Palaeographic Dating of Judaean Seals and Its Significance for Biblical Research
This article presents a palaeographic investigation of the official seal impressions from the late eighth century B. C. E. and compares the script of this corpus with seals from the late seventh century B. C. E. The study shows that seals from both periods exhibit a wider variation than might be exp...
Main Author: | |
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Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
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Published: |
1999
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In: |
Bulletin of ASOR
Year: 1999, Volume: 313, Pages: 43-64 |
Online Access: |
Volltext (JSTOR) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
Parallel Edition: | Non-electronic
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Summary: | This article presents a palaeographic investigation of the official seal impressions from the late eighth century B. C. E. and compares the script of this corpus with seals from the late seventh century B. C. E. The study shows that seals from both periods exhibit a wider variation than might be expected. This variation makes it difficult to allow the dating of an unknown seal to the time period of one reference point (termed a "peg") or the other-late eighth or late seventh century B. C. E.-except in the case of a few letters: he, waw, nun, alep, samek, and qop. Even for these few diagnostic letters, there are what might be called "intermediate" forms that are not diagnostic (i. e., forms that would allow dating to one or the other peg). For all the other letters and the intermediate forms of the diagnostic letters, palaeographic dating to one or the other peg is impossible. At best one can date unknown seals to the general time period of the late eighth century or to the general time period of the late seventh century. A further conclusion is drawn that the Siloam Tunnel Inscription should not be used as the starting point for the dating for Hebrew seals because there are certain inconsistencies between the script of late eighth-century seals and the script of the Siloam Tunnel inscription. |
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ISSN: | 2161-8062 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: American Schools of Oriental Research, Bulletin of ASOR
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Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.2307/1357616 |