...and we’ll do our very best, Miss Sophie... – The directors of the Kinneret Regional Project will report on the results of the 2008 season at the Annual Meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research, which will take place from Wednesday, 19 November until Saturday 22 November at the Westin Waterfront Hotel in Boston/USA. The title of our paper is “Kinneret Regional Project—The 2008 Field Season” and the session we’re in is scheduled for Saturday 22, from 4:15-6:15 pm (for the academic program of this congress click here).
Additionally, we will present our project during the Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature in a session called “Archaeological Excavations and Discoveries: Illuminating the Biblical World” (SBL23-5) with a paper “Kinneret: A Nonbiblical City in the Land of the Bible” scheduled for Sunday November 23, 2008, 9:00-9:35 am (for an abstract click here and search for ‘Kinneret’). Both papers will be presented by Stefan Münger. – We would be happy to meet you there, if you are in the area (BTW: if you did not get the title of this post, click on the picture...!)

Staff member Juhana Saukkonen (UCL London) will present a lecture on the 2007 Season of the Kinneret Regional Project at the 6ICAANE in Rome on May 8th, 2008, 11:00-11:30 am.

6ICAANE is the sixth International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, which is this year hosted from May 5th to May 10th, 2008 by the La Sapienza – Università di Roma. The aim of 6ICAANE is to promote cooperation and information exchange between archaeologists working in all fields and areas of the Ancient Near East, from the Eastern Mediterranean to Iran and from Anatolia to Arabia, from prehistoric times to Alexander the Great.

The congress venue is the Museo dell’Arte Classica in the basement of the Facoltà di Scienze Umanistiche, Piazzale A. Moro 5. – If you happen to be in the region you should not miss...

Registration for the coming field season of the Kinneret Regional Project was opened today. We welcome students (and non-students) from all over the world to participate as team-members. From July 6 to July 25 you will explore the fascinating world of ancient cultures on the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee and bring back to life the stories of the past. Applications must be submitted until May 1st, 2008. To apply click here.

This year, we will conduct a surface survey and soundings at Horvat Kur with remains from the Hellenistic to the Byzantine periods (3th c. BCE to 6 c. CE). Furthermore, we intend to excavate (and conserve) the last remaining portion of a large domestic complex dating to the end of the Iron Age I (ca. 950 BCE) at Tel Kinrot. Work in the field will be accompanied by evening lectures and field trips on weekends. No tuition fees are charged.

Fieldwork started already early this year. At the end of January and beginning February 2008, a small team of students headed by Prof. Dr. Michael Heinzelmann (Institute of Archaeology, University of Bern) conducted together with Jürgen Zangenberg, co-director of the Kinneret Regional Project, a geophysical prospection at Horvat Kur and Tel Kinrot at. Currently, we are eagerly awaiting the results.

A few weeks later, Wolfgang Zwickel (project coordinator) visited Tel Kinrot and shot the image to the right. The Tel is in good shape and the vegetation is flourishing.

Juha Pakkala, co-director of the Kinneret Regional Project, presents on behalf of the project at the Annual Meeting of the American Schools in San Diego. The title of the lecture is “Kinneret Regional Project – The 2007 Field Season.”
This is the published abstract: The paper reports on the recent results of archaeological investigations at Tel Kinrot/Tell el-Oreimeh (ancient Kinneret) and its environs undertaken by the Dutch-German-Finnish-Swiss «Kinneret Regional Project» under the auspices of the Universities of Bern, Helsinki, Leiden and Mainz.
Kinneret – located on the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee (Israel) – is emerging as one of the major sites for the study of urban life in the Iron Age IB in the Southern Levant in the dawn of the first Millennium BCE. Its material culture witnesses a lively and multilayered urban culture and shows a variety of cultural influences on the ancient population of the city.
Work concentrated in the past years on a large excavation field in the lower city with well-preserved Iron IB structures and installations. The architecture of those areas, belonging to the main Iron Age IB phase at Tel Kinrot, was fully exposed and subsequently prepared for conservation. The paper also presents the most recent finds, the results of current research programs and future developments within the «Kinneret Regional Project».