Khirbet al-Mukhayyat (Arabic: خربة المُخيَّط) also commonly known as the town of Nebo is a village in

Madaba Governorate Madaba (Arabic مادبا) is one of the governorates of Jordan. It is located southwest of Amman, the capital of Jordan, and its capital is Madaba. The governorate is ranked 8th (of 12 governorates) by population and by area. It is bordered by ...

Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...

. The village is about 3.5 km from

Mount Nebo Mount Nebo ( ar, جَبَل نِيبُو, Jabal Nībū; he, , Har Nəḇō) is an elevated ridge located in Jordan, approximately above sea level. Part of the Abarim mountain range, Mount Nebo is mentioned in the Bible as the place where Moses ...

also known as ''Siyagha''. Many Byzantine churches were found in the village, including the Church of Saint Lot and Saint Procopius, the church of St. George, and the al-Kaniseh Monastery located a short distance down in a valley below the hill. The town also contains material culture from a wide range of phases from the Chalcolithic to the Ottoman including several Hellenistic features, an Iron Age fort, and a number of caves, tombs, cisterns and agricultural infrastructure. Since 2014, Mukhayyat has been excavated by an international team of archaeologists, led by Dr. Debra Foran of WiIfrid Laurier University (Canada). These excavations are ongoing and indicate a long history of occupation, from the Early Bronze Age to the Ottoman Period.

Location

Khirbat al-Mukhayyat is located 9km northwest of

Madaba Madaba ( ar, مادبا; Biblical Hebrew: ''Mēḏəḇāʾ''; grc, Μήδαβα) is the capital city of Madaba Governorate in central Jordan, with a population of about 60,000. It is best known for its Byzantine and Umayyad mosaics, especi ...

on a steep

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

escarpment. The site looks out toward the Dead Sea and the

Jordan Valley The Jordan Valley ( ar, غور الأردن, ''Ghor al-Urdun''; he, עֵמֶק הַיַרְדֵּן, ''Emek HaYarden'') forms part of the larger Jordan Rift Valley. Unlike most other river valleys, the term "Jordan Valley" often applies just to ...

. The Wadi Mukhayyat lies to the west and the Wadi Afrit to the east. Located on the western edge of the Transjordanian Plateau, the site presents a sweeping view of the

with the Judean Highlands to the west. This commanding position would have allowed residents to monitor access to and from the Jordan Valley and also provided fertile agricultural opportunities.

History

The biblical town of Nebo is first mentioned in a stele known as the Mesha Inscription dated to the mid-9th century BCE in reference to the towns occupation by the

Israelites The Israelites (; , , ) were a group of Semitic-speaking tribes in the ancient Near East who, during the Iron Age, inhabited a part of Canaan. The earliest recorded evidence of a people by the name of Israel appears in the Merneptah Stele o ...

. The Moabite king

Mesha King Mesha ( Moabite: 𐤌𐤔𐤏 *''Māšaʿ''; Hebrew: מֵישַׁע ''Mēšaʿ'') was a king of Moab in the 9th century BC, known most famously for having the Mesha Stele inscribed and erected at Dibon. In this inscription he calls himself ...

took over the settlement and removed cultic Israelite sites. The town of Nebo is often confused with the nearby

, but the Mesha Inscription seems to imply a settlement, and no significant Iron Age remains have been found at Mount Nebo, implying the site was likely Khirbet al-Mukhayyat. The nearby

features prominently in Jewish source of

Hellenistic In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in ...

and

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

origin, primarily as the burial place of Moses. Historic sources also mention efforts made by the Roman government to locate said tomb to no avail. The town also has considerable

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

remains, with numerous churches for the growing Christian population through the 6th and 8th centuries. The Monastery of al-Kanisah, the Monastery of Theotokos, and the Monastery of the Memorial of Mount Nebo are all located nearby and the town was likely the main destination for pilgrims and travellers to the region in that period. However, the

structures in the town appear to go out of use by the 7th century BCE and subsequently abandoned. Inhabitants only returned to the site in the late 19th century CE, but only limited occupation to the north-eastern slope of the hill.

Archaeological excavations

The first modern exploration of the site dates to Félicien de Saulcy in 1863 who provided the first mention of the site as Khirbet al-Mukhayyat. The site was later explored by Alois Musil who described the remains in detail and created the first detailed plan. The site was investigated in detail by the

Franciscans , image = FrancescoCoA PioM.svg , image_size = 200px , caption = A cross, Christ's arm and Saint Francis's arm, a universal symbol of the Franciscans , abbreviation = OFM , predecessor = , ...

under Brother Jerome Mihaic who discovered the mosaics of the Chapel of Priest John and the Church of Saint George on the acropolis. Work continued under the Franciscans into the early 1970s where the mosaics were excavated.

The Town of Nebo Archaeological Project

Under Debra Foran of Wilfrid Laurier University, Khirbet al-Mukhayyat has undergone several seasons of investigation. Over the course of several field seasons, an Iron Age tower was identified, likely as part of other contemporaneous defenses also uncovered. The tower was later altered in the Hellenistic period. A series of over 75 intact upright cooking pots were discovered buried with fill from earlier levels. This pottery arrangement is thought to be ritual associated with seasonal feasting. The soil around this pottery contains fragments of Iron Age pottery. The pots conform with the Palestinian type of Hellenistic ceramics.

References

External Links

Photos of the archaeological sites at Khirbet al-Mukhayyat
at the

Manar al-Athar Manar al-Athar is a photo archive based at the Faculty of Classics at the University of Oxford which aims to provide high-quality open-access images of archaeological sites and buildings. The archive's collection focuses on areas of the Roman Em ...