Archaeology series 10: Tell Dan Stela

Tell Dan Stele

*Discovered by Avraham Biran and his team of archaeologists unearthed a piece of stone with fragments of writing on it at Tell Dan


*The fragment was found at Tel Dan which lies by the head waters of the Jordan River, in Israeli occupied Golan heights


*It contains 13 lines, but no single line is complete. The surviving letters are clear, however. Line 9 contains the words "House of David".

*A line by line translation by André Lemaire is as follows (with text missing from the stele, or too damaged by erosion to be legible, represented by "[.....]"):

[.....................].......[...................................] and cut [.........................]
[.........] my father went up [....................f]ighting at/against Ab[....]
And my father lay down; he went to his [fathers]. And the king of I[s-]
rael penetrated into my father's land[. And] Hadad made me—myself—king.
And Hadad went in front of me[, and] I departed from ...........[.................]
of my kings. And I killed two [power]ful kin[gs], who harnessed two thou[sand cha-]
riots and two thousand horsemen. [I killed Jo]ram son of [Ahab]
king of Israel, and I killed [Achaz]yahu son of [Joram kin]g
of the House of David. And I set [.......................................................]
their land ...[.......................................................................................]
other ...[......................................................................... and Jehu ru-]
led over Is[rael...................................................................................]
siege upon [............................................................]

Left: The "House of David" characters