Archaeologists in Israel have uncovered extraordinary artifacts, including a 5,000-year-old winepress and a 3,300-year-old animal-shaped vessel.
Archaeological excavations connected to a highway development project in northern Israel, east of the ancient city of Megiddo, have shed light on the area’s Bronze Age history and Canaanite people—the communities that lived in the Levant starting around 3,000 BCE. The discoveries provide insight into early wine production as well as potential Canaanite rituals.
“Megiddo has been excavated for over a century,” the researchers explained in a statement by the Israel Antiquities Authority. “While it is long-recognized as a key site in the study of ancient urbanism and Canaanite worship, the excavations we conducted east of the tel have revealed a new part of the matrix between the known settlement in the city—evidence of which has been revealed upon the tel—and the activities taking place in the area around and outside the city.” A tel is a mound that represents the location of an ancient city.
A unique wine press
The researchers excavated a small wine production press carved directly into the rock from the Early Bronze IB period (3300 to 3100 BCE). According to excavation directors Amir Golani and Barak Tzin, the finding is unique because there are very few presses that date back to the region’s first urbanization. “This discovery is the first time such an installation may be securely dated as early as the early Bronze I period nearly 5,000 years ago, making it the first and earliest direct evidence of wine production in our region,” Golani explained in an Israel Antiquities Authority video.
Archaeologists found numerous residential buildings in its vicinity, suggesting that the press was important to the ancient community and that Megiddo spread farther than the established limits of the tell.
The team also discovered artifacts dating to the Late Bronze Age II (1400 to 1200 BCE) and buried as ritual offerings, including a miniature ceramic model of a temple, storage jars, jugs and juglets from Cyprus, and a set of vessels likely used for libations (pouring out drinks as offerings to gods). “This is what the real temples in the Canaanite Late Bronze Age may have looked like,” Golani said of the temple model.
A special vessel set
The vessel set consists of a container in the shape of a ram and a few small bowls. Given that researchers usually find only isolated fragments of such vessels, the set is remarkable. It was buried intact and in a way that suggests its ancient function. According to the statement, it represents the entire region’s first-ever glimpse into how Canaanites used these vessels in their rituals. The researchers explain that Canaanites would have likely used a small bowl with a handle to pour liquid into another small bowl-shaped funnel attached to the ram’s body during a ceremony.
“The ram’s head was shaped like a spout. Once the vessel was filled, tilting the ram forward spilled the liquid out from its mouth to collect it into a small bowl placed before it,” the team explained in the statement. “The vessel seems intended for pouring a valuable liquid such as milk, oil, wine or another beverage, which could either be drunk directly from the spout, or poured into a smaller vessel for consumption, or as a votive gift.”
According to the researchers, the fact that the vessels were buried in direct view of Tel Megiddo’s Late Bronze Age II large temple area might suggest the presence of a Canaanite folk cult outside the city along the way to the main city gate. It could have consisted of local farmers who could not go into the city and its temple. Some of the offerings were buried next to a large rock outcrop, which may have been used as an open-air altar outside Megiddo.
The discoveries shed light on the history of a region whose future, some might say, is even more obscure than its ancient past.
