The Enigmatic Faience Head of a Bearded Male from Tel Abel Beth Maacah

A unique faience head of a bearded male of exceptional artistic and technical quality was found at Tel Abel Beth Maacah in a citadel occupying the highest part of the mound. Associated material remains, notably pottery, as well as Carbon-14 dating of olive pits found with the head, date the context to the 9th century BCE.

The focus of this lecture will be on the beard as an ideal hegemony masculine trait. Indeed, a dark, lustrous beard and hairstyle emphasized the masculinity of a given, elite image, as manifested in Ancient Near East visuals and texts conventions. In visual representations, the beard served as one of the distinctive features of masculine construction, also reflected in the biblical text (2 Sam: 10, 4-5; Isaiah 7:20). While the Abel Beth Maacah`s head has no identical parallels, stylistic and iconographic, and technological analysis includes it in a wider group of figurines, statues, and reliefs, related to other images made of faience that fits nicely within the artistic Koine of the wider Levant.