Gezer calendar



The Gezer calendar is a small limestone tablet with an early Canaanite inscription discovered in 1908 by Irish archaeologist R. A. Stewart Macalister in the ancient city of Gezer, 20 miles west of Jerusalem. It is commonly dated to the 10th century BCE, although the excavation was not stratified.

Scholars are divided as to whether the language is Phoenician or Hebrew and whether the script is Phoenician (or Proto-Canaanite) or paleo-Hebrew. Koller argued that the language is Northern Hebrew. Use of the term "Paleo-Hebrew alphabet" is due to a 1954 suggestion by Solomon Birnbaum, who argued that "to apply the term Phoenician [from Northern Canaan, today's Lebanon] to the script of the Hebrews [from Southern Canaan, today's Israel-Palestine] is hardly suitable".

The inscription is not a formal calendar, as it describes agricultural seasons with imprecise dates, rather than precise divisions of time as would be required for a ritual or bureaucratic calendar. As such, some of the time units comprise two months rather than one, and none are referred to by the month numbers or names known from other sources.

Inscription
The calendar is inscribed on a limestone plaque and describes monthly or bi-monthly periods and attributes to each a duty such as harvest, planting, or tending specific crops.

The inscription, known as KAI 182, is in Phoenician or paleo-Hebrew script:

𐤉𐤓𐤇𐤅𐤀𐤎𐤐.𐤉𐤓𐤇𐤅𐤆 𐤓𐤏.𐤉𐤓𐤇𐤅𐤋𐤒𐤔 𐤉𐤓𐤇𐤏𐤑𐤃𐤐𐤔𐤕 𐤉𐤓𐤇𐤒𐤑𐤓𐤔𐤏𐤓𐤌 𐤉𐤓𐤇𐤒𐤑𐤓𐤅𐤊𐤋 𐤉𐤓𐤇𐤅𐤆𐤌𐤓 𐤉𐤓𐤇𐤒𐤑
 * 𐤉𐤁𐤀

Which in equivalent square Hebrew letters is as follows:





This corresponds to the following transliteration, with spaces added for word divisions:


 * yrḥw ʾsp yrḥw z
 * rʿ yrḥw lqš
 * yrḥ ʿṣd pšt
 * yrḥ qṣr šʿrm
 * yrḥ qṣrw kl
 * yrḥw zmr
 * yrḥ qṣ
 * ʾby [h]

The text has been translated as:
 * Two months gathering (October, November — in the Hebrew calendar Tishrei, Cheshvan)
 * Two months planting (December, January — Kislev, Tevet)
 * Two months late sowing (February, March — Shvat, Adar)
 * One month cutting flax (April — Nisan)
 * One month reaping barley (May — Iyar)
 * One month reaping and measuring grain (June — Sivan)
 * Two months pruning (July, August — Tammuz, Av)
 * One month summer fruit (September — Elul)
 * Abij [ah]

Scholars have speculated that the calendar could be a schoolboy's memory exercise, the text of a popular folk song or a children's song. Another possibility is something designed for the collection of taxes from farmers.

The scribe of the calendar is probably "Abijah", whose name means "Yah (a shorter form of the Tetragrammaton) is my father". This name appears in the Bible for several individuals, including a king of Judah (1 Kings 14:31). If accurate, then it would be an early attestation of the name YHWH, predating the Mesha Stele by more than a century.

History




The calendar was discovered in 1908 by R.A.S. Macalister of the Palestine Exploration Fund while excavating the ancient Canaanite city of Gezer, 20 miles west of Jerusalem.

The Gezer calendar is currently displayed at the Museum of the Ancient Orient, a Turkish archaeology museum, as is the Siloam inscription and other archaeological artifacts unearthed before World War I. A replica of the Gezer calendar is on display at the Israel Museum, Israel.