Matthew J Adams
Director, The Center for the Mediterranean World (2022-Present)
Director, W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem (2014-2022)
Director, Jezreel Valley Regional Project
President, American Archaeology Abroad, Inc.
Co-Director (w/Israel Finkelstein), Tel Aviv University, Megiddo Expedition
Field Director, The Penn State Expedition to Mendes, Egypt
Education
Phd, The Pennsylvania State University, Department of History and Religious Studies (2007)
MA - Honors, The Pennsylvania State University, Department of History and Religious Studies (2003)
BA, University of California, Los Angeles, Ancient Near Eastern Languages and Cultures (2001)
Address: 5920 E West Miramar Dr
Director, W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, Jerusalem (2014-2022)
Director, Jezreel Valley Regional Project
President, American Archaeology Abroad, Inc.
Co-Director (w/Israel Finkelstein), Tel Aviv University, Megiddo Expedition
Field Director, The Penn State Expedition to Mendes, Egypt
Education
Phd, The Pennsylvania State University, Department of History and Religious Studies (2007)
MA - Honors, The Pennsylvania State University, Department of History and Religious Studies (2003)
BA, University of California, Los Angeles, Ancient Near Eastern Languages and Cultures (2001)
Address: 5920 E West Miramar Dr
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Videos by Matthew J Adams
Written and Produced by Israel Finkelstein and Matthew J. Adams
Israel Finkelstein is a leading figure in the archaeology and history of Ancient Israel. Over 40 years of work and research, he has helped to change the way archaeology is conducted, the bible is interpreted, and the history of Israel is reconstructed. Matthew J. Adams, Director of the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem, sat down with Israel over several sessions to talk about how a lifetime of work has informed the story of Ancient Israel. These conversations became the series Conversations in the Archaeology and History of Ancient Israel with Israel Finkelstein.
24 Videos 2020-2021. Subscribe to get notified of new episodes!
Conversations in the Archaeology and History of Ancient Israel with Israel Finkelstein is made possible with a grant from the Shmunis Family Foundation.
Film and Television by Matthew J Adams
Set against the backdrop of the Jezreel Valley, "Megiddo – The Mother of All Tells" explores the city’s central role in commerce, chariotry, fortifications, and geopolitics. Through meticulous archaeology and engaging storytelling, this series connects ancient Megiddo to broader questions of state formation, imperial dominance, and the enduring legacy of its strategic location.
Edited Books by Matthew J Adams
Jezreel Valley Regional Project Studies vol. 1
As one of the earliest state-forming societies whose reach can be seen across the Mediterranean world, Egypt’s interaction with its neighbors has been of great interest to scholars inside and outside of Egyptology for more than a century. Over the last 15 years, new textual evidence has emerged, while the application of archaeological sciences has given new life to legacy data. Importantly, recent developments in the absolute chronology of the third millennium coupled with new archaeological data from all parts of the Mediterranean, have started a new wave of reassessment of the synchronisms, nature, and intensity of Egypt’s relationships with its northern neighbors.
Given these developments, it was timely to convene a cross-disciplinary dialogue through an international conference showcasing the latest
research on interactions between Egypt, the Levantine and Aegean worlds in the late 4th–3rd millennium (Late Early Bronze I – EB IV/Intermediate Bronze Age). Each region was represented by a different institutional partner which hosted invited papers related to the questions of Egypt’s interaction with that region. The conference was held in a fully online format that allowed for global participation in real time.
Discussions of transitional periods, therefore, are muddled by a paradigm in which the before and after are individually defined, while the transition introduces added variability that defies allocation to one or the other distinct spatial temporal cultural groups. In short, our chronological model of periods succeeding one another is one dimensional and fails to help explain the cultural and spatial development within societies, that move much more fluidly through time. The result is the shoehorning of variable societies into periods of “transition” from one solid cultural state to another, judged according to their predecessors and successors.
To address these issues, Matthew J. Adams, Valentine Roux, and Felix Höflmayer organized a workshop which took place 16–18 May 2018 in Jerusalem at the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research and the Centre de recherche français à Jérusalem (Fig. 1–2). The event was supported by these institutions as well as the Institut für Orientalische und Europäische Archäologie (OREA) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Twenty-eight papers were presented by forty authors and co-authors, and ample time was provided for formal and informal discussion over plentiful food and drink.
The objective of this workshop was to confront scholarly interpretations of the various transitional phases across the late 4th–3rd Millennium (Late Chalcolithic to Early Bronze I, EB I to EB II, and EB III to EB IV/Intermediate Bronze Age) in the southern Levant. The focus was on the nature of the cultural-period-defining traits and their value for distinguishing between changes related to endogenous or exogenous evolution, cultural or demic diffusion. These traits include material culture, architecture, mortuary practices as well as patterns of relationships between sites and subsistence strategies.
The present volume brings together several papers which originated as presentations in this workshop and benefitted from the discussion therein.
The Formation and Interpretation of Old Testament Literature series; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2010.
"
The birth of the West stems from the rejection of tradition. All our evidence for this influence comes from the Axial period, 800-400 BCE. Baruch Halpern explores the impact of changing cosmologies and social relations on cultural change in that era, especially from Mesopotamia to Israel and Greece, but extending across the Mediterranean, not least to Egypt and Italy. In this volume he shows how an explosion of international commerce and exchange, which can be understood as a Renaissance, led to the redefinition of selfhood in various cultures and to Reformation. The process inevitably precipitated an Enlightenment. This has happened over and over in human history and in academic or cultural fields. It is the basis of modernization, or Westernization, wherever it occurs, and whatever form it takes.
Forschungen zum Alten Testament; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck (2009).
Articles by Matthew J Adams
Written and Produced by Israel Finkelstein and Matthew J. Adams
Israel Finkelstein is a leading figure in the archaeology and history of Ancient Israel. Over 40 years of work and research, he has helped to change the way archaeology is conducted, the bible is interpreted, and the history of Israel is reconstructed. Matthew J. Adams, Director of the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem, sat down with Israel over several sessions to talk about how a lifetime of work has informed the story of Ancient Israel. These conversations became the series Conversations in the Archaeology and History of Ancient Israel with Israel Finkelstein.
24 Videos 2020-2021. Subscribe to get notified of new episodes!
Conversations in the Archaeology and History of Ancient Israel with Israel Finkelstein is made possible with a grant from the Shmunis Family Foundation.
Set against the backdrop of the Jezreel Valley, "Megiddo – The Mother of All Tells" explores the city’s central role in commerce, chariotry, fortifications, and geopolitics. Through meticulous archaeology and engaging storytelling, this series connects ancient Megiddo to broader questions of state formation, imperial dominance, and the enduring legacy of its strategic location.
Jezreel Valley Regional Project Studies vol. 1
As one of the earliest state-forming societies whose reach can be seen across the Mediterranean world, Egypt’s interaction with its neighbors has been of great interest to scholars inside and outside of Egyptology for more than a century. Over the last 15 years, new textual evidence has emerged, while the application of archaeological sciences has given new life to legacy data. Importantly, recent developments in the absolute chronology of the third millennium coupled with new archaeological data from all parts of the Mediterranean, have started a new wave of reassessment of the synchronisms, nature, and intensity of Egypt’s relationships with its northern neighbors.
Given these developments, it was timely to convene a cross-disciplinary dialogue through an international conference showcasing the latest
research on interactions between Egypt, the Levantine and Aegean worlds in the late 4th–3rd millennium (Late Early Bronze I – EB IV/Intermediate Bronze Age). Each region was represented by a different institutional partner which hosted invited papers related to the questions of Egypt’s interaction with that region. The conference was held in a fully online format that allowed for global participation in real time.
Discussions of transitional periods, therefore, are muddled by a paradigm in which the before and after are individually defined, while the transition introduces added variability that defies allocation to one or the other distinct spatial temporal cultural groups. In short, our chronological model of periods succeeding one another is one dimensional and fails to help explain the cultural and spatial development within societies, that move much more fluidly through time. The result is the shoehorning of variable societies into periods of “transition” from one solid cultural state to another, judged according to their predecessors and successors.
To address these issues, Matthew J. Adams, Valentine Roux, and Felix Höflmayer organized a workshop which took place 16–18 May 2018 in Jerusalem at the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research and the Centre de recherche français à Jérusalem (Fig. 1–2). The event was supported by these institutions as well as the Institut für Orientalische und Europäische Archäologie (OREA) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Twenty-eight papers were presented by forty authors and co-authors, and ample time was provided for formal and informal discussion over plentiful food and drink.
The objective of this workshop was to confront scholarly interpretations of the various transitional phases across the late 4th–3rd Millennium (Late Chalcolithic to Early Bronze I, EB I to EB II, and EB III to EB IV/Intermediate Bronze Age) in the southern Levant. The focus was on the nature of the cultural-period-defining traits and their value for distinguishing between changes related to endogenous or exogenous evolution, cultural or demic diffusion. These traits include material culture, architecture, mortuary practices as well as patterns of relationships between sites and subsistence strategies.
The present volume brings together several papers which originated as presentations in this workshop and benefitted from the discussion therein.
The Formation and Interpretation of Old Testament Literature series; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2010.
"
The birth of the West stems from the rejection of tradition. All our evidence for this influence comes from the Axial period, 800-400 BCE. Baruch Halpern explores the impact of changing cosmologies and social relations on cultural change in that era, especially from Mesopotamia to Israel and Greece, but extending across the Mediterranean, not least to Egypt and Italy. In this volume he shows how an explosion of international commerce and exchange, which can be understood as a Renaissance, led to the redefinition of selfhood in various cultures and to Reformation. The process inevitably precipitated an Enlightenment. This has happened over and over in human history and in academic or cultural fields. It is the basis of modernization, or Westernization, wherever it occurs, and whatever form it takes.
Forschungen zum Alten Testament; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck (2009).
century CE.
when the Tel Aviv University Megiddo Expedition discovered a cache of Egyptianized pottery below the temple complex. Originally thought to have come from underlying EB IB strata, ongoing excavation at the site and refinement of the stratigraphy of the cultic area led the present author to conclude that the pottery cache was a foundation deposit associated with the Stratum XV Triple-Temple Complex. The cache, fitting well, typologically, with Egyptian foundation deposits from the late Old Kingdom/First Intermediate Period, supports, in turn, an EB IV/IB date for the construction of the Megiddo Triple-Temple Complex.
This paper returns to this issue to properly place the architecture of the Triple-Temple Complex into its Northern Levantine EB IV world as temples in antis and to consider Northern Levantine and Egyptian contacts from the unique perspective of Megiddo.
millennium.
The interpretive aspect of this sequence is viewed through the lens of Robert J. Wenke’s “First Dynastic Cycle”. The adoption of an agricultural subsistence strategy, around 4000 BCE, is the first spark of a trajectory toward the great nation-state of the Old Kingdom which achieved its apex of power and stability the 5th Dynasty and collapsed suddenly at the end of the 6th Dynasty around 2200 BCE. This “single epoch of transformation” is a broad approach to the normally narrow focus of studying the rise and collapse of the state in Egypt. The entire development from nascent agricultural society to the collapse of the first state in the late Old Kingdom is an evolutionary process which must be assessed holistically. Thus ‘state formation’ is perhaps best seen, not merely in the final centuries of the 4th millennium, but as a lengthy process, spanning some two millennia, during which the first iteration of the Egyptian state is actualized. Because of the stratified sequence presented in this project, Mendes provides a unique opportunity to excavate in one place the entire First Dynastic Cycle: the rise of agriculture and complex society, prehistoric period of Egypt, the formation of the state, the first 400 years of experimentation in statehood, the apex of the first successful nation state in the world, and the last hurrah before its sad decline. This archaeological sequence, therefore, will be the first to stratigraphically, and consequently ceramicly, unify prehistoric Egypt to its successor, the great state of the Old Kingdom.
The interpretive aspect of this sequence is viewed through the lens of Robert J. Wenke’s “First Dynastic Cycle”. The adoption of an agricultural subsistence strategy, around 4000 BCE, is the first spark of a trajectory toward the great nation-state of the Old
Kingdom which achieved its apex of power and stability the 5th Dynasty and collapsed suddenly at the end of the 6th Dynasty around 2200 BCE. This “single epoch of transformation” is a broad approach to the normally narrow focus of studying the rise and collapse of the state in Egypt. The entire development from nascent agricultural society to the collapse of the first state in the late Old Kingdom is an evolutionary process which must be assessed holistically. Thus ‘state formation’ is perhaps best seen, not merely in the final centuries of the 4th millennium, but as a lengthy process, spanning some two millennia, during which the first iteration of the Egyptian state is actualized.
Because of the stratified sequence presented in this project, Mendes provides a unique opportunity to excavate in one place the entire First Dynastic Cycle: the rise of agriculture and complex society, prehistoric period of Egypt, the formation of the state, the first 400 years of experimentation in statehood, the apex of the first successful nation state in the world, and the last hurrah before its sad decline. This archaeological sequence, therefore, will be the first to stratigraphically, and consequently ceramicly, unify prehistoric Egypt to its successor, the great state of the Old Kingdom.
This study establishes three categories of xntjw-S, each with very different responsibilities and realms in which they operate—xntjw-S pr-aA, pyramid-compounded xntjw-S, and non-compounded xntjw-S. The underlying connection between the three categories is, of course, the presence of xntjw-S in each version of the title, suggesting a common evolutionary history. In summary, the results of this thesis advocate that, although there is an underlying connection between the three categories of xntjw-S, each category had its own distinct roles, which differed to such a degree that we must translate each title differently. xntjw-S pr-aA should be rendered “attendant,” pyramid-compounded xntjw-S should be rendered “tenant landholder of pyramid X,” and non-compounded xntjw-S should be rendered “royal mortuary complex attendants.”
Due to the relative isolation of Palestinian scholars, American scholarship has remained largely unaware of the archaeological research being conducted inthe Palestinian territories. Likewise, due to this low visibility, Palestinian scholars and students have had few opportunities to engage with American fieldwork in the region. With this program, AIAR has raised awareness of archaeological fieldwork being carried out within Palestinian autonomous Area A; fostered dialogue between Americans and the growing community of cultural heritage scholarship in Palestine; and provided supplemental educational opportunities to the next generation of students. Together, these forms of person-to-person engagement promoted the AIAR's role as an ORC that can serve all its constituents.
AIAR's location in East Jerusalem suggets neutrality: a corpus separatum for Palestinians, Israelis, and international fellows. The interplay of borders, physical barriers, and the residency statuses of different local populations presented unique logistical challenges to the implementation of the program on the ground. Program coordinators and participants from AIAR and Al-Quds will present the goals, outcomes, and future directions of EAPCH and its role in engaging the soft powers of place and of person-to-person exchange at AIAR.
In Area K, at the southeastern edge of the tell, a segment of a massive mudbrick wall was exposed, being at least 3.5 m high and 4.5 m wide with exterior and interior towers and an externally adjoining glacis. This wall was mounted on an earthen rampart well above the enclosed city during the time of its construction in the early MBA. Over time, occupational layers continually rose along the interior slope of the rampart, to finally reach the top of the mudbrick wall at the beginning of the Late Bronze Age.
In Area S, on the north side of the tell, a reinvestigation of the MBA gate system exposed by the Oriental Institute as “Area AA” has resulted in a revised understanding of the stratigraphy of the gates from the beginning of the MBA through the LBA. Additionally, new evidence demonstrates that the Stratum XIII “gate” as presented by the OI is, in fact, a conflation of multiple stratigraphic elements.
The problem with this traditional view, however, is that no clear capital city matching this historical reconstruction has emerged from the archaeological record nor is it evident in the textual record. This paper seeks to establish a history of the city of Memphis rooted in contemporary texts and archaeology independent of the Classical sources. It will trace the development of the city through the Saite period. The author takes a historical revisionist approach to Memphis and provides a historiographical framework for the development and transmission of the myth of Memphis as presented in the Classical sources.
From 1996 - 2010, the Tel Aviv University Megiddo Expedition uncovered a massive temple dating to the Early Bronze Age I (ca. 3000 B.C.) on the cultic acropolis of Tel Megiddo. The data from the compound demonstrated an unprecedented leap in monumental building activity late in the EB I with the construction of the 1100 m2 Great Temple. Ranking in size and sophistication on par with the temples of early urban Mesopotamia, the Great Temple represents the best evidence for the development of state-level society in the Levant in this early period. This Great Temple is now well-understood, but the larger settlement landscape, the home of its builders, has never been explored.
Tel Megiddo East is the site designation for the area of settlement directly east of Tel Megiddo, which includes a wide variety of loci of human activity dating primarily to the Early Bronze Age and Roman periods. Guided by survey data collected by the Israel Antiquities Authority and the TAU Megiddo Expedition, the JVRP conducted an initial trial season and a ground penetrating radar survey in 2010, followed by full-scale excavation in 2011. The results of this work confirm the location of the town associated with the Great Temple and bear witness to the social changes which coincided with the monumental changes on the acropolis.
This paper also presents new paleo-environmental and archaeological data pertaining to the rise and fall of the EB I society responsible for the construction of the Great Temple, and discusses new avenues for research on the nature of early urbanism and state formation in the southern Levant.
The problem with this traditional view, however, is that no clear capital city matching this historical reconstruction has emerged from the archaeological record nor is it evident in the textual record. This paper seeks to establish a history of the city of Memphis rooted in contemporary texts and archaeology independent of the Classical sources. It will trace the development of the city through the Saite period. The author takes a historical revisionist approach to Memphis and provides a historiographical framework for the development and transmission of the myth of Memphis as presented in the Classical sources.
Since the discovery of the cache, 5 new seasons of work have commenced in Area J, supervised by the author. On the basis of this work, which included new significant horizontal and vertical exposure, a revised and more solid stratigraphic sequence for the Early and Middle Bronze Ages at Megiddo has been established. In light of this recent excavation, this study reassesses the stratigraphy, ceramic date, and the function of the cache of Egyptianizing pottery, shedding new light on Egyptian and Leventine relations in the 3rd Millenium BCE.
This is a draft of the paper which will appear in D.B. Redford (ed.), Delta Reports 2.
Written and Produced by Israel Finkelstein and Matthew J. Adams
Israel Finkelstein is a leading figure in the archaeology and history of Ancient Israel. Over 40 years of work and research, he has helped to change the way archaeology is conducted, the bible is interpreted, and the history of Israel is reconstructed. Matthew J. Adams, Director of the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem, sat down with Israel over several sessions to talk about how a lifetime of work has informed the story of Ancient Israel. These conversations became the series Conversations in the Archaeology and History of Ancient Israel with Israel Finkelstein.
24 Videos 2020-2021. Subscribe to get notified of new episodes!
Conversations in the Archaeology and History of Ancient Israel with Israel Finkelstein is made possible with a grant from the Shmunis Family Foundation.