"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 _______________________________________________ g-Megillot mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mailman.McMaster.CA/mailman/listinfo/g-megillot