Beth Shemesh: Sherds and Data
Semester: Fall 2024
Faculty Advisor: Jennie Bradbury
Field Site: Penn Museum
Field Supervisor: Katy Blanchard
Praxis Poster:
Anna Kimsey Final Poster
Further Context:
When Katherine Blanchard, Keeper of the Near Eastern Collections at the Penn Museum, accepted my request to be my field supervisor for my independent study project, she sent me a list of potential projects that fell within my scholarly interests that she had on her agenda. Of the five projects she listed, the description of Beth Shemesh was the longest entry and it piqued my interest. Beth Shemesh, an ancient town located approximately 18 miles west of Jerusalem, was occupied from the Middle Bronze Age IIA period through to the Iron Age IIC (2000-650 BCE). As a result, it features an incredibly diverse range of both locally produced and imported ceramics. For about 30 years, the bulk of the excavated materials that were exported from Palestine were housed at Haverford College, in Sharpless Hall, with a few study collections scattered across American universities. In 1961, the Penn Museum acquired the collection, and at that time accessioned the whole objects and small finds. However, the majority of the 5,000-odd sherds from Beth Shemesh laid un-processed and un-catalogued.
So, my goal at the Penn Museum was not to process all of the sherds, but rather to establish a system for future accession and to do as much as I possibly could in one semester. At the museum, I catalogued each sherd, recording its type, findspot, and excavation date along with generating a description of the color, ware, decoration, and any other interesting features. I later entered this data into a spreadsheet in order for it to be uploaded into the Museum database. The other aspect of this process was photography, which was exclusively shot-down in this instance. I was able to process two boxes of sherds, which may not sound like much but does amount to almost 400 sherds.
Through this process, I learned to keep an open mind about what I was seeing, and not make assumptions about the material based on what I expected to see. This opened my eyes to the true diversity of the ceramics at Beth Shemesh. However, my final project for PRAXIS is not based on ceramic analysis. Ultimately, the provenance of this material became the driving force behind my research paper as I grew increasingly interested in Haverford College’s one archaeological excavation. I supplemented readings suggested by my Faculty Supervisor, Jennie Bradbury, with archival research carried out at the Penn Museum Archives and the Quaker and Special Collections at Haverford College. I was able to access the correspondence and photographs of Elihu Grant, the biblical studies professor who carried out the excavations.
This process has truly pushed me out of my comfort zone and exposed me to a whole new way of thinking about archaeology. The combination of hands-on experience and my research into the historical context of the excavation has given me a vastly more nuanced perspective on Beth Shemesh and its ceramic material than I started this independent study off with.