Late Quaternary Geological History of the Dead Sea Area, Israel

1993 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-67 ◽  
Author(s):  
Y. Yechieli ◽  
M. Magaritz ◽  
Y. Levy ◽  
U. Weber ◽  
U. Kafri ◽  
...  

AbstractA 34.5 m borehole, which was drilled near the Dead Sea coast (altitude -394 m) in the southern part of the fan delta of Wadi Zeelim, reveals the geological history of that area from the latest Pleistocene to present. The depositional time frame is based on six 14C dates and two U-Th dates. An erosional (or nondepositional) period is implied by the hiatus between 21,100 yr B.P. (U-Th age, depth 33 m) and 11,315 yr B.P. (14C age, depth 32 m). A subsequent arid phase is recorded by a 6.5-m-thick layer of halite; based on 14C dates this phase relates to the abrupt Younger Dryas cold period reported in temperate to polar regions. The fragility of the environment in this region is indicated by the fact that the region experienced such a severe, short aridification phase (less than 1000 yr), evidence of which is found widely in the desert fringes of the Middle East and North Africa. The aragonite found in most of the Holocene section indicates that the well site was covered by the lake for most of the Holocene. Exceptions are the intervals at 0-3 and 10-14 m depths which represent low stands of the lake.

2005 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 60-77 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. Hazan ◽  
M. Stein ◽  
A. Agnon ◽  
S. Marco ◽  
D. Nadel ◽  
...  

The freshwater Lake Kinneret (Sea of Galilee) and the hypersaline Dead Sea are remnant lakes, evolved from ancient water bodies that filled the tectonic depressions along the Dead Sea Transform (DST) during the Neogene–Quartenary periods. We reconstructed the limnological history (level and composition) of Lake Kinneret during the past ∼40,000 years and compared it with the history of the contemporaneous Lake Lisan from the aspect of the regional and global climate history. The lake level reconstruction was achieved through a chronological and sedimentological investigation of exposed sedimentary sections in the Kinnarot basin trenches and cores drilled at the Ohalo II archeological site. Shoreline chronology was established by radiocarbon dating of organic remains and of Melanopsis shells.The major changes in Lake Kinneret level were synchronous with those of the southern Lake Lisan. Both lakes dropped significantly ∼42,000, ∼30,000, 23,800, and 13,000 yr ago and rose ∼39,000, 26,000, 5000, and 1600 yr ago. Between 26,000 and 24,000 yr ago, the lakes merged into a unified water body and lake level achieved its maximum stand of ∼170 m below mean sea level (m bsl). Nevertheless, the fresh and saline water properties of Lake Kinneret and Lake Lisan, respectively, have been preserved throughout the 40,000 years studied. Calcium carbonate was always deposited as calcite in Lake Kinneret and as aragonite in Lake Lisan–Dead Sea, indicating that the Dead Sea brine (which supports aragonite production) never reached or affected Lake Kinneret, even during the period of lake high stand and convergence. The synchronous level fluctuation of lakes Kinneret, Lisan, and the Holocene Dead Sea is consistent with the dominance of the Atlantic–Mediterranean rain system on the catchment of the basin and the regional hydrology. The major drops in Lake Kinneret–Lisan levels coincide with the timing of cold spells in the North Atlantic that caused a shut down of rains in the East Mediterranean and the lakes drainage area.


2000 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 474-476 ◽  
Author(s):  
LUIZ JOSÉ TOMAZELLI ◽  
SÉRGIO REBELLO DILLENBURG ◽  
JORGE ALBERTO VILLWOCK

2009 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oliver Hahn ◽  
Gisela Weinberg ◽  
Ira Rabin ◽  
Timo Wolff ◽  
Admir Masic

AbstractIn this study we demonstrate the possibility to identify the production area of the scrolls, coupling non-destructive quantitative analysis of trace elements to spectroscopic investigation of the inks. This approach, that allowed us to determine the Dead Sea area as origin of 1QHodayota, is of general validity.


2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 636-651 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Coianiz ◽  
Uri Schattner ◽  
Guy Lang ◽  
Zvi Ben‐Avraham ◽  
Michael Lazar

Author(s):  
Claire M. C. Rambeau

Palaeoenvironmental research in the Southern Levant presents a series of challenges, partly due to the unequal distribution of palaeoenvironmental records and potential archives throughout the region. Our knowledge of climatic evolution, during the last approximately 25 000 years, is of crucial importance to understand cultural developments. More local, well-dated, multi-proxy studies are much needed to obtain an accurate picture of environmental change in respect of the Late Pleistocene and the Holocene. This contribution reviews the current state of knowledge regarding Late Quaternary palaeoenvironmental changes in the Southern Levant, including some examples of more recent developments in palaeoenvironmental reconstruction in Israel and the Dead Sea area, and introduces the major challenges researchers face in the region. It also presents the first results of a new case study in Jordan, based on an analysis of peaty deposits located in the mountain slopes east of the Dead Sea. Such new studies help refine our knowledge of local environmental changes in the Southern Levant and especially the more arid areas, for which little information is presently available. More material suitable for palaeoenvironmental research, for example extensive tufa and travertine series, still awaits consideration in Jordan, opening up exciting perspectives for future research in the area.


Author(s):  
Steven D. Fraade

The Damascus Document is an ancient Hebrew text that is one of the longest, oldest, and most important of the ancient scrolls found near Khirbet (ruins of) Qumran, usually referred to collectively as the Dead Sea Scrolls for the proximity of the Qumran settlement and eleven nearby caves to the Dead Sea. Its oldest parts originate in the mid- to late second century BCE. While the earliest discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls occurred in 1947, the Qumran Damascus Document fragments were discovered in 1952 (but not published in full until 1996), mainly in what is designated as Qumran Cave Four (some ten manuscripts altogether). However, it is unique in that two manuscripts (MS A and MS B) containing parts and variations of the same text were discovered much earlier, in 1896 (and published in 1910), among the discarded texts of the Cairo Geniza, the latter being written in the tenth-eleventh centuries CE. Together, the manuscripts of the Damascus Document, both ancient and medieval, are an invaluable source for understanding many aspects of ancient Jewish (and before that Israelite) history, theology, sectarian ideology, eschatology, liturgy, law, communal leadership, canon formation, and practice. Central to the structure of the overall text, is the intersection of law, both what we would call “biblical” (or biblically derived) and “communal,” and narrative/historical admonitions, perhaps modeled after a similar division the biblical book of Deuteronomy. A suitable characterization of the Damascus Document, to which we will repeatedly return, could be “bringing the Messiah through law.” Because of the longevity of its discovery, translation, publication, and debated interpretation, there is a long history of modern scholarship devoted to this ancient text.


2005 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Ezersky ◽  
A. Al-Zoubi ◽  
C. Camerlynck ◽  
S. Keydar ◽  
A. Legchenko ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Dead Sea ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Sea Area ◽  

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