A wealthy Late Bronze Age tomb at Yavne Yam on the coast of Israel has us talking about trade, class, and real estate. How did folks at a pokey little port afford all that stuff, not to mention all the opium? Is this the Southern Levant’s Boca Raton? Come for the wide-ranging discussion of social inequality, stay for shoutouts to the one and only ‘Grandpa’ Al Lewis and the classic hit by Golden Earring, Radar Love!

The discovery of a dam in Iron Age Jerusalem speaks highly about the Judean state’s ability to organize public works projects to meet evolving public needs. The fact that they put their capital in Jerusalem in the first place, where the only water is underground, also says something about their, umm, common sense. Still, if its the view you’re after, there’s no better place!

A new article has us talking about toys. Did the potters at Early Bronze Age Hama make rattles for their kids out of love or to maximize investment in their future labor output? It’s an episode that cuts to the heart of the whole ‘childhood’ scam! Come for the insights into Bronze Age childrearing, stay for the word of the day. It’s fructiform!

New research on Bronze Age silver hoards in the Levant has us wondering about the origins of money. What is it about those shiny and attractive metals that makes us love them so? And sure, you can bury metal in a hole in the ground, but then you have to remember where you put it. Still, banking from home has never been easier.

An itsy bitsy seal impression with the name of a Biblical figure raises the perennial question, was Judah robust and bureaucratic, or was it tiny and only occasionally literate? How robust do little tiny statelets get anyway? More importantly, was king Josiah really the Brian Cashman of Levantine kings?

The recent decipherment of the South Arabian Dhofari script from the first millennium BCE reminds us that we don’t know as much about ancient peoples and languages as we think. And finding a completely new language in a Hittite text shows that they knew a lot more than us, which is sobering, since they didn’t have fancy degrees or iced pecan oat milk lattes.

Thuthmosis III had a difficult relationship with Hatshepsut, who was, after all, both his aunt and stepmother. And Pharaoh. But does that mean he had the faces on her statues smashed? Or did he just want them turned off so his guys could fill in a big pothole? Archaeology may have the answer!

Romans sure loved their pigs. Soldiers were even buried with pig jawbones at Legio in the Jezreel Valley after military feasts (which doesn’t sound kosher). They brought pig power to the Levant, but hey, what did the Romans ever do for us?

We like to think of the Carthaginians as the western extension of the Phoenicians, but Punic genetics suggest that they were primarily descended from local peoples. Did that create identity crises for them? How about for their elephants?

Bronze is a metal so popular that it has an entire age named after. But to make bronze you need tin otherwise you have squishy copper tools and, well, no Bronze Age. We’ve looked high and low for the source and now it seems like it might have been Cornwall. That’s right, the area of southwest Britain famous for pirates, pasties and, um, tin mines?