546 ANNUAL, REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1921. 



the northern end stood formerly the portico, three or four columns 

 deep. Columns 8£ meters high are reported. Fortunately those who 

 in the past dug out and carried away the ashlar for building pur- 

 poses left, as useless for their need, many architectural fragments 

 which, constantly turning up, help in the determination of questions 

 of style and execution. This same quarrying in ancient and modern 

 times for building materials has tossed about much of the wreckage, 

 so that much confusion has resulted, and would be utterly discourag- 

 ing: if it were not for the stratification studies mentioned above. 

 The reports of Garstang indicate a thoroughgoing clearance of the 

 great building, the complete analysis of which has not been published 

 as yet. The building stood near the junction of the main roads, and 

 must have been of first-rate importance through several periods of 

 history. The foundations go down into the Philistine level, though 

 what that may signify has not been made clear. 



The work on this structure in 1920 had disclosed at the southern 

 end a tank which the explorer was inclined to identify with the 

 famous Peace Pool mentioned by Antoninus Martyr (560-570 A. D.). 

 Twelve to sixteen feet below the tank were found the retaining walls 

 of a similar structure. Fancy was naturally caught by a potsherd, 

 found in situ, on which was a decoration showing a man fishing with 

 a rod and line on which were hanging two fish. This suggested the 

 old pool and sanctuary of the goddess Derketo, half human and half 

 fish. The tank is at the center of three concentric circles, arcs of 

 which were formed by semicircular walls lying to the south of the 

 tank. These were the boundaries of terraces or benches, each suc- 

 cessively higher than the tank and paved as ambulatories, which were 

 lined with Carrara marble. In the southwest corner of the great 

 structure Garstang identified materials running through a thousand 

 years' use of the building, Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine. It 

 was here that the inscription honoring the officer in Titus' Tenth 

 Legion was found. A date in the second or third century A. D. is 

 allowed to a Greek lintel inscription found here which reads "Pros- 

 per Askalon, prosper Rome." 



Perhaps the leading hope in the present excavations is that prob- 

 lems relating to the Philistines may be illuminated. Decorated 

 wares from the Philistine and pre-Philistine periods have been iden- 

 tified, and as the stratum just preceding the Philistine and the one 

 immediately following it have been located it is possible that a part 

 of the expectations may have fulfilment. Several layers below the 

 Philistine remains show communications of the inhabitants with the 

 Mediterranean lands, and date about the time of the eighteenth and 

 nineteenth dynasties of Egypt. Still lower down were found caves 

 containing artificial objects. The oldest objects recovered have been 

 recognized as of the period of the Hyksos. The site yields hundreds 



