11 thousand years ago, 30 kilometers northeast of modern Jerusalem, an event took place that marked a new era in the development of mankind. One of the local tribes, later called Natufians, unexpectedly for all stopped wandering in the ancient Levant and settled in a picturesque oasis in the Jordan Valley.
Having not yet discovered agriculture for themselves, not knowing how to make ceramics and tools of labor from metal, the Natufians, nevertheless, founded a permanent settlement, which became one of the first cities on the planet. Most surprising of all is the fact that, despite all the many millennia that have passed, it continues to exist in the same place.
Until the end of the last ice age, it was difficult for mankind, which eked out a rather miserable existence during it, to organize a more or less large settlement. The unfavorable climate and its regular changes forced the representatives of the species homo sapiens to constantly wander from place to place in an attempt to find food for themselves and, if lucky, continue the race. During the glacial maximum (about 22-26 thousand years ago), all of northern Europe lay under ice, including even a fragment of the territory of the modern Vitebsk region of Belarus.
For example, the unfortunate Neanderthals, representatives of an alternative modern branch of human development, became victims of this glaciation. Fortunately for all of us, after any cold snap, no matter how eternal it may seem, a warm period inevitably follows, which once again happened around 10,000 BC.
In the development of mankind, a new, most important era begins - the Neolithic, when our distant ancestors finally moved from appropriating the gifts of nature (hunting and gathering) to their independent production. Thanks to improved climatic conditions, people have discovered agriculture, learning how to ensure their own food security by cultivating beneficial crops for the body, such as cereals. The main center of this civilizational leap was the Middle East in general and the Levant (present-day Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria) in particular - the territory that was named by the descendants "Fertile Crescent".
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Agriculture was a natural consequence of the transition to a sedentary lifestyle. The inhabitants of the Middle East were able to organize more or less permanent settlements, but only a few of those early Neolithic proto-cities are still inhabited today. One of these settlements arose near the Dead Sea in an oasis located in the Jordan Valley in modern Palestine.
It should be noted right away that the age of many ancient cities, especially those that appeared long before the beginning of the written history of mankind, is a debatable issue and lies primarily in archeology. Of course, there can be no question of any exact dating of their origin - in this case, scientists are forced to operate for centuries and even millennia. Several settlements (for example, Syrian Damascus or Lebanese Jebeil) claim the status of the most ancient more or less continuously inhabited city on the planet, but even with serious competitors, Palestinian Jericho stands out among them.
This is the famous story of the capture of Jericho by the troops of the Jews heading for the Promised Land under the leadership of Joshua - the first significant event where this settlement is mentioned in the Bible. The walls of the then prosperous city were destroyed by the Trumpets of Jericho (and the loud voice of the people), and this famous legend usually dates back to 1400 BC.
Many discoveries were made by the British expedition working in these places (1930-1936) under the leadership of Professor John Garstang. Before archaeologists, an ancient city rose from oblivion, the ruins of which very vividly told about its history.
During the excavations of Jericho, Garstang made such an amazing discovery that he considered it necessary to attest to it with a special document signed by himself and two other members of the expedition.
He writes about this discovery as follows: “As for the main fact, there is thus no doubt about it:
the walls of the city fell outward, and completely, so that the attackers could climb over the rubble and go into the city."
Garstang, John. Jericho and the Biblical Story // Wonders of the Past / Ed. JA Hammerton. New York: Wise, 1937, p. 1222.
The fact that the walls of the city collapsed outward, it would seem, was contrary to common sense, but this was exactly the case. This fact is unusual due to the fact that city walls do not fall outward, they fall inward. And nevertheless, in the book of Joshua it is written: “… and the wall of the city collapsed to its foundations, and the people went into the city, each from his side and took the city” (Joshua 6:19). The walls of Jericho fell exactly outward. The city wall collapsed to the ground, opening the way for the attackers to the city. During further excavations, traces of terrible fires were found that destroyed the city. Huge mountains of ash and coal were opened to the eyes of archaeologists.
Jericho Trumpet (Shofar) The shofar is a Jewish ritual wind musical instrument made from an animal's horn. Has a very ancient history and tradition of use, dating back to Moses.
It is blown during synagogue services on religious holidays and on a number of other occasions.
Small shofar.
The shofar was made in ancient times and is now made only from natural horn.
Hollow horns of rams, goats, antelopes, gazelles have been used and are used, never or almost never (due to allusions to the golden calf) bull or cow horns. Therefore, the shapes and lengths of shofars can be very different.
The shofar can be short, with a simple bend (as is customary among the Ashkenazi), or it can be long, twisted. The latter variety originated in the Jewish community of Yemen.
Yemeni shofar made from kudu antelope horn. In some countries and communities it is customary to process the horn heavily, heat it up with steam to give it the desired shape, in others, on the contrary, it is customary to minimize processing and not change the shape.
The tip of the horn at the shofar is cut or drilled, and the one who blows the shofar uses this simple hole to make sound. There are cases when the tip of the horn was shaped like a simple pipe mouthpiece.
Another significant piece of evidence was that archaeologists discovered entire barns and storerooms filled with wheat, dates, lentils and many other supplies, things and objects, dating of which also showed that the city was destroyed around 1400 BC. of ancient times it was customary to collect everything valuable and edible from a conquered city, especially if it was then subjected to destruction. However, these archaeological finds are perfectly explained in the light of the same book of Joshua, which says that Joshua did not allow his soldiers to plunder the treasures of Jericho, dedicating them to God.
Garstang published preliminary reports from his research, and after World War II, he and his son published a popular book in which he dated the violent destruction of a settlement he called City IV around 1400 BC. (end of the Late Bronze Age I).
After the war in 1953, the excavation of Jericho was continued by another archaeologist, Kathleen Kenyon. Her research ushered in a new era in Palestinian archeology, as she was the first to use the stratigraphic method - determining the relative geological age of sedimentary rocks based on the location of cultural soil layers. It was then that they started talking about Jericho as the oldest city in the world.
Like Garstang, Kenyon discovered a meter-long ash layer in Jericho, destroyed walls, and many grain-filled vessels in dwelling houses - evidence that fire and destruction took place shortly after the harvest. Many details in the description of Jericho in the book of Joshua, right up to the residential buildings attached to the northern section of the defensive wall, are really confirmed by archaeological data - they are clearly recorded "from the words of an eyewitness."
Many modern scholars believe that the archaeological facts are entirely consistent with the biblical account. Moreover, there is the most important archaeological evidence, which for many years was not adequately interpreted, but is now a key factor in solving the issue of chronology from the point of view of archeology. Jericho was destroyed as the Bible describes it, followed by a long period of absence of settlement in this place. It is clear that biblical tradition associates this destruction with the events of the Jewish conquest.
Quite recently (in the archaeological sense, of course) the next Ice Age ended. The vast majority of the world's population has not yet had time to appreciate the benefits of this and start living in a new way, and in the sands of the future Judean Desert a settlement with an area of 2.5 hectares arose, in which about 2-3 thousand people lived. The most striking fact was that this proto-city, from which Jericho later grew, was surrounded by a fortress wall already 10 thousand years ago, when the ancestors of modern Belarusians still got food with the help of digging sticks.
The Neolithic revolution (the transition to the domestication of animals and plants) has not yet happened, the inhabitants of this settlement did not yet know ceramics, but the picturesque nature, favorable climate and the presence of several sources of fresh water at once allowed them to create a community that was stable for many generations, which also lived under conditions that can (with a certain stretch, of course) be called urban.
The settlement was surrounded by a wall with a height of 3.7 to 5.2 meters and a thickness of up to one and a half meters. In front of the wall there was a ditch 2.7 meters deep. Within the perimeter were several dozen round brick buildings on a limestone base, each with several rooms. There was no street network yet, the development was chaotic, but archaeological data testified to the level of labor organization and social structure unprecedented for the era (8500-8000 BC).
The inhabitants of Jericho subsequently quickly switched from collecting wild cereals to the cultivation of wheat and barley, from hunting to cattle breeding, domesticated dogs (their burials were found right inside the buildings). At the same time, their life was surprisingly peaceful: even that very wall, probably the earliest surviving structure of this type on earth, was not defensive, but served as protection from floods. At least no archaeological evidence of hostilities has been found during this period.
The most surprising find was a round tower built into the wall with a diameter of 9 meters and a height of 8.5 meters with an internal staircase with 22 steps. It was also built not for defense, but, apparently, had exclusively ceremonial functions. According to researchers from the University of Tel Aviv, during the solar solstice (June 20 or 21), the shadow from the nearest mountain fell first on this tower, after which it covered the rest of the city. Thus, this structure, probably, symbolized the beginning of the lengthening of the nights, was a kind of astronomical instrument and, most likely, the central element of a certain rite like the Slavic Kupalya.
The walls of Jericho Tel-es-Sultan and in particular its tower, the most difficult engineering structure for a person of the Neolithic era, are possibly the oldest buildings on the planet, preserved in the still inhabited city. Ten thousand years ago, when they were born, before the construction of, for example, the Great Egyptian pyramids in Giza, there were still five and a half millennia long.
The proto-city in Jericho, which became one of the cradles of modern human civilization, continued to exist quite successfully, with short interruptions, for many centuries. This thriving settlement, whose inhabitants eventually switched from subsistence agriculture to mining salt in the Dead Sea basin, was destroyed around 1550 BC, which is usually associated with the above-mentioned Old Testament legend of Joshua, the seven Israelite priests, the ark of the covenant and Jericho pipes. By that time, the settlement had expanded, and a new double wall system took the place of the Neolithic fortifications. This is what Jericho looked like in the middle of the Bronze Age, who fell victim to the resettlement of Jews from Egypt.
The Jewish city that emerged from its ruins was destroyed by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar at the beginning of the 6th century BC, but the fertile Jordanian oasis was too tasty to be completely abandoned. Despite numerous waves of conquest, Jericho was reborn again and again, until already in antiquity, just before the onset of a new era, it became the residence of Herod the Great.
The remains of the palace of the Jewish king, who preferred to move here for the winter from Jerusalem, is now the second main attraction of Jericho after the Neolithic city of Tel es-Sultan. Under Herod, a hippodrome appeared here, and a system of aqueducts was also built under him, which has partially survived to this day.
Here are also the ruins of one of the oldest known temples on the planet (70-50 years BC).
Jericho also occupies an important place in the New Testament. On the north-western outskirts of the city there is a small (380 meters) Mount Karantal, Mount of Temptation or Forty-day Mountain. It was here, in one of the caves, where, according to the Gospels, 40 days after baptism Jesus Christ fasted, the devil tried to tempt him three times.
Now in this landmark place for all Christians there is a Greek Orthodox monastery. The main object of worship in the cave itself, where the events described in the gospels took place, is the stone on which Jesus personally sat during his temptation.
Pilgrims arriving to the Mount of Temptation can conquer the summit on foot or use the cable car built relatively recently (and for some reason by the Japanese), which offers panoramic views of modern Jericho and its surroundings.
Christian tourists continue to be one of the city's main sources of income. Being now part of the Palestinian National Authority, for objective reasons, he is not spoiled by their attention, being in some shadow of the same Bethlehem. Nevertheless, Jericho is popular as a "weekend city" among the Palestinians themselves, in no small part due to one of the landmark investment projects of the time of Yasser Arafat. In 1998, a large entertainment complex consisting of a hotel and a casino opened here, with about $ 150 million invested.
Since the end of the 19th century, in the very center of Jericho, there has been a courtyard of the Russian Orthodox Church. On its territory, the eyes and souls of pilgrims are delighted with the so-called fig tree of Zacchaeus - a tree, which, according to legend, climbed a local resident (and a tax collector in combination) Zacchaeus before meeting with Jesus Christ and the repentance that followed.
Zacchaeus fig tree.
Since January 2012, both the Russian courtyard and the biblical fig tree (which turned out to be another ficus - sycamore) are located on Dmitry Medvedev Street. This name was solemnly given to her during the visit of the then Russian president to the city as a sign of the growing friendship of the fraternal Russian and Palestinian peoples.
Possessing a unique complex of archaeological monuments and a number of Christian shrines, otherwise, from the point of view of architecture, Jericho is not very interesting. After the Turkish conquest of the XII-XIII centuries, the city degraded into a small village, in the XIX-XX centuries it turned into a typical Middle Eastern city, which is now being imprinted by the Palestinian environment.
Nevertheless, people have lived here almost continuously for 10 thousand years. The oldest city on earth, the city of date palms, Jericho bears witness to the entire history of human civilization.
Afterword
The history of this city has always served, on the one hand, as the confirmation of the faith of Christians, and on the other - the target of critics who scoffed at the biblical story. The latter was due to the fact that the case of Jericho was an example of a particularly striking God's intervention in the course of history. Disputes around this city flared up often, and the attacks of a number of scientists were so great that even some believers began to consider the story of the capture of Jericho as just a legend that has no historical basis. But, as in many other cases, archaeological excavations confirm the Bible's fidelity, silencing material scientists with shame. For true believers, these findings became a joy, because the whole world saw the facts confirming the words of Holy Scripture.