THE ANCIENTS

Southland Times, Issue 18974, 22 June 1923, Page 6

THE ANCIENTS

EXCAVATIONS IN PALESTINE. (By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright). LONDON, June 20. (Received June 21, 11.20 p.m.) The Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund, assisted by the Daily Telegraph, have arranged with the Palestine Government for the Fund to conduct an important excavation at Ophel Hill, Jerusalem. Dr R. G. Hogarth, at a meeting of the Fund today, said that it was possible that tombs of kings would be found and that treasures of the time of David and Solomon would be revealed in an accumulation of rubbish, including an inscribed monument, recording David’s victories. Professor R. A. Stewart Macalister, who is in charge of the excavations, recalled the fact that the Daily Telegraph had financed George Smith’s expedition to Kuminjik in 1873, which had discovered the Babylonian cuneiform tablets relating to Noah’s flood. The excavations at Jerusalem will begin in September on the eastern hill south of the city wall which scholars have long recognised as a Jebusite fortress afterwards known as the hill of David. He also recalls that Josephus states that Simon Maccabaeus demolished the Akra which was a sort of citadel overtopping the temple. The work of destruction took the townsfolk of Jerusalem three years to accomplish working day and night. It might be possible to find the remains of the Akra which Simon Maccabaeus toppled into the adjacent valley. There were also the problems to be solved which were raised by the records on the Tel-el-Amarna tablets. He was of opinion that King Abdkhiba who was an accomplished intriguer and diplomatist might have left an archive chamber on the hill of David.