The Argaman of King Solomon's Robe
Some people read the Bible as a codex of religious law, others as ancient moralistic philosophy, and many see it as a book of fairy-tale-like legends and stories. We live in exciting days when, thanks to science, many legends start to look very real. Modern technology allows us to see things we have not been able to see before and learn from the artifacts of the ancient biblical past. Just a few years ago, Israeli archaeologists unearthed something unique - a fragment of dyed fabric. Not very exciting, right? Only these textiles were estimated to be about three thousand years old!
It is absolutely remarkable that something organic can survive three thousand years and even retain its unique properties. But then, Timna is a desert area, much like the Masada and Qumran region, where many Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered last century. The dry climate helped to preserve this rare find. While examining the textile remnants recovered from Timna Valley, an ancient copper production district in southern Israel, the researchers were surprised to discover some fragments of woven fabric, a tassel, and fibers of wool dyed with royal purple. The radiocarbon dating confirmed that the artifact dates to about 1000 BCE, an era that corresponds to the reign of biblical David and Solomon in Jerusalem.
It should be noted that the Timna copper mines are within the borders of modern Israel but are nowhere near Jerusalem. The very dye that was used to color the fabric fibers came from an exotic source, a certain species of mollusk found in the Mediterranean, over 300 km from Timna Valley. How did such fabric make it all the way to Southern Israel? Perhaps via travel or trade, but either way, these are signs of a well-organized civilization 3000 years ago.
