Honoring the Elite Deceased: A Re-Examination of the Shechem Courtyard Complexes
The function of the enigmatic Middle Bronze Age Courtyard Complexes at Shechem has remained at the forefront of debate concerning the courtyard palace form. Shechem’s excavators have been unable to agree on the function of the Courtyard Complexes, with some viewing them as palaces and others as temp...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
University of Chicago Press
2023
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| In: |
Bulletin of ASOR
Year: 2023, Volume: 389, Pages: 75-97 |
| Further subjects: | B
Shechem
B Courtyard Complex B courtyard palace B Middle Bronze Age B Funerary B burials B Southern Levant |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | The function of the enigmatic Middle Bronze Age Courtyard Complexes at Shechem has remained at the forefront of debate concerning the courtyard palace form. Shechem’s excavators have been unable to agree on the function of the Courtyard Complexes, with some viewing them as palaces and others as temples. Since the only detailed analysis of the Shechem Courtyard Complexes occurred almost four decades ago (Toombs 1985), a reassessment of the material is overdue. An analysis of the Phase 902 Courtyard Complex, the best preserved of the five sequential complexes, supports its architectural association with the courtyard palace form (Oren 1992), while also highlighting a commemorative function, centered around housing and honoring the deceased elite and administering the ancestral funerary cult. Moreover, a functional link with the later Migdol temple and standing stones suggests at least a partial transference of function to this new, and possibly introduced, temple form in the later Middle Bronze Age. Therefore, the Shechem Courtyard Complexes are to be associated with the courtyard palace form, along with a primarily funerary/commemorative function and are perhaps better viewed as elite funerary complexes. |
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| ISSN: | 2769-3589 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Bulletin of ASOR
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1086/724363 |