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During the seventh excavation season in 2019 at Tel Abel Beth Maacah, located in northern Israel, part of a well-constructed building was revealed just below topsoil in Area K. One partially excavated room in this building was found to contain at least five smashed storage jars in situ. Restoration showed that the jars are all of the same type and mode of manufacture, and one of them, with a marked handle, bears a one-word ink inscription. The standardization of the jars, the marked handle, and the inscription, indicate the existence of a local, centralized administrative system. The typology and surface treatment of the jars point to a date in the 9th century or at the latest, the beginning of the 8th century bce, a date corroborated by the palaeography of the inscription and by other pottery in the building. The inscription itself consists of a Hebrew personal name (as it has a Yahwistic theophoric ending) written in the Old Hebrew script. The name and its archaeological and regional context add information concerning the possible cultural and political affiliation of the site at this time, a debated issue in light of its location in the border region between the kingdoms of Israel and Aram Damascus, and within the sphere of the Phoenician polities of Tyre and Sidon to the west. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Jerusalem pithos inscription was found in 2012 in an Iron IIA (tenth century, High Chronology) context. Nine epigraphers have already tried to decipher this short Canaanite or Early-Alphabetic inscription, but their readings vary greatly. Galil, followed by Petrovich, boldly restores the words yyn ḥlq ('inferior, poor wine') and deduces that this is "the first Hebrew inscription" from Jerusalem. It supposedly relates to allocation of wine by Solomon for his many builders and soldiers in Jerusalem. I suggest here that this reading is forced. The wide-mouthed Jerusalem pithos is not a wine vessel. A negative term like 'poor, inferior wine' finds its place in administrative and literary contexts, but cannot be a wine-vessel label. There is no proof that this inscription is in Hebrew and it does not 'prove' the United Monarchy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article deals with a Safaitic inscription from Wādī al-Hašād in Jordan. This inscription has been dated to the third year of Rabbel II (AD 72/73) and is considered as the first Safaitic inscription to follow the Nabataean dating system, characterised by providing a specific year date for the inscription. Comparing this inscription with the published Oxtoby inscription from Wādī Maqāt, both are attributed to the same writer, sharing the same proper personal and family names, and both are dated by the reign of Rabbel II. Since the present inscription is written in the so-called square Safaitic script and dated to the third year of Rabbel II (AD 72/73), it could be concluded that the square script is not necessarily older than the regular script. This conclusion contradicts Winnett's suggestion that the square script is datable to the first century BC and represents an archaic form of the regular Safaitic script. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]