Does Archaeology Support Bible History?
TO CELEBRATE THE TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF THE Biblical Archaeology Review, the editors invited Michael D. Coogan to list the “10 Great Finds” or discoveries from the years of modern archaeological exploration in the ancient Near East. His selections included: (1) the Gilgamesh Epic tablet XI from Nineveh, a parallel with the biblical flood story; (2) the Beni Hasan mural from nineteenth-century Egypt, showing 37 Asiatics coming to trade and depicting what the patriarchs may have looked like; (3) the Gezer High Place near Tel Aviv from 1600 B.C.; (4) the carved ivory knife handle from Megiddo in the thirteenth or twelfth century B.C.; (5) the fertility goddess pendant from Ras Shamra, Syria, from the fourteenth or twelfth century B.C.; (6) the Gibeon Pool, six miles north of Jerusalem, from the eleventh century B.C., where David’s forces probably fought under Joab against the forces of Saul’s son Ishbosheth under Abner (2 Sam 2:12-17); (7) the Beersheba Altar in southern Israel from the
