Rameses II-Period Crypt Discovered In Israel

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By Matt Pepple, SJ Correspondent
November 11, 2022 07:30 am UTC
Modified: 2022-11-11 07:30 am

ISRAEL – Scientists reported an unbelievable find of a burial rock shelter from the period of Pharaoh Rameses II. The cavern is overflowing with bronze-age relics, earthen pots and pottery bits.

The lair was unearthed on a seaside when a construction excavator laboring in the Palmahim National Park struck the ceiling of the cavern. Archaeologists then went down operating a step-ladder into the manufactured hollow.

The Israel Antiquities Authority has made publicized a video showcasing the awestruck scientists gleaming their flashlights on various fragments and ceramic vats and streamers of different shapes and masses that have been determined to have come from the time period of Rameses II who died in 1213 BC.

Cookware, pots, a few of which held bones (some outlined in red paint) cups, mugs, vats for storing goods, oil lamplets, and bronze-age arrowheads were found in the shelter.

These items were considered to be funerary donations to go with the dead on their final voyage into life after death, and remain 3,300 years later intact.

One comparatively undamaged skeleton was located in one of two rectangle-shaped graves at the edge of the crypt.

Dr. Eli Yannai, an Israel Antiquities Authority Bronze Age consultant said, "The cave may furnish a complete picture of the Late Bronze Age funerary customs...an extremely rare...once in a lifetime discovery,” as reported by The Archaeologist. Dr. Yannai also noted the cavern stayed secured up to its current unveiling.

Rameses II reigned over Canaan, which is a region that covers contemporary Israel and the Palestinian area.

"The birthplace of the earthen vessels were the territories of Jaffa, Gaza, Northern Syria, Cyprus, and Lebanon, which attest to the lively trading activity that took place along the coast" Dr. Yannai declared in an IAA remark, as reported by The Archaeologist.

A second Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologist, Dr. David Gelman, speculated on the identification of the human remains found in the rock shelter, positioned in what is a modern-day notorious beach in the middle of Israel.

Dr. Gelman said, "The fact that these people were buried along with weapons, including entire arrows, shows that these people might have been warriors, perhaps they were guards on ships—which may have been the reason they were able to obtain vessels from all around the area.”

Dr. Gelman also thinks that this is an astounding find; despite who the citizens of the cavern were, according to The Archaeologist.

Dr. Gelman went on to say, "Burial caves are rare as it is, and finding one that hasn't been touched since it was first used 3,300 years ago is something you rarely ever find...It feels like something out of an Indiana Jones movie: just going into the ground and everything is just laying there as it was initially -– intact pottery vessels, weapons, vessels made out of bronze, burials just as they were,” as stated in The Archaeologist.

The cavern has been re-secured and is being patrolled while a course of action for the complete unearthing is being devised the Israel Antiquities Authority commented.

According to the IAA several objects have been plundered from the crypt during the brief time between its uncovering and closing.