The first week of our dig at Lachish has ended.

On the last day of each week the expedition team visits a nearby site to learn more about the history of the area.

Our destination today was Gezer. I have learned that it is very easy to mispronounce the name of the tel and city. The way that I remember it is “A geezer went to Gezer.” The two words are not pronounced the same. Geezer has a long ‘e’ sound and Gezer has a short ‘e’ sound.

I will share more about the history of Gezer in a future post, but for now will just share a few pictures from the site.

The first picture is of a replica of the Gezer Calendar. The calendar was found in 1908 and is now on display at the Museum of the Ancient Orient in Istanbul, Turkey.  The calendar is an agriculture calendar and describes the progression of field work throughout the year.

Our next stop was at the Middle Bronze Age gate. The city gate was guarded by a massive stone tower.

There is also an Iron Age gate at Gezer. This gate has six chambers and is unique in that it has seats around the inside of some of the chambers.

The other major feature that we visited at the site was a row of standing stones. There were originally ten monolithic stones at the site. The area is described as a cultic center.

I will close with a couple pictures that illustrate the size of the stones.

Here we have a geezer at Gezer standing with one of the stones.

Here is a group of students from Oakland University standing in front of two of the stones. They are digging in squares that are near ours at Lachish.

Now for a weekend trip to Jerusalem and some rest before the second week of the dig.

Steven