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  • From: "Banyai Michael" <banyai AT t-online.de>
  • To: b-hebrew
  • Subject: Re: ane Peleset: pro Bimson ...
  • Date: Fri, 4 Feb 2000 9:31:55


Ian Hutchesson wrote:

> No substantial case has been made to separate the Philistines from the
> Peleset of Aegean origin. The argument that "Philistine" is in some sense
> geographical doesn't deal with the archaeology or the epigraphy. The fact
> seems to me to be that the Philistines are the Aegean people mentioned by
> Ramses III. This being the case, of course one can talk of anachronisms. We
> know basically when the Philistines arrived. Their pottery is a rather good
> temporal indication -- a form that changed in the Aegean was being
> manufactured in Palestine using *local* fabric.

Is there a possibility to assume the "Philistine" ceramic isn´t Philistine
at all, but work of some Aegean ceramist?
We might connect the appearance of the slight Aegean cultural contact, with
the story of Mopsos leading an Anatolian group (Shekelesh?) with a liberal
Greek admixture to Ashkelon.
Where he was defeated after having destroyed the local temple of
"Aphrodite". This group, should one suppose its historicity, may have got
captive, and provided the Aegean workmen, ceramist. The influence is very
short, perhaps a mans lifetime, and the called ceramic is but about 10% of
the whole ceramic finds. The rest simply continues the local styles.
There is no possibility at all to link this "Philistine" ceramic style with
the plst of the Ramses III reliefs.

The biblical story of the arrival of people, settling south of Gaza, from
Kaphtor may better be connected with the minoic palaces and ceramic
(Dolphin jug from Lisht) during later MB age. Ipuwer mentions a Kaphtor
making the east boundary of Egypt:
„None ideed sail northward to Byblos today; what shall we do [to obtain]
cedar trees for our mummies, with the produce of which priests are buried
and with the oil of which [chiefs] are embalmed, [reaching on land only] as
far as Keftju?” Ipuwer 3,6-3,8.
There is indeed during the MBA to notice an increase of Cretan cultural
influence in Egypt and the Levante. The archaeological excavations in Tell
el-Dab´a revealed Minoan (perhaps LB I) frescoes. In Tell Kabri in
Palestine were found similar frescoes as well. Even the dolphin-jug from
Lisht ( found in a MBA Egyptian grave by Lisht ), with typical Minoan
motifs, turned out after a Neutron Activation Analysis11 of the clays, to
be a local South-Palestinian manufacture.
There is much evidence that the Minoic presence in Palestine during the MBA
is the result of a real Cretan presence not only of comercial exchange.
It is possible to suppose the existence of Hyksos-controlled Cretan trading
colonies in the MBA in the south Palestine.
Stephanus Polyhistor knew of a city Minoa by Gaza.
The Egyptian version of the Canopus decree equates the geographically
rather vague Greek term Phoinix (covering the whole Levante coast) with
Keftju (and not with Plst, nota bene!). Why?
One should observe the representation of keftju on Egyptian monuments. The
later representations show them wear an asiatic habit, as though they have
accomodated their new country.

Best regards,


Banyai Michael



  • Re: ane Peleset: pro Bimson ..., Banyai Michael, 02/04/2000

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