An Early Bronze IVB tomb was discovered by the MOTA-DACH on June 2009 in the city of Bethlehem, nearby the Milk Grotto. Its architectural features, burials and associated funerary equipment are here considered and compared with those of other Early Bronze IV cemeteries and necropoleis of Southern Levant to grasp the historical-archaeological meaning of this discovery.
Rescue excavations in Bethlehem undertaken by the Sapienza University of Rome and the Palestinian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities-Department of Archaeology and Cultural Heritage-have revealed four Bronze Age necropolises. These newly discovered sites illuminate the development of pre-Classical Bethlehem.
In Spring 2019 the Italian-Palestinian joint team of Sapienza University of Rome and the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities of Palestine Dept. of Archaeology and Cultural Heritage resumed rescue excavations at the Necropolis of Khalet al-Jam’a, 2.2 Km south-east from the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem. Works were focused on Tomb A7, identified in 2015, a huge underground burial place, dating back to the Iron IIC (8th-7th century BC), but also including earlier depositions dating from the EB IVB-MB.
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