During the same years in which Breasted was assessing the Egyptian campaign, a German team under Schuhmacher began to excavate at the presumed site of Megiddo (i.e. Tell el-Mutesellim). But as the report stated, concerning identification of the mound with that besieged and conquered by Thutmose (54): "At the spot excavated by Schuhmacher, absolutely nothing has been found which could provide any further information".
Schuhmacher's excavation was much too limited, however, to permit final judgment. Breasted, quite rightly, refused to give up so easily. He wanted scientific proof for his identification; so he suggested to one of his students, Harold H. Nelson, that he dedicate his doctoral thesis to the problem.
Danelius takes up the rather tragic story of Nelson's assignment (55):
Nelson was not given freedom to look for the frightening defile among the mountains of Palestine; Breasted confined him to a specific region: "This study is confined almost entirely to ... interpret the Annals of Thutmose III in the light of the geography of the environs of Megiddo" [Nelson's own words in the preface to his thesis, The Battle of Megiddo, 1913].
In other words, the "scientific investigation" had to verify a foregone con- clusion of Breasted - it was "prove or perish" for the unhappy, young man.
For the sensitive reader, the resulting dissertation is a moving testimony of an intelligent and honest young student who tried desperately to har-monise the theory of his venerated teacher with the observations made on the spot, which simply did not fit.
Nelson travelled the Wadi 'Ara pass in 1909, and again in 1912. He described it in detail:
... the road enters the Wady 'Ara which is there ... flat and open ... All the way to a quarter of a mile above 'Ar'arah the valley is wide and level ... the ascent is so gradual as to be scarcely perceptible ... a watcher posted on the hill above Lejjun could descry an approaching army at least a mile above the mouth of the pass.
Nor did Nelson even believe that the name of the pass matched that of the defile named in Thutmose's account (56): "Etymologically, it seems hardly possible to equate (Egyptian) 'Aruna with (Arab) 'Ar'arah".
Commenting on this unhappy situation, Danelius continued:
Neither the physical appearance of the road as described by Nelson, nor its use as an international highway justify its identification with a road described as "inaccessible", "secret" or "mysterious" in the Egyptian records (57).
But Nelson's difficulties were not only of a geographical nature. Logistics had to be taken into account as well. According to the timetable drawn up by Breasted, the Egyptian army emerged from the pass in the afternoon, set up camp, and spent a quiet night, to go forth to battle the next morning (58). All this in full view of the army of the Asiatics!
Nelson was unable to understand the behaviour of "the Allies" - as he called them - or why they should have, as he said (59):
"... thrown away the advantage afforded by the narrowness of the pass ... to strike Thutmose under circumstances so favourable to the success of the Allies. Our meagre sources must leave us forever ignorant of the reasons of the Allies for thus throwing away the greatest chance of victory ...".
Despite the name given to Nelson's thesis, The Battle of Megiddo, it appears that there was no battle.
As Nelson himself admitted (60):
"On the actual conflict which took place there is not a vestige of information. To judge from the Annalist's narrative it would seem that the Asiatics fled without striking a blow ... why the Asiatics fled is not plain. They probably mustered a considerable force".
And finally, why was the city of Mkty not taken by storm? Nelson could only wonder at this: "Just why Thutmose did not make such an attempt at once is hard to surmise ...".
Danelius concluded philosophically (61): "Habent sua fata libelli - books have their own fate, and Nelson's was no exception".
At least Breasted apparently was well satisfied with Nelson's effort, and the doctorate was awarded. World War I broke out while Nelson was in Beirut for the cuts of the illustrations and the maps. Later, Nelson had the opportunity of discussing his thesis with some British officers who had participated in the conquest of Palestine, 1917/1918. Nelson referred to the outcome of these meetings in the Preface to the 1920 edition of his thesis:
"Had the University of Chicago [with which Professor Breasted was con- nected] regulations governing the publication of theses permitted, I would gladly have re-written the whole manuscript in the light of the recent campaign of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force under Lord Allenby in the same region in which Thutmose III, nearly 3,500 years earlier [sic], also defeated an enemy advancing from the north towards Egypt, [but] I cannot make use of certain valuable suggestions made by those who campaigned in Palestine in 1917-18 ...".
A Rockefeller-Financed Excavation
Unfortunately, Nelson never re-wrote his dissertation. Professor Breasted, armed with his pupil's precious study, approached John D. Rockefeller Jr. and persuaded him to finance a renewed excavation of Tell el-Mutesellim for a five-year period. Clarence S. Fisher was to be the director, and he came to Palestine in 1925 to start with preparations for the dig. A comfortable house was built for members of the expedition, and in 1926 excavation was started, lasting until 1939.
About this new excavation, Danelius has tellingly remarked (62):
"Results, as far as the Thutmose campaign was concerned, were as negative as those of Schuhmacher's excavation. Concerning identification of the mound with the city besieged and conquered by the Pharaoh, the excavators relied only and solely on Nelson's dissertation":
"There can now be no doubt concerning the identification of tell el-Mutesellim as Megiddo (Armageddon). What little doubt might have remained ... was entirely dispersed by Nelson's translation of and com- mentary on the account of the Battle of Megiddo given in the annals of Thutmose III ..." (R. Lamon & G. Shipton, Megiddo I, Seasons of 1925-34, Introduction, xix)".
Despite the fact that now, for more than half a century, the doctoral thesis of the young Nelson has become the unanswerable proof of the how, when and where of Thutmose III's first Palestinian campaign, Nelson himself, when parting with the last copy of his thesis, giving it to the librarian of the Cairo Museum, apparently told the latter that he no longer identified himself with his findings as expressed in the study (63).
Another authority who doubted the conventional view of the localisation was P. Guy, a Scotsman, who nonetheless accepted Breasted's invitation to take over the leader- ship of the Megiddo excavation (the biggest and most richly endowed in Mandatory Palestine) that Fisher had had to give up for health reasons.
Concerning Guy's opinion, Danelius wrote (64):
"Guy died in 1952. His wife, who had lived with him at Megiddo and shared work on the site, continued working with the Department of Antiquities of the State of Israel. Mrs. Guy most willingly answered all my questions. Again and again she stressed the fact that nothing, absolutely nothing, had been found during their nine years of digging which would throw any light on the story of Thutmose's campaign".
Great credit must go to Dr. Danelius for firstly maintaining (against the conventional point of view) that the geographical description of Thutmose's campaign cannot reasonably find its place in the environs of Tell el-Mutesellim/Megiddo (as Nelson had shown); and for secondly having insisted (from the revisionist point of view) that king Rehoboam of Judah would by no means have been involved with a city so far to the north as is Megiddo (which lay in enemy territory anyway). ....
No comments:
Post a Comment