A GREAT DISCOVERY.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume XXIV, 31 December 1926, Page 5

A GREAT DISCOVERY.

THE WALLS OF MIZPAH. JERUSULEM, November 14. The interesting discoveries made by Mr William Frederick Bade, the "wellknown archaeologist, and Dean of . the Pacific School of Religion at Berkeley, California, who has unearthed the walls of Mizpah, the famous Biblical city, were related in an interview recently at Southampton. Mr Bade said : “Shortly after I began I found an ancient city buried, presumably Mizpah of Benjamin. I struck a portion of the south-eastern wall, which ranks as the finest city wall of the bronze age ever unearthed in the Orient. It dates back to 1500 years before Christ. Its thickness led me to believe that the city of Mizpah must have been remarkably rich, as the ancient people were not in the habit of building walls of that type unless they had something to protect by them. From the length of the wall, which I judged to be about three-quarters of a mile, I should think the city of Mizpah was probably seven and a-half acres in extent, which is very large when it is considered that Jerusalem was only 11 acres. At the south-east corner I found a citadel built for defensive purposes. Inside was a pile of what seemed to be cannon balls, made from hammered flint and used by the famous Babylonian slingers with such deadly effect. There were also copper arrow heads, spears, and daggers. Inside the wall I found two cave tombs, which were more than 1000 years older than the wall itself, and these contained a large amount of pottery of the period during the transition from the stone to the bronze age. The specimens, which included a number of drinking vessels, were all painted, and were quite finely finished. These tombs had been, used as burial places for one or two families for centuries, for they contained upwards of 100 skeletons. Buried with the bones were gold beads, a gold ring, and beads of semi-precious stones, all carefully ground and threaded on gut. In readiness to meet the emergencies of siege, eight water cisterns were also found, dug from the living rock, and one of these was large enough to hold 50 people, and had five holes at the top from which water might be drawn. Another discovery of considerable interest was the finding of the head of a Babylonian Venus, called “The Queen of Heaven,” and sometimes worshipped by the Israelites. It was made of terracotta ciay, and the head has bobbed hair with a fringe. Mr Bade, who has sent some specimens home to the University of California for examination by experts, will return to* continue his work next spring, and in> succeeding years, as t a result of which many interesting discoveries are expected to be tinadc.