238 DE. E. W. G. MASTERMAN, ON RECENT DISCOVEEIES 



of Egypt, i.e., about 1500 B.C. This gate we may then conclude 

 was, with the wall to which it belonged, ruined and useless at 

 that time, and the depth of the strata makes it probable that it 

 was constructed a thousand years earlier. This, then, is a most 

 important historical fact, that the city of Gezer between 1500 

 and 2500 B.C. was a large and powerfully fortified city. If we 

 may judge by the fine masonry work of the wall, the Gezer 

 people must at tbit period have enjoyed a very considerable 

 degree of civilisation. It may further be gathered from the 

 remains that they were an agricultural people owning cows, 

 sheep, goats, camels, and donkeys. The streets were narrow 

 and crooked, and the houses had small rooms — little indeed but 

 sleeping places, life during most of the year being passed in the 

 open air, as with the fcllaliiii to-day. Some of the larger rooms 

 had roofs supported by wooden posts set on stone bases.* Many 

 of these bases have been found in situ lying in a row down the 

 centre of the room. 



The third wall is by far the most important historically. It 

 must have been built immediately after the destruction — pro- 

 bably by Thuthmosis III. of the second wall about 1500 B.C. 

 It lasted down to about 100 B.C. Before it must have appeared 

 the Khabiri when besieging the governor Yapahi, and through 

 its gates passed the adventurer Lapaya.f Again, in the reign 

 of Meremptah these walls saw and yielded to an enemy.J Here, 

 too, came the children of Israel under Joshua, the governor of 

 the city having been defeated and slain at Lachish (Joshua x, 

 33). Later on, a Pharaoh, having captured the city and slaugh- 

 tered its inhabitants, presented its ruined walls to his daughter, 

 the wife of Solomon, who re-fortified it (i Kings ix, 1 6). Again, 

 in later Jewish history, the walls are the scene of a siege. 

 Bacchides, after having been defeated by Jonathan Maccabaius, 

 fortified Gezer (Gazara) for a siege (i jMnc. ix, 53.) It was 

 besieged, captured, and purified by Simon Maccabanis, who built 

 himself a palace and re-settled the city with faithful Jews. 

 AVhat of all this long history may be traced in the remains of 

 these long-buried walls ? 



Firstly, the walls are a curious patchwork of good and bad 

 masonry. Only one gate on the south has been found, and that 

 not so imposing as the great brick-gate of earlier times. There 



* Perliaps its arcliitectural feature may explain the last heroic feat of 

 Samson (Judges xvi, 29). See Macalister, Stat. P.E.F., 1905, p. 196. 

 t Tell el Aniarna Correspondence. 

 \ "Gezer is taken,'' occurs on a stele of this monarch. 



