Dating the Iron Age I/II Transition in Israel: First Intercomparison Results

Abstract

Nearly a decade ago, a different chronology than the conventional absolute chronology for the early Iron Age in Israel was suggested. The new, lower chronology “transfers” Iron Age I and Iron Age IIA contexts in Israel, traditionally dated to the 11th and 10th centuries BCE, to the 10th and 9th centuries, respectively. Thus, it places the Iron I|IIA transition at about 920–900 BCE. This alternative chronology carries important implications for Israelite history, historiography, and Bible research, as well as for the chronologies of other regions around the Mediterranean. Relevant radiocarbon data sets published to date, which were measured at different sites by different laboratories, were claimed to be incompatible. Therefore, the question of agreement between laboratories and dating methods needs to be addressed at the outset of any study attempting to resolve such a tight chronological dilemma. This paper addresses results pertaining to this issue as part of a comprehensive attempt to date the early Iron Age in Israel based on many sites, employing different measuring techniques in 2 laboratories. The intercomparison results demonstrate that: a) the agreement between the 2 laboratories is well within the standard in the 14C community and that no bias can be detected in either laboratory; and b) calculating the Iron I|IIa transition in 3 different ways (twice independently by the measurements obtained at the 2 labs and then by combining the dates of both) indicates that the lower chronology is the preferable one.

Report on the First Stage of the Iron Age Dating Project in Israel: Supporting a Low Chronology

“…In a re-examination of the context, it was recognized that the locus was contaminated by intrusive material. In another case from the same site (sample 4282), the excavators changed the phase designation without any indication from the 14 C dates that something was amiss (note the different stratigraphic designation in Table 7 vs. Boaretto et al 2005: Table 1). …”

14C Dates and the Iron Age Chronology of Israel: A Response

“…The same samples were measured by 2 or even 3 different methods, thus enabling interlaboratory comparisons. In an initial version of the present paper, we examined the results of the Bayesian models as published by Boaretto et al (2005) and presented alternative models based on evaluation of the same data combined with a few additional dates. After the submission of that paper in March 2007, a more detailed report on the Iron Age Dating Project including additional radiometric dates, calibrated dates, and Bayesian models was published in this journal by Sharon et al (2007).…”

“…Boaretto et al (2005) published 68 radiocarbon dates relating to 30 samples from 10 Iron Age sites in Israel as part of their Early Iron Age Dating Project. Though the main goal of their paper was an interlaboratory comparison, they also presented results of Bayesian models, calculating the transition from Iron Age I to Iron Age II in Israel to be about 900 BCE instead of the conventional date of about 1000 BCE.…”

“…It should be noted that while in Boaretto et al (2005) Tucson and Rehovot laboratory numbers were marked as separate sample numbers, the same dates were marked in Sharon et al (2007) as sample numbers of the Iron Age Dating Project. We present in our tables both numbering systems in 2 different columns.…”

“…It should be noted that all dates with similar sample numbers in Sharon et al (2007) come from the same sample of seeds or charcoal, even though they may appear in several lines in our tables since they were measured by different methods. When such clusters pass the χ 2 test and are all done by 1 laboratory, we used the average date as calculated by Boaretto et al (2005) or Sharon et al (2007).…”