"Neither does [Yizhak] Magen mention the identification of an Essene
settlement somewhere in this area by the Roman scholar Pliny in his Natural
History." Hershel Shanks (BAR Sept./Oct. p.29) wrote that. Though they failed
to mention Pliny by name, Y. Magen and Y. Peleg, in the Brown University Qumran
volume article in question do mention (p.56 n.5) the question of the location of
an Essene settlement. They (rightly) reject Yizhar Hirschfeld's proposal
to locate (Pliny's, [and Dio's and Solinus']) Essenes at his proposed site to
the south of Qumran. But in rejecting Qumran as the Essene settlement location,
Magen and Peleg create yet another improbability on their Rube Goldberg pottery
proposal: where then was the Essene settlement? The area has been thoroughly
surveyed. But Magen and Peleg just bracket off that evidence.

BAR (p 29) provides an odd caption to a photo of three of the more than three
Qumran inkwells: "Inkwells found at Qumran by de Vaux are considered by
many to be a significant link between the site and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Magen
does not offer an explanation for the inkwells in his report, but they may be
irrelevant since no scrolls or parchment fragments were found during excavation
of the site." But this caption is oblivious to the fact that Qumran had a fire,
and then a water system that fell into disrepair and could flood the site,
rather than protect scrolls, unlike the cave, which did preserve scrolls.
Furthermore, no scraps of writing there equally means not only no religious text
on skin or papyrus but also no such media Pottery Barn invoices either.

Plus, there is a five line religious inscription from Locus 129. And in the
remains of that same Qumran Locus 129 another Qumran inkwell was found. Jan
Gunneweg and Marta Balla, in a Qumran pottery neutron activation analysis
article, (p. 32): "The ninth one [i.e., inkwell], incomplete [the base remains
9personal communication)] and only recently recognized as such, was analyzed
(QUM 221) from the khirbeh, L. 129." J.-B. Humbert & J. Gunneweg ed., Khirbet
Qumran et Ain Feshkha (volume 2), Etudes d'anthropologie, de physique et de
chemie  (NTOA.SA 3, 2003).

best,

Stephen Goranson
http://www.duke.edu/~goranson

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