Stamp-Seals from the Southern Levant

In two weeks, an exciting group of international scholars will join us in the workshop “Beyond the ‘Biblical World’ Paradigm: Religion, Mediality, and Gender in the Southern Levant.”

The session will happen at the International Organization for the Study of Old Testament (IOSOT) Conference at the University of Zurich.

Check for the full schedule and abstracts at the IOSOT 2022 website: https://www.iosot2022.uzh.ch

Bruno Biermann, a staff member of our project, was featured recently on the University of Zürich podcast Erleuchtung Garantiert and discussed how the study of ancient seals can be used to reveal and overcome prejudices about past sexualities and gender roles.

Tune in!

S*x oder kein S*x? – Bruno Biermann über Interpretation und Funktionen antiker Stempelsiegel Männer sind erfolgreich - Frauen tragen Schmuck? Anhand von bis zu 4000 Jahre alten Siegeln wird im Gespräch mit hartnäckigen Vorurteilen aufgeräumt. Ausserdem geht es darum, dass Daumennagel-kleine Darstellungen von S*x einst Dämonen abwehren sollten und dass der Verlust eines winzigen Siegels...

Our heartfelt congratulations to Bruno Biermann, a staff member in our project, for receiving the 2022 Sean W. Dever Memorial Prize for his paper “Seals from the Southern Levant and Gender Archaeology: Theoretical and Practical Considerations”!

What is a seal impression? The impression left by a seal on clay or plaster.
Seal impressions are used by individuals and institutions to guarantee the contents of a container or sealed storehouse. When used on documents, they indicate the participation of individuals or institutions in private or legal transactions. Seal impressions can also serve for branding purposes, to indicate the prestigious origin of an item.
The impression on this jar sealing shows the name of Pharaoh Hatshepsut. This vessel was found in an Egyptian tomb, but sealings impressed with royal Egyptian seals have also been discovered in the Levant.
Βy Tatjana Beuthe
(image: Jar from Egypt, Luxor, ca. 1492-1473 BCE, Metropolitan Museum 36.3.83)

What is the Southern Levant?
Scholars use the term “Southern Levant” as a tentative neutral geographic term to refer to the region comprising the modern states of Jordan, Palestine, and Israel (in contrast, “Northern Levant” would refer to Lebanon and Syria). Labels such as French 'le Levant,' Arabic 'mashriq, the Latin-based 'Orient' and related terms refer to areas in the east—meaning the place of the sun's rising. From a European perspective, the term designated the maritime trade field of the eastern Mediterranean from the 16th century on. The southern part of the Levantine region is geographically bounded in the west by the Mediterranean shores, and spans east to the Arabian desert. The area is naturally divided by the Syro-African Rift, splitting the region east and west of the Jordan River, respectively referred to as Trans- and Cisjordan.
By Silas Klein Cardoso
(© NASA Visible Earth, edited by SKC)

This week our team paid a visit to the intellectual founder of our project. Othmar Keel, Emeritus Professor of Old Testament at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland), dreamed in the late 1970s of a corpus of all stamp seals found in scientifically controlled excavations in what was then called the "Lands of the Bible". His ultimate intent as a Hebrew Bible scholar was to use these tiny but abundant shreds of evidence as aids to biblical interpretation. By 2013 he had analyzed, and published in six weighty volumes, 7500+ seals from Israel, Palestine, and Jordan. The project's impact went far beyond Biblical Studies, attracting the attention of disciplines such as Archaeology, Egyptology, History and the Study of Religion. Our project aims to bring this corpus to completion, and to ensure its transition to the Digital Humanities era. (Photo: Bruno Biermann / Text: Silas Klein Cardoso)

Studying stamp seals from the Bibel+Orient Museum Fribourg

What is a sealing? An unfired piece of clay or plaster, that covers or is attached to an object, e.g. the jar shown here.
Sealings were and are still used to guarantee the contents of a container, a storeroom or document. When used on a vessel, they are also meant to guarantee the quality of its contents, and when used on a door, they indicate the contents are safeguarded.
Did you know? Many ancient sealings found in the Levant, Egypt, and the Near East are blank and not impressed with a seal. This jar from the age of the Pyramids is also blank.
By Tatjana Beuthe
(image: Jar from Egypt, Saqqara, ca. 2649-2100 BCE, Metropolitan Museum 28.2.20)

Why study seals? What makes these small seals from ancient times interesting for today's researchers? These inconspicuous items are among the numerous types of objects of ancient material ulture found in the southern Levant. Seals were manufactured from various materials (mostly stones, local or imported, but also composite materials or bone, metal etc.), often engraved with motifs, and they could have many uses—from sealing goods to adorning bodies alive or deceased. They thus offer us significant insights into social, economic, cultural, and religious developments and processes in the region.
By Bruno Biermann

What are seals?

Seals are miniature objects that were used in a variety of contexts in ancient daily life. Large numbers of seals are known from the southern Levant, especially during and after the Middle Bronze Age (2000-1550 BCE). Seals were made from different solid materials and often engraved; when a cylinder-shaped seal was rolled, or a stamp seal pressed into clay this would produce an impression. In the ancient Levant, seals take on diverse stereometric shapes, in particular scarabs. Other shapes include cylindrical, oval, or square, as well as complex, figurative designs such as animal and human-shaped seals. Most of the seals from the southern Levant are stamp seals were made to look like beetles, such as the scarab-shaped seal in the second photo. (© Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by David Harris).

By Bruno Biermann

11,000+ stamp seals, sealings, and seal impressions dated from the Neolithic to the Hellenistic period (330 BCE) have been documented through controlled excavations in what are today Israel, Jordan, and Palestine. The longevity, number, and diverse use of these tiny objects render them fruitful sources for studying ancient lives and societies. Cataloging and investigating these artifacts are the main aims of the project “Stamp Seals from the Southern Levant” (SSSL). Since January 2020, an international and multidisciplinary team of researchers has been assembled in Bern, Tel Aviv, and Zurich to produce innovative studies. Their core tool of research is a common database, to be developed into a collaborative online, open access format called the “Corpus of Stamp Seals from the Southern Levant” (CSSL). Taking as its starting point an unfinished corpus project initiated by Othmar Keel in the late 1970s and bringing it to completion, CSSL will also marking its transition to the digital humanities. SSSL is a four-year SINERGIA project funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation.
By Silas Klein Cardoso

The project Stamp Seals from the Southern Levant (SSSL) brings together senior scholars, postdocs, and Ph.D. students from several disciplines and the universities of Bern, Tel Aviv, and Zurich to build a collaborative, comprehensive and expandable database of stamp seals from the Southern Levant.

The project board consists of Prof. Dr. Christoph Uehlinger (Zürich), Prof. Dr. Silvia Schroer (Bern), Prof. Dr. Stefan Münger (Bern) and Dr. Ido Koch (Tel Aviv). Research staff includes Dr. Ben Greet (archaeology, Great Britain), Bruno Biermann (biblical studies, Germany), Dr. Eythan Levy (archaeology/computer science, Israel/Belgium), Dr. Fabio Porzia (history of religion, Italy), Dr. Giulia Tucci (archaeology of the ancient Near East, Italy), Inbar Meyerson (archaeology of the ancient Near East, Israel), Dr. Nadia Ben-Marzouk (archaeology of the ancient Near East, USA), Noa Ranzer (archaeology of the ancient Near East, Israel), Dr. Silas Klein Cardoso (history of religion/biblical studies, Brazil), and Dr. Tatjana Beuthe (archaeology of Egypt and the ancient Near East, Canada). Missing on the image are Ben Greet, Inbar Meyerson, and Nadia Ben-Marzouk.

Over the next weeks we will introduce our team and board in more detail, so stay tuned!

Text and image by Bruno Biermann