The Avdat in Late Antiquity Project: Report on the 2012/2016 Excavations of a Cave and Stone-Built Compound along the Southern Slope

ABSTRACT:This article reports on the 2012 and 2016 field seasons at the Nabataean-Roman hilltop town of Avdat in the central Negev highlands of Israel. The fieldwork, being carried out as part of the Avdat in Late Antiquity Project, is concerned with a multi-roomed cave and stone-built compound along the southern slope of the town, which appears to have been inhabited by the town's monastic community during late antiquity. The various finds in the compound, including numerous red-painted dipinti and unusually well-preserved organic remains, provide evidence of the social and economic agency of the monks and draw attention to the understudied phenomenon of "urban monasticism" in late antique Palestine. In addition, through the combined use of radiocarbon and archaeoseismological data, important new questions are raised about the Byzantine-Early Islamic transition and the duration of settlement at Avdat.

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