Unearthed in Israel’s Negev: Mysterious 1,500-Year-Old African Figurines Challenge History’s Secrets

Unearthed in Israel’s Negev: Mysterious 1,500-Year-Old African Figurines Challenge History’s Secrets

The African Figurines Found At Tel Malhata

African Figurine Made Of Ebony

Dafna Gazit/Israel Antiquities AuthorityOne of the African figurines made of ebony.

According to a Facebook post from the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), the figurines were unearthed during an archaeological dig at Tel Malḥata in the Negev Desert’s Arad Valley. Within the 1,500-year-old tombs of two women and a child, the archaeologists found five figurines. Three were made from bone, which is common for the region. But two were made of ebony and seemed to have distinctly African features.

“Carved from bone, and from ebony wood — a rare raw material originating from southern India and Sri Lanka — the figurines were designed in the form of women and men bearing prominent African facial features, and with a hole for the purpose of wearing them around the neck,” the researchers explained in a study about the figurines, published in IAA’s journal ‘Atiqot. “It seems their purpose was not only decorative — but also as intimate personal items carrying with them a story of identity, tradition and memory.”

Archaeologists At Excavation Site

Svetlana Talis/Israel Antiquities AuthorityArchaeologists at the excavation site in the Negev Desert.

One of the ebony figures depicts a female head and torso; the other depicts a man’s head. Archaeologists also found other objects in the graves, including glassware, stone, and alabaster jewelry, as well as bronze bracelets. The graves, which are seemingly Christian burials, appear to date to between the sixth and seventh centuries C.E., though the figurines could be older.

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