An Analysis of an Archaeological Excavation has Proven for the First Time: Hasmonean Rule Extended South into the Negev Highlands
“The Hasmonean king Alexander Jannaeus, great-grandson of Matityahu, conquered Gaza and the Negev and for decades prevented the Nabataeans from using the Incense Road”
...One of the sites that were excavated was Horvat Ma'agurah, which is located on a ridge, c. 3.4 kilometers west of the Sede Boqer region...It was along this road that the Nabataeans transported precious goods such as myrrh and frankincense to the Mediterranean Sea and Egypt.
An analysis of the finds has revealed that after Gaza was conquered in 99 BCE, King Alexander Jannaeus – the great-grandson of Matityahu the High Priest – built a fortress with four towers inside an earlier Nabataean caravanserai. With the aid of this fortress he was able to halt any Nabataean activity along the Incense Road and in effect force them out of the Negev...a new analysis of the artifacts which were discovered inside the fortress, and the architectural features of the fortress itself, has led to the unequivocal conclusion that the fortress is Hasmonean.
...“We are talking about a revolutionary discovery that will redraw the maps of the region which describe that era and greatly increase the territory governed by the Hasmoneans into the heart of the Negev Highlands as we know it. This is an important discovery from an archaeological and historical standpoint. Despite the evidence of the historian Josephus, according to which King Alexander Jannaeus conquered the southern coast of the Land of Israel and the harbor in Gaza (which was of paramount importance to the Nabataeans) and even further south, no clear archaeological proof of this has been found in the field. And it was because of this lack of proof that historians were inclined to dismiss the possibility that the Hasmoneans did indeed control the Negev”.
It is now clear that the Hasmoneans kept hold of the fortress located on the Nabataeans’ principal trade route until the year 66 BCE, and by means of it, prevented any movement by their Nabataean enemies along the road between Halutza and Northern Sinai. Such a move cut off the trade route between Petra and the ports and in fact commerce in the region received a fatal blow that halted trade through the Negev for several decades...
Despite the risk of sounding rabidly nationalist, what this announcement does is again confirm the historical facts: this land is the Jewish land and the Biblical and Second Temple period accounts are basically true.
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