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Buffalo Jewish Review · Buffalo, New York · 15 July 1927

CP-1927-014

What American Archaeologists Excavated at Tell En-Nasbeth

Dean William Frederic Bade

What American Archaeologists Excavated at Tell En-Nasbeth — Buffalo Jewish Review, 15 July 1927
Buffalo Jewish Review · Buffalo, New York · 15 July 1927

Transcribed from the clipping

“Seven miles north of Jerusalem, on the west side of the Nablus road, lies a commanding hill whose summit has all the earmarks of an ancient city mound… the writer was able to leave for Palestine with funds sufficient for an initial campaign. It was fortunate for our maiden enterprise that we were able to avail ourselves of the co-operation of the American School of Oriental Research in Jerusalem… Dr. Albright, director of the school, initiated negotiations with some of the Arab owners of Tell en-Nasbeh and assisted in reaching a formal agreement with them in the presence of Mr. C. Lubbat, Governor of the Ramallah District. Dr. C. S. Fisher, professor of archaeology in the school and director of the Megiddo Expedition, outlined for me his technique, gave me an experienced assistant in the person of Mr. Labib Sorial, besides several trained Egyptian workmen, and undertook in addition the task of general supervision.… Among the first structures that came to light, when we began to strip layers within the city wall, were what we took to be grain bins, or silos… Farther back from the wall were later found more than thirty silos excavated from bedrock and of much greater capacity. These clearly were of the Bronze Age and contained abundant and interesting evidence of the Canaanite period of the city’s occupation… The women often went to draw water at night and accidently dropped their lamps into the cisterns, thus providing, unintentionally, another means of identifying the strata.… [Facing columns] New York. — The sum of $587,704 has been received in cash by the national headquarters of the United Palestine Appeal during the period of Redemption Month… Among the communities that have led in this response are: Eastern Pennsylvania with 110,000; Greater New York with $89,172; Newark, N. J., $50,000; Connecticut and Rhode Island, $49,225, exceeding their cash quota by $8,225; Sea Board Region, $39,140; Pacific Coast, $39,880; Northern New Jersey, $24,676; Southern Michigan, $24,563; Chicago, $20,850… ‘I desire to express my confidence that the efforts of all concerned will continue throughout the summer and that the means will be provided for conquering the difficulties through which Palestine is still passing.’… this year’s income, up to July 1st, which amounts to $2,841,510, is in excess of that for the same period of the previous year by $471,773… One of the most important items in the expansion of the educational work is the publication of the ‘Palestine Pictorial,’ a monthly magazine sent to 35,000 contributors and featuring in graphic form the developments and possibilities of Palestine…”

Context added by this archive

An excavation report that records, in passing, who owned the hill: Arab owners of Tell en-Nasbeh, negotiated with formally in the presence of the governor of the Ramallah district. A named Arabic-speaking assistant, Labib Sorial, and Egyptian workmen did the digging. The archaeologist also notes the local women drawing water at night, whose dropped lamps helped him date the layers. The other two-thirds of the page is the money: half a million dollars collected in one American month for the United Palestine Appeal, listed by region, and a magazine on the possibilities of Palestine going to thirty-five thousand subscribers.

Cite this item

"What American Archaeologists Excavated at Tell En-Nasbeth," Buffalo Jewish Review, 15 July 1927. Covering Palestine archive, CP-1927-014. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-1927-014

Elsewhere in the archive

This record is part of Covering Palestine, an archive of American and Anglophone newspaper clippings about Palestinians, 1812 to 2022. Researched and assembled by Maria Robles.

The clipping belongs to the newspaper that printed it, or to the wire service that supplied the copy. It is reproduced here for research, criticism and commentary. The city is derived from the masthead, not read off the clipping.

Something wrong here, or something you know about this clipping? The archive is still being built and corrections are wanted: maria@rozumstudio.com, quoting CP-1927-014.

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