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Zif () is a
Palestinian Palestinians () are an Arab ethnonational group native to the Levantine region of Palestine. *: "Palestine was part of the first wave of conquest following Muhammad's death in 632 CE; Jerusalem fell to the Caliph Umar in 638. The indigenous p ...
village located south of
Hebron Hebron (; , or ; , ) is a Palestinian city in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Hebron is capital of the Hebron Governorate, the largest Governorates of Palestine, governorate in the West Bank. With a population of 201,063 in ...
. The village is in the Hebron Governorate in the southern
West Bank The West Bank is located on the western bank of the Jordan River and is the larger of the two Palestinian territories (the other being the Gaza Strip) that make up the State of Palestine. A landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...
. According to the
Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS; ) is the official statistical institution of Palestine. Its main task is to provide credible statistical figures at the national and international levels. It is a state institution that provid ...
, Zif had a population of 1,061 in 2017.


History

Tell Ziph near Zif has been identified as the site of ancient Ziph.14539 - ZIPH - Church
A Digital Corpus of Early Christian Churches and Monasteries in the Holy Land.
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. It is the second-ol ...
. Retrieved 30 Jan 2025.


Iron Age


Hebrew Bible

Zif is identified with the biblical town of Ziph. It appears several times in the
Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' Tribe of Judah According to the Hebrew Bible, the tribe of Judah (, ''Shevet Yehudah'') was one of the twelve Tribes of Israel, named after Judah (son of Jacob), Judah, the son of Jacob. Judah was one of the tribes to take its place in Canaan, occupying it ...
(). The nearby "Wilderness of Ziph" is mentioned as a place where
David David (; , "beloved one") was a king of ancient Israel and Judah and the third king of the United Monarchy, according to the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament. The Tel Dan stele, an Aramaic-inscribed stone erected by a king of Aram-Dam ...
hides himself from
Saul Saul (; , ; , ; ) was a monarch of ancient Israel and Judah and, according to the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament, the first king of the United Monarchy, a polity of uncertain historicity. His reign, traditionally placed in the late eleventh c ...
(). Later, the town of Ziph is said to be fortified by
Rehoboam Rehoboam (; , , ; , ; ) was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the first monarch of the Kingdom of Judah after the split of the united Kingdom of Israel. He was a son of and the successor to Solomon and a grandson of David. In the account of I Ki ...
(). Its name was found on a number of royal Judahite
LMLK seal The LMLK seal appears on the handles of several large storage jars from the Kingdom of Judah, where it was first issued during the reign of Hezekiah around 700 BCE. Seals bearing these four Hebrew letters have been discovered primarily on uneart ...
s along with those of
Hebron Hebron (; , or ; , ) is a Palestinian city in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Hebron is capital of the Hebron Governorate, the largest Governorates of Palestine, governorate in the West Bank. With a population of 201,063 in ...
,
Socoh Sokho (alternate spellings: Sokhoh, Sochoh, Soco, Sokoh; ) is the name given to two ancient towns in the territorial domain of Judah as mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, west of the Judean hills. Both towns were given the name ''Shuweikah'' in A ...
and
MMST MMST (Hebrew: ''MMŠT'') is a word written in Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, Paleo-Hebrew abjad script. It appears exclusively on LMLK seal inscriptions, seen in Archaeology of Israel, archaeological findings from the ancient Kingdom of Judah, whose mea ...
.


Archaeology

Iron Age remains were found at Tell Ziph, the nearby tell.


Roman and Byzantine periods

Zif existed as a village in the
Roman period The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...
. Between the Great Jewish Revolt and the
Bar Kokhba revolt The Bar Kokhba revolt (132–136 AD) was a major uprising by the Jews of Judaea (Roman province), Judaea against the Roman Empire, marking the final and most devastating of the Jewish–Roman wars. Led by Simon bar Kokhba, the rebels succeeded ...
, it served as the administrative center for the district south of
Hebron Hebron (; , or ; , ) is a Palestinian city in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Hebron is capital of the Hebron Governorate, the largest Governorates of Palestine, governorate in the West Bank. With a population of 201,063 in ...
. Evidence of its Jewish population during this period is found in an inscription on an
ossuary An ossuary is a chest, box, building, well, or site made to serve as the final resting place of human skeletal remains. They are frequently used where burial space is scarce. A body is first buried in a temporary grave, then after some years th ...
from Zif and two documents discovered in the Tze'elim Stream. In the 4th century,
Eusebius Eusebius of Caesarea (30 May AD 339), also known as Eusebius Pamphilius, was a historian of Christianity, exegete, and Christian polemicist from the Roman province of Syria Palaestina. In about AD 314 he became the bishop of Caesarea Maritima. ...
described it a place "of the tribe of Judah. It is now a ''kṓmē'' in the Daromas in the territory of
Eleutheropolis Bayt Jibrin or Beit Jibrin ( lit. 'House of the Powerful') was an Arab village in the Hebron Subdistrict of British Mandatory Palestine, in what is today the State of Israel, which was depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. It was ...
, near Hebron, eight miles to the south. Where David hid". It had a
Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...
population until at least the 4th century, but it became
Christian A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a Monotheism, monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the wo ...
during the
Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...
period.Magness, 2003, p
94
/ref> The remains of a Byzantine-era Christian communal
church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...
have been discovered at Zif. Potsherds from the Byzantine period have also been found here.


Ottoman period

In 1838, Edward Robinson was the first to identify the village Zif and its adjacent Tell Zif with the biblical town of Ziph. In 1863,
Victor Guérin Victor Guérin (; 15 September 1821 – 21 September 1890) was a French people, French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included ...
visited and described the ruins. In 1874, surveyors from the
PEF Survey of Palestine The PEF Survey of Palestine was a series of surveys carried out by the Palestine Exploration Fund (PEF) between 1872 and 1877 for the completed Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) and in 1880 for the soon abandoned Survey of Eastern Palestine. The ...
visited, and noted about Tell ez Zif: "A large mound, partly natural; on the north side a quarry; on the south are tombs. One of these has a single chamber, with a broad bench running round; on the back wall are three kokim with arched roofs, the arches pointed on the left side wall; at the back is another similar koka. A second tomb was a chamber, 8 feet to the back, 9 feet wide, with three recesses, one on each side, one at the back; they are merely shelves, 8 feet by 5 feet, raised some 2 feet. This tomb has a porch in front, supported by two square rock-cut piers."


1967 and aftermath

In September 2002, a bomb filled with screws and nails, planted by Jewish settlers, exploded in the village's school, wounding five children. A second bomb was found by the school's principal and was detonated by Israeli bomb experts.


Current status

Zif has been under
Israeli occupation Israel has occupied the Golan Heights of Syria and the Palestinian territories since the Six-Day War of 1967. It has previously occupied the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt and southern Lebanon as well. Prior to 1967, control of the Palestinian terr ...
since 1967. The
primary health care Primary health care (PHC) is a whole-of-society approach to effectively organise and strengthen national health systems to bring services for health and wellbeing closer to communities. Primary health care enables health systems to support a pe ...
facilities in the village itself are designated by the Ministry of Health as level 1 and at nearby Yatta as level 3.


References


Bibliography

* (p
315
* * * * (p
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* *


External links


Zif Village , قرية زيف on Facebook

Zif Village (Fact Sheet)
Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem, ARIJ
Zif Village Profile
ARIJ
Zif aerial photo
ARIJ
The priorities and needs for development in Zif village based on the community and local authorities’ assessment
ARIJ *Survey of Western Palestine, Map 21:
IAAWikimedia commons
{{Authority control Villages in the West Bank Hebron Governorate Ancient Jewish settlements of Judaea Municipalities of Palestine Biblical archaeology