Heshbon Expedition
Open-knowledge reference entry
The Heshbon Expedition is the name commonly used to refer to five seasons of archaeological excavations looking for biblical Heshbon at Tall Hisban in Jordan. The excavations were carried out by a team of archaeologists from Andrews University between 1968 and 1976. The first three campaigns (1968, 1971, and 1973) were led by Siegfried H. Horn of the Theological Seminary at Andrews University and Roger S. Boraas of Upsala College and last two (1974, 1976) by Lawrence T. Geraty, Horn's successor at Andrews, and Boraas.
Biblical mentions of Heshbon
There are 38 references to Heshbon in the Old Testament, most of which recall in various ways the conquest by the Israelite tribes of Sihon, king of the Amorites at Heshbon, and the subsequent rebuilding of the town by the tribe of Reuben.
Archaeological findings
The Heshbon Expedition failed to find clear archaeological evidence proving the Biblical account or existence of a King Sihon at Tall Hisban. This has led some scholars to look for other locations for biblical Heshbon. Others have welcomed it as support for a revisionist history of the origins of Israel. For still others this story is best understood as an example of cultural memory. More recently, it has been argued that the Israelites were nomadic and would not have left significant material remains.
Contributions to archaeology in Jordan
The Heshbon Expedition was the first excavation of a multi-millennial archaeological tall in Jordan.
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This entry incorporates text from “Heshbon Expedition” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.