publication of The Bible and Radiocarbon Dating - Archaeology, Text and Science (Levy & Higham 2005; Levy et al. 2005a). Readers are referred to these sources for the specific details of our response. There seems little need (or space) to repeat them here. The Wadi Arabah site contains a detailed analysis of the Bayesian modelling included in the original Antiquity paper, which, for space reasons was removed from that publication. Inclusion of this would have undoubtedly solved many of the misunderstandings in their response, particularly the two date ranges they query in their table. (The ranges are correct in both cases but the modal values listed are taken from the text and refer to boundary distributions acting as termini post quem for the archaeological contexts above. Again, this is outlined in detail on the Wadi Arabah web site). They suggest that postulated dates of scarabs and ceramics were incorporated in the Bayesian model to 'amend the radiocarbon dates'. This is not the case; only the radiocarbon likelihoods and archaeological stratigraphy were included in the analysis.

The Bible and Radiocarbon Dating book contains two chapters on the Khirbat en-Nahas site, which render this discussion rather moot. One of these (Higham et al. 2005) includes the Bayesian analysis of a further 27 AMS dates which sharpen the chronology considerably over the previous dataset and enable us to consider outliers in the data overall. The analysis shows an expansion in copper production began from about 950 BC with incipient copper production starting at least from the early tenth century BC. Towards the end of the ninth century BC activity in both excavated areas ceased.

The application of the latest AMS and conventional radiocarbon dating methods to Iron Age/Historical archaeology is long overdue. With contributors working in Jordan, Israel, Egypt, and other parts of the eastern Mediterranean, this book recently demonstrated how archaeologists conduct Iron Age field work and analyses in the twenty-first century. Chronologies based solely on pottery typologies, with all the built-in temporal assumptions, are not, by themselves, sufficient anymore. Whether one examines the very end of the Iron Age trajectory at c. 500 BC or (Levy et al. 2005b) its beginning around 1200 BC, the historical records of the ancient Near East in which Mesopotamian, Egyptian and Biblical texts are crucial for reconstructing the past. In short, we are dealing with historical archaeology and consequently are thrown into the temporal processes that F. Braudel (Braudel 1976; Levy & Holl 1998) referred to as the history of events or short-term (episodic) 'evenements' or individual time that relates to narrative political history, events, and the acts of individuals. These are the sub-century periods of time where only coins or in the case of archaic periods such as the Iron Age - only high precision radiocarbon dating can help.

References

• BIENKOWSKI, P. 1995. The Edomites: The Archaeological Evidence from Transjordan, in D.V. Edelman (ed.) You Shall Not Abhor an Edomite for He is Your brother: Edom and Seir in History and Tradition, Archaeological and Biblical Studies 3: 41 - 92. Atlanta: Scholars Press.
• - 2001. Iron Age Settlement in Edom: A Revised Framework, in P.M.M. Daviau, J.W. Wevers & M. Weigl (ed.) The World of the Aramaeans II: Studies in History and Archaeology in Honour of Paul-Eugen Dion. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series 325: 257 -69. Sheffield: Academic Press.
• - 2002. Busayra - Excavations by Crystal-M. Bennett, 1971-1980 (British Academy Monographs in Archaeology 13). Oxford: Council for British Research in the Levant/Oxford University Press.
• BRAUDEL, F. 1976. The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean world in the age of Philip II. New York: Harper & Row.
• HIGHAM, T., J. VAN DER PLICHT, C. BRONK RAMSEY, H.J. BRUINS, M. ROBINSON & T.E. LEVY. 2005. Radiocarbon dating of the Khirbat-en Nahas site (Jordan) and Bayesian modeling of the results, in T.E. Levy & T. Higham (ed.) The Bible and Radiocarbon Dating - Archaeology, Text and Science: 164 - 178. London: Equinox.
• LEVY, T.E. & A. HOLL. 1998. Social Change and the Archaeology of the Holy Land, in T.E. Levy (ed.) The Archaeology of Society in the Holy Land, 2nd edition: 2 - 10. London: Leicester University Press.
• LEVY, T.E., R.B. ADAMS, M. NAJJAR, A. HAUPTMANN, J.A. ANDERSON, B. BRANDL, M. ROBINSON & T. HIGHAM. 2004. Reassessing the chronology of Biblical Edom: new excavations and 14C dates from Khirbat en-Nahas (Jordan). Antiquity 78: 863-876.
• LEVY, T.E. & T. HIGHAM (ed.). 2005. The Bible and Radiocarbon Dating - Archaeology, Text and Science. London: Equinox.
• LEVY, T.E., M. NAJJAR, J. VAN DER PLICHT, N.G. SMITH, H.J. BRUINS & T. HIGHAM. 2005a. Lowland Edom and the High and Low Chronologies: Edomite State Formation, the Bible and Recent Archaeological Research in Southern Jordan, in T.E. Levy & T. Higham (ed.) The Bible and Radiocarbon Dating - Archaeology, Text and Science: 129 - 163. London: Equinox Publishing Ltd.
• LEVY, T.E., M. NAJJAR & T. HIGHAM. 2005b. How many fortresses do you need to write a preliminary report? Or response to Edom and the Early Iron Age: review of a recent publication in ANTIQUITY. P. Bienkowski and E. van der Steen (ed.) http://www.wadiarabahproject.man.ac.uk/. Manchester: University of Manchester.
• PORTER, B.W. 2004. Authority, Polity, and Tenuous Elites in Iron Age Edom (Jordan). Oxford Journal of Archaeology 23: 373 - 395.