A hoard or "wealth deposit" is an archaeological term for a collection of valuable objects or artifacts, sometimes purposely buried in the ground, in which case it is sometimes also known as a cache. This would usually be with the intention of later recovery by the hoarder; hoarders sometimes died or were unable to return for other reasons before retrieving the hoard, and these surviving hoards might then be uncovered much later by metal detector hobbyists, members of the public, and archaeologists.
The archaeology of Israel is the study of the archaeology of the present-day Israel, stretching from prehistory through three millennia of documented history. The ancient Land of Israel was a geographical bridge between the political and cultural centers of Mesopotamia and Egypt.
Ein Gedi, also spelled En Gedi, meaning "spring of the kid", is an oasis, an archeological site and a nature reserve in Israel, located west of the Dead Sea, near Masada and the Qumran Caves. Ein Gedi, a kibbutz, was established nearby in 1954.
David Ussishkin is an Israeli archaeologist and professor emeritus of archaeology.
The Judaean Desert or Judean Desert is a desert in the West Bank and Israel that lies east of the Judaean Mountains, so east of Jerusalem, and descends to the Dead Sea. Under the name El-Bariyah, it has been nominated to the Tentative List of World Heritage Sites in the State of Palestine, particularly for its monastic ruins.
Ghassulian refers to a culture and an archaeological stage dating to the Middle and Late Chalcolithic Period in the Southern Levant. Its type-site, Teleilat Ghassul, is located in the eastern Jordan Valley near the northern edge of the Dead Sea, in modern Jordan. It was excavated in 1929-1938 and in 1959–1960, by the Jesuits. Basil Hennessy dug at the site in 1967 and in 1975–1977, and Stephen Bourke in 1994–1999.
The Cave of Letters is a refuge cave in Nahal Hever in the Judean Desert where letters and fragments of papyri from the Roman Empire period were found. Some are related to the Bar Kokhba revolt, including letters of correspondence between Bar-Kokhba and his subordinates. Another notable bundle of papyri, known as the Babatha cache, comprises legal documents of Babatha, a female landowner of the same period.
Teleilat el-Ghassul, also spelled Tuleilat el-Ghassul and Tulaylât al-Ghassûl, is the site of several small hillocks containing the remains of a number of Neolithic and Chalcolithic villages in Jordan. It is the type-site of the Ghassulian culture, which flourished in the Southern Levant during the Middle and Late Chalcolithic period. It is located in the lower eastern Jordan Valley, opposite and a little to the south of Jericho and 5-6 kilometers northeast of the Dead Sea. Teleilat el-Ghassul was occupied for a relatively long period of time during the Chalcolithic era - 8 successive Chalcolithic phases of occupation were identified there, most of them belonging to the Ghassulian culture.
Tel Tsaf is an archaeological site located in the central Jordan Valley, south-east of Beit She'an. Tel Tsaf is dated to the Middle Chalcolithic a little-known period in the archaeology of the Levant, post-dating the Pottery Neolithic B phase of the Wadi Rabah Culture and pre-dating the Ghassulian of the Late Chalcolithic.
Nahal Mishmar or Wadi Mahras is a small seasonal stream in the Judean Desert in Israel. A hoard of rare Chalcolithic artifacts, the Nahal Mishmar hoard, was discovered in a cave near the stream bed which was dubbed the "Treasure Cave".
The Chalcolithic temple of Ein Gedi is a Ghassulian public building dating from about 3500 BCE. It lies on a scarp above the oasis of Ein Gedi, on the western shore of the Dead Sea, within modern-day Israel. Archaeologist David Ussishkin has described the site as "a monumental edifice in terms of contemporary architecture".
Nonferrous archaeometallurgy in the southern Levant is the archaeological study of non-iron-related metal technology in the region of the Southern Levant during the Chalcolithic period and Bronze Age from approximately 4500BC to 1000BC.
Cave of Horror is the nickname given to a refuge cave that archaeologists have catalogued as Nahal Hever Cave 8 (8Hev) of the Judaean Desert, Israel, where the remains of Jewish refugees from the Bar Kokhba revolt were found.
The Beersheba culture is a Late Chalcolithic archaeological culture of the late 5th millennium BC, that was discovered in several sites near Beersheba, in the Beersheba Valley, in the northern Negev, in the 1950s. It is considered to be a phase of the Ghassulian culture. Its main sites are Bir Abu Matar, Bir Tzafad and Bir Safadi, but additional sites belonging to this cultural phase have been discovered in other parts of southern Israel.
'En Esur, also En Esur or Ein Asawir, is an ancient site located on the northern Sharon Plain, at the entrance of the Wadi Ara pass leading from the Coastal Plain further inland. The site includes an archaeological mound (tell), called Tel Esur or Tell el-Asawir, another unnamed mound, and two springs, one of which gives the site its name.
The Wadi Rabah culture is a Pottery Neolithic archaeological culture of the Southern Levant, dating to the middle of the 5th millennium BCE.
The Te'omim Cave, or the Twins Cave, Arabic name Mughâret Umm et-Tûeimîn, is a karstic cave within a nature reserve in Israel located on the western edges of the Jerusalem Mountains, in the vicinity of Beit Shemesh.
The Bar Kokhba refuge caves are natural caves that were used for shelter by Jewish refugees during the later phases of the Bar Kokhba revolt. Most of the refuge caves were located in the Judaean Desert, nestled within steep cliffs far away from settlements, many overlooking the Dead Sea and the Jordan Valley. Some were also found in ravines flowing into the Dead Sea, while others were nestled within the Judaean Mountains. Unlike the other two hideout systems used by the rebels, the man-made rock-cut hiding complexes, and the hard-to-reach cliff shelters which often contain hewn installations, the refuge caves remained largely untouched by human intervention.
The archaeological survey of Judea and Samaria and the Golan in 1968 or as it was called the "Emergency Survey" is the first comprehensive archaeological survey that was conducted in these areas.
Ein Gedi was an important Jewish settlement on the western shore of the Dead Sea in ancient times. The ruins, including the 6th century Ein Gedi synagogue, home to one of the most impressive mosaic floors in Israel, testify to a continuous Jewish settlement in the area for over 1,300 years, from the 7th century BCE to the 6th century CE.
