ABSTRACT
Archaeological Data and Extra-Biblical Sources It is believed that biblical Shechem should be located in Tell Balâtah, situated some 65 km north of Jerusalem.1 Excavations were started there in 1912 (E. Sellin) and continued in the years 1914, 1926-1927, 1932 and 1934 (H. Steckeweh), and again in 1956-64 (G.E. Wright). The oldest traces of settlement there come from the Chalcolithic period. Shechem was settled again in the Middle Bronze Age (the period of the Middle Bronze Age IIA is generally dated from 1850 to 1750 BCE). Egyptian sources dated in the eighteenth century BCE mention skmm, interpreted as the name “Shechem.” The IIB stratum (1750-1650 BCE) is where the oldest remains of city walls have been found. The same period dates the remains of constructions which served sacral purposes (analogous with those of Beth-Shean in stratum IX).2 Shechem was settled continuously during the period of the Hyxoses. One suggestion is that the inhabitants of that time were of Indo-European origin.3 The temple built in the middle of the second millennium has been described by archaeologists as a “massive fortress-temple (migdal).”4 The dimensions of the building, dated from the seventeenth or sixteenth century BCE, allow us to suppose that at that time the town was the capital of the entire region (from Megiddo to Gezer).5 Traces of previous destruction have been 1. E.F. Campbell, Shechem II: Portrait of a Hill Country Vale. The Shechem Regional Survey, Atlanta, 1991; E.F. Campbell and G.R.H. Wright, Shechem III: The Stratigraphy and Architecture of Shechem/Tell Balâtah. Vol. 1, Text. Vol. 2, Illustrations, Boston, 2002. 2. G.E. Wright, “Shechem,” in EAEHL, 4:1083-94 (1086-88). 3. G.E. Wright, Shechem: The Biography of a Biblical City, New York, 1965, 94-95. 4. Wright, “Shechem,” 1089. 5. Ibid., 1090.
