Christmas in Israel: Farewell Apollonia

Photos (top to bottom):  from the Crusader fortress looking down toward the built harbor (as opposed to the larger anchorage to the south);  wandering amongst the collapsed Crusader walls.

Randi and I were exceptionally fortunate to have become involved with the archaeology (terrestrial and marine) at Apollonia over the past 18 years.  The influence of the experience has been very significant for both of us.  A new generation of archaeologists are now coming on the scene at Apollonia, as Israel Roll, Professor Emeritus at Tel Aviv University, and long-time lead researcher at Apollonia, has retired.

We toured Apollonia with Professor Roll last week, and he generously shared his encyclopedic knowledge with us.  He explained that the area of the former munitions' factory, adjacent to the national park, has already been purchased, and is anticipated to become one of the most affluent and exclusive neighborhoods in the country.  An American firm has been hired to clean-up the contaminants left by the munitions' factory for a cool $14 million (or was it $40 million?).  Once the clean-up is completed (and the responsible party pays the bill, which may have to be resolved in litigation), then the clearing of the land may begin.  The Israel Antiquities Authority will be on hand to oversee the rescue excavation of the extensive property to be developed.  What this means exactly has not been made clear.  At a minimum, officials may monitor the land development, and remove key artifacts for preservation. It will be a time to be in Israel to observe the process, as much of the commercial center of the ancient city may be revealed.

Yesterday, Randi, Eva and I chatted with Haggi, the administrator overseeing Apollonia.  Haggi is himself an archaeologist with years of experience excavating at Apollonia and other sites around Israel.  Here's what we learned from him:

An large earthen berm, perhaps 10 meters in height, located to the east of the Crusader fortress, was constructed by the munition's factory.  One of the weapons being produced here was nitroglycerin, and to buffer the factory from a possible explosion, the berm was built.  Haggi has observed that the berm is full of artifacts, all out of context, having been bulldozed.  He suspects, however, that the Byzantine layers beneath the berm may be intact, and it is a location he'd like to excavate. 

I asked Haggi about the area around the former munitions' factory, planned for development.  His understanding is that test digs by the Israeli Antiquities Authority have revealed few artifacts out there, and a rescue excavation may be not necessary.  This is surprising news.  I would have expected that remnants of the commercial center might be found out there.  However, as Professor Roll explained, the concentration of occupation and thus material artifacts diminishes as you move away from the city center.  

I've learned that two teams will be working at Apollonia this summer:  a group from Brown University, who will be using some high tech equipment to create a 3-D representation of the Crusader fortress;  and a group of students and volunteers from Tel Aviv University (TAU) and solicited through the magazine Biblical Archaeology Review (see BAR for information about volunteering).  Professor Oren Tal, from Tel Aviv University, will be coordinating the TAU/BAR team, and will be focusing on an area immediately to the north of the Crusader fortress where an inscribed mosaic floor was discovered two years ago.  Haggi also mentioned the possible excavation of a site where a knight, accompanying Richard-the-Lion-Hearted in the 3rd Crusade, may be buried.  (I am thinking about returning to Israel this summer for the excavation season, despite the horrible heat.)

I asked Haggi about the worked flint we'd found to the south of the site, in the bluffs below a small school.  It is in this same area that we'd found a concentration of human bones eroding from the bluffs, and an abundance of rounded cobbles.  Based on his experience in using heavy machinery, Haggi felt that when the school was built, the soil may have been pushed seaward, leaving the layers in tact but sloping downward toward the west.  He explained that worked stone has been found throughout Apollonia, and is attributed to seasonal camps during the Neolithic.  The bones are thought to date to an Early Arab (638 - 1099 CE) cemetery.  Haggi felt that the cobbles may have been placed by the municipality to obscure the eroding bones, and thus avoid all the politics associated with the discovery of human remains.

Thus we leave Israel.  As Eva remarked, "We'll speak again when we have something to say."

 

Christmas in Israel: Diving Apollonia 2

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Photos:  (photo 1) top of human skull discovered by Randi this AM;  (photo 2) rib fragments adjacent to skull;  (photos 3) examples of encrusted metal objects in Apollonia harbor;  (photo 4) recorded for Dr. Eva Grossman, documenting dredging that took place through near Byzantine breakwater;  (photo 5) aerial photograph of Apollonia & the harbor, with dredged area circled. 

For video footage of this dive, see BOT.

Knowing that a storm system was on the way, I hopped into the water first thing this morning.  Eva asked that I investigate a cut in the breakwater, created two years ago when a boat ran aground and required dredging to be freed.  It is Eva's belief that the breakwater once held construction, evidenced by the abundance of ashlar stones (cut stones) around sections of the breakwater.  (Note photo 5 above and the video footage at ashlar stones.)  She was interested in the seeing whether the dredging might offer further evidence in support of her working theory.  While the video might not be interesting for you, I've uploaded a clip at breakwater.

One develops an eye for metal on an underwater archaeological site.  All metals tend to become encrusted with thick layers of calcium carbonate, along with shells, stones, and other forms of marine life.  Bronze and copper tends to develop a blue-green patina when exposed to saltwater.  Iron turns black.  I include photo 3 above as an example of an encrusted object, unidentified;  note also the video footage at metal.  These objects might be ancient or modern.  There's an abundance of modern junk here in the sea, and distinguishing between something modern and ancient is difficult.  I have observed that the marine encrustation around copper-bronze and lead objects simply knocks off, revealing a clean surface.  Not so with iron, where the metal seems to chemically bond to the encrustation.  Break the casing, and break the metal object.

While I was off diving, Randi roamed the bluffs and found two objects of note:  a coin, heavy with corrosion, likely Byzantine, judging by its size;  and a second human skull, this time exposed at the top, with the suture lines clearly exposed in the bone.  We went back to explore the area after my dive, and discovered other bone material scattered around.  Note the video footage of this at bones1, bones2, and bones3.

Christmas in Israel: Diving Apollonia 1

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Photos:  (photo 1) stone anchor, single hole;  (photo 2) amphora rim & handle;  (photo 3)  stone anchor, three holes;  (photo 4)  amphora rim;  (photo 5 & 6) columns;  (photo 7) a three-holed stone anchor with wooden shanks, from the Haifa Maritime Museum.

For video footage of this dive, see BOT.

A train of seasonal storms cross the eastern Mediterranean in winter, and the near shore sands at Apollonia redistribute, revealing reef rock in patches.  The quantity of the sand transported is remarkable.  Eva has determined that the depth of sand redistributed can be up to +/- 1 meter per day.  This was demonstrated dramatically in the past week.  I was in the water diving on the 22nd, shortly after arriving in Herzylia.  At that time, a large and archaeologically significant area of reef was exposed.  A large storm arrived and passed, burying this area in a thick blanket of sand, perhaps 2-3 meters in depth!  Another smaller patch opened, and it was there that the video available on BOT was captured over the past two days.

Photos 1 & 3 are of ancient stone anchors.  We mapped dozens of them in the harbor of Apollonia in the early '90s.  They are, essentially, a rock with a hole bored through it, though they vary widely in size, form, and craft.  Ancient maritimers inserted shanks of wood through the bottom pair of holes in the three-holed anchor for snagging the bottom. Note the example in photo 7 from the Haifa Maritime Museum, and the video footage from the harbor at anchors.

Photos 2 & 4 shown the rims & handles of Roman-Byzantine amphorae jars.  The rims and handles are the strongest section of the pots, and thus are often found as a intact units.  These storage jars were used to export wine, olive oil and grain, and are clear evidence of shipping.  Note the video footage from Apollonia at amphorae.

Photos 4 & 5 are columns.  The second column is one of several fragments located at what Eva has interpreted as the entrance to the anchorage.  These are large columns, perhaps 24 in/60 cm in diameter.  Note the video clips at column1 column2.

Christmas In Israel: Domus Galilei, Dinner With Robyn & Loretta

At Eva's suggestion, we visited Domus Galilei, a monastery near the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee).  The top photo was taken in the monastery library, with a priest leading a tour group in the background.  The books are a reflection, as is the image of Eva, in red.

We had dinner with former AIS-Israel colleagues and their spouses, Robyn & Gilad Gross and Loretta & Victor Cohen.  Robyn and I together taught grade 5, Loretta taught art and Spanish. It was, of course, terrific seeing them all again, catching up on family, travel, and other news.  I would much enjoy having them as neighbors and colleagues once again, although we're now resigned to visiting virtually on facebook.

Seeing Robyn and Loretta was a reminder, a small shock, that time is passing, we are aging, all of us, and despite obvious changes on the exterior, we tend to remain the same.  We are who we were, even as primary-aged children.  How could we be anything else?

Christmas in Israel: Apollonia & Tel Michal

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For many more photos, see BOT.

Photo 3 is exactly what you think it is.  I discovered the skull in a outcropping we'd known from years past as containing human bones.  In fact, in the early '90s, I brought my 5th grade class down from the international school to see them.  We have notified the several archaeologists responsible for the site.  Creepy cool, eh?!  Note video at skull.

Finding human bones on an archaeology site in Israel can be problematic if discovered by the religious community, who may close the site while the bones are exhumed and given a proper burial according to Jewish tradition.  For this reason, the discovery of human bones tends be treated discretely, meaning they are disregarded, quietly ignored, and not reported.  For recent examples of this, see Jerusalem Post, New York Times, B-NET, New Scientist, Haaretz.

When we moved to Israel in '90, there was a munition's factory adjacent to Apollonia, surrounded by barbed wired, the perimeter guarded by dogs and armed security patrolling in jeeps.  We used to hike up a ravine from the beach that led toward the factory complex where fragments of Roman-Byzantine glass kilns could be found.  Unfortunately, it was through this ravine that toxic chemicals flowed from the factory to the sea.  The effluent was bright green and smelled very heavily of chemicals.  The munition's factory blew up, literally so, in the mid-90s.  The incident even made the international press.  The good news is that the area where the factor stood is now available to excavation.  The bad news is that the ground is poisoned with chemical waste, and is undergoing is a long period of flushing, the runoff flowing, of course, through the same mentioned ravine into the sea.

Randi and I hiked up the canyon, now dry, though still carrying a strong chemical smell.  We again found fragments of the ancient glass kilns, along with many rusting metal barrels carrying who knows what.  Note photo 4.

In beach sand immediately to the south of the ravine you'll find rounded, shore break-tumbled blue glass beads from the glass kilns of Roman-Byzantine origin.  When we lived here, it was popular amongst locals and expats to collect the beads, referred to as Roman glass. The glass is still here, as shown in photo 5. 

Apollonia still has its mysteries.  Photo 6 was taken from the beach looking up toward the kurkar bluffs.  Look carefully and you'll see that the kurkar has been nicely cut, and since filled-in.  Another puzzle lies just to the south, where building stones form a floor and two walls.  What are they?  Why are they here?  What was their function?  To be determined, certainly by another generation of archaeologists.

A second archaeology site, Tel Michal, lies immediately to the south of Herzylia Pituach.  The occupation of Tel Michal predates Apollonia, being in its heyday during the Persian Period (538 - 323 BCE) and earlier in the Bronze Age (3300 - 1200 BCE).  Tel Michal is, for me, an old friend, an area where I spend dozens of hours wandering and diving in the early '90s.  The site remains undeveloped today, despite the construction of a massive marina project immediately to the west.  Note panoramas 1 (an overview of Tel Michal) and 2 (an overview of the marina), and photo 7 (a grave in a Persian Period cemetery) looking eastward toward the Herzylia Pituach Industrial Area.

Christmas In Israel: Jerusalem

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Photos (top to bottom):  looking down Aqbat e Saraya Street toward the Temple Mount;  a typical street in the Old City with risers for rolling carts over the many steps;  the Stone of Unction (at the entrance to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher), which commemorates the preparation of Jesus' body for burial;  pilgrims passing in front of the Tomb of Christ;  one of many chapels in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher;  1st century tombs off the Syrian Chapel (note the ghostly green images!);  the Tomb of Jesus with the Coptic Chapel to the right;  "lane blurring" while departing Jerusalem

For many more photos of Jerusalem see http://www.becauseoftime.org/ISD/ScenesDakar2.html.

We spent the day in the Old City yesterday, wandering from the Armenian Quarter, through the Jewish Quarter and the Western Wall, on to the Temple Mount, through the Muslim Quarter, to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.  

The Old City is at the same time profound and contradictory.  At the entrance to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, a smooth limestone stab commemorates the washing of Jesus' body before his burial.  Pilgrims enter, knee beside the stone, lay their hands upon it, smile for photographs, then immediately move on.  One woman lay both palms upon the stone, and paused with eyes closed, as if to imbibe the essence of the Holy Spirit.  (While the stone may look and feel ancient, it actually dates to 1808, when the prior 12th-century slab was destroyed.)

In the Old City of Jerusalem you can find everything from olive wood carvings of Christ, to t-shirts reassuring Americans that the Israeli Army has their backs;  from groups singing and dancing in celebration of a bar-mitzvah, to an Arab store owner promising you a special deal, won't you just look in my shop;  from plastic toys, to prayer in a hundred or more Christian churches, Muslim mosques, and Jewish synagogues.  All the while, beneath every step, around every corner, embedded in every wall, there lies a fantastically rich and complex history spanning 4000 years.

Jerusalem is a fantastic experiment in maintaining social and cultural boundaries, while, on the street, most shop owners are concerned with making enough sales to pay the rent and support their families.

Christmas In Israel: Haifa Maritime Museum & Lunch With Cats

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For loads more photos see http://www.becauseoftime.org/ISD/ScenesDakar2.html.

Eva guided us to the Haifa Maritime Museum where two of the most important artifacts from the harbor of Apollonia are displayed:  a marble ceremonial vase and a little bronze statue of the goddess Minerva, both dating to the Roman Period, both collected during our time here in the early '90s.  (Note photos 2 and 3.)  The remaining artifacts are currently held by the Rockefeller Museum in Jerusalem, likely stored away in boxes in their vast basement collection.

With time and experience, one develops an eye for artifacts.  I've heard it well-described as a pattern threshold, when the scanning of objects in our perceptual field ignites a match with something in our catalogue of internal representations -- a shape, color, texture, or pattern.  In my experience, this process occurs without thinking, below thinking, faster than thinking, on a perceptual level.

The statue of Minerva was found in about eight inches of water within several feet of shore.  I noticed a discoloration on the sandy bottom, a little dark patch which, when stirred, revealed the headdress of the goddess.  Remarkable.

Photo 1 was also taken at the Maritime Museum.  It shows an collection of amphorae organized by historical period, with the oldest to the right, dating from the Bronze Age.  The storage jars found in the harbor of Apollonia are represented by those at the left, dating from the Roman and Byzantine Periods, when the city reached the height of its expansion, with several thriving industries (purple dye, wine, glass).

Randi & I have been hanging out with Eva.  She is a attentive hostess, filling our tummies to overflowing, while her two dogs and innumerable cats lounge in the periphery.  Interesting that Eva's animals all understand Czech.  Naturally, the cats run the show, as illustrated in Photo 5, which shows a cat lifting his food can from a refrigerator shelf.

Christmas in Israel: Kfar Shmaryahu Tombs, Apollonia & Caesarea

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Photos (top to bottom):  Caesarea, King Herod's Hippodrome (photo 1);  surf breaking over seawall in Caesarea;  Byzantine tombs in Kfar Shmaryahu, associated with the ancient city of Apollonia (photos 3-5);  the location of the old AIS-Israel (photo 6), now a vacant field.  For loads more photos see http://www.becauseoftime.org/ISD/ScenesDakar2.html.

As photo 2 suggests, we are experiencing full-on winter weather, with rain in the forecast over the next several days.  The image was taken at Caesarea, where a cafe owner explained that we are seeing the largest swells of the year thus far, expected to grow up to 7 meters in height.

The nearshore deposits of sand are very dynamic along the coast of Israel, and they shift in depth and distribution, shifting with each winter storm.  It was after such a storm in '91 that we discovered a cargo of Roman nails, three sounding leads, and a copper wine vessel in a location previously concealed beneath a thick blanket of sand.  The next storm concealed the area once again, and it never reopened in the following year.  Ironically, the area was open yesterday morning, though I was not able to relocate the site of what we interpreted as a Roman shipwreck.

Kfar Shmaryahu is an affluent community situated about 10 miles north of Tel Aviv, where the international school was located in the early '90s.  The community lies on the second kurkar (sandstone) ridge from the seacoast.  Along this ridge are found a complex of Byzantine-period tombs associated with the ancient port city of Apollonia dating to the 4th and 5th centuries.  During the two years when I was teaching at the international school, we were aware of the tombs, but most were overgrown, and many littered with garbage.  The tombs have since been excavated, conserved, and surrounded by a lovely neighborhood park.  Note photos 2-5 above.

Former AISers may know that the international school has moved north to Netanya.  While I haven't seen it yet, I understand that it is quite fancy.  Alas, the former school, located in the heart of Kfar Shmaryahu, has been razed;  there is nothing left but an vacant field, slated to be developed.  Sad.

Christmas in Israel: Arrive Herzylia Pituach

For loads more photos, see http://www.becauseoftime.org/ISD/ScenesDakar2.html.

I'm writing from the Tadmor Hotel in Herzylia Piutach, Israel.  The Tadmor is located a few blocks from where we lived from '90-'92, when I taught grade 5 at the American International School (AIS) in Israel.  It's great to be back.

I was in the water snorkeling at Apollonia shortly after arriving.  

Apollonia is a local archaeological site, with an illustrious history, now a national park. Apollonia was a prominent Byzantine port city, and the site of two great battles:  the Battle of Arsuf (1091), pitting Richard the Lion-Hearted against Saladin during the 3rd Crusade in 1091;  and the Battle of Armageddon (1918), led by British General Allenby against the Turks during WW1.  

The sea was, this morning, reasonably clear, with a small swell and surge, certainly not ideal for diving.  Being my first time back in 11 years, I'm motivated to get wet.  I've brought my diving and underwater video gear,  with the intent of filming in the ancient harbor.  It took only  few minutes to find an ancient stone anchor, essentially a large stone with a hole drilled through it;  a wooden mast, or what we referred to as such when it was first identified 18 years ago;  two clay amphorae, used to transport wine or olive oil during the Roman/Byzantine Periods;  and a load of pot handles, ballast stones, and fragments of cut marble.

The site has not been systematically studied since marine archaeologist Dr. Eva Grossman surveyed the port in the early 90s.  I had the good fortune to work with Eva then, acting as photographer and diver.  We had lunch with her this afternoon, and had a chance to catch-up news about family, archaeology, and, of course, politics.

The photos above were taken late this afternoon, and show how dense the ceramic shards are along the seaside bluffs.  The shards, with their so-called combed decoration, all date to the Byzantine Period.

Which Audrey: Theoretical Physicist or Opera Deva?

I shot portrait photos of the grade 6ers for the school yearbook, including this series of Audrey, from Brazzaville, Congo.  At the start of the school year, Audrey presented herself as serious and reserved.  Then one day, quite unexpectedly, she volunteered to sing the end-of-Monday song, meant to be a fun and silly way to close the school day.  Audrey launched into a full-on musical performance, complete with opera and interpretive dance.  

Note the following two video clips which illustrate Audrey's substantial talent for musical theater:

http://www.becauseoftime.org/Movies/AudreySong9.22.mov

http://www.becauseoftime.org/Movies/Audrey11.1.mov

The quiet/reserved Audrey is still there, but now we know that she co-habitates with a performer, revealed in the photos/videos above.

I predict that Audrey will become either a theoretical physicist or star in her own situation comedy, a la Carol Burnett.