Pottery Uncovered at Megiddo in Northern Israel Indicates Military Presence and May Confirm Battle Between King Josiah and Pharaoh Necho, and Suggests Gog and Magog Story
For the first time, a team of Israeli archaeologists has found ancient artifacts at the site of “Armageddon” in northern Israel that may prove a major battle described in the biblical books of II Kings and Chronicles
This battle is said to have taken place between a king of Judah and an Egyptian pharaoh.
Two studies published earlier this year explained that a staggering amount of Egyptian pottery from the 7th century BCE was discovered in recent excavations at Megiddo.
This suggests that Egyptian soldiers were indeed in the right place at the right time mentioned in the Bible.
“Megiddo is the only place in Israel and the surrounding countries mentioned in both the Bible and important records of the Ancient Near East,” explained Professor Israel Finkelstein, head of the School of Archaeology at the University of Haifa and longtime director of the Megiddo Expedition.
The books of 2 Chronicles (chapters 34-35) and 2 Kings (chapters 22-23) tell the story of Josiah, the 16th king of Judah.
“”He took the throne as a God-fearing leader who tried to bring the people of Israel back to a righteous path after centuries of idolatry and sin.
Yet his efforts failed to appease God’s wrath against the people.
When the Egyptian Pharaoh Necho marched against the Assyrians, Josiah confronted him at Megiddo, where he was eventually killed by Necho (2 Chronicles 35:20-22; 2 Kings 23:29).
The Assyrians, the biblical enemies of the people of Israel, had destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel (where Megiddo is located) in the eighth century B.C., about a hundred years before this battle.
“It has long been suspected that Megiddo was once again an Egyptian stronghold in the late seventh century B.C., mainly because of a verse in the Book of Kings that describes the death of Josiah at Megiddo at the hands of Necho,” said Dr. Assaf Kleiman of Ben-Gurion University, who led the studies published in the journals Egypt and the Levant and Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament.
In addition to the large amount of Egyptian pottery, the excavations also uncovered many vases from eastern Greece.
By comparing these vessels with other well-dated archaeological sites, the researchers concluded that they arrived at Megiddo between 630 and 610 B.C. – the battle between Josiah and Necho is thought to have taken place in 609 B.C.
Finkelstein and Kleiman believe that these finds may indicate the presence of Greek mercenaries fighting alongside the Egyptians against Josiah.
“We know that there were Greek mercenaries in the service of Egypt at that time, according to Greek and Assyrian sources,” Finkelstein said.
These Greek mercenaries may even have connections to the Bible.
“There are clues in the Bible that Lydians from western Anatolia were involved in the death of Josiah.
One of them is the story of Gog:
Some scholars believe that Gog refers to Gyges, king of Lydia, who, according to the Assyrians, sent mercenaries to the Egyptian army in the seventh century B.C.,” Finkelstein explained.
In the Hebrew Bible, the name Gog appears in two books.
In Ezekiel (chapters 38-39), Gog is a prince of the land of Magog, an enemy of Israel who will be destroyed by God.
In Chronicles 5:4, Gog is a descendant of the prophet Joel.
In the New Testament, Gog and Magog are allies of Satan in the final battle against God (Revelation 20:7-9).
“The Book of Revelation speaks of a final battle between the forces of God and evil at Armageddon-which comes from the Greek ‘Har Megiddo,’ meaning the hill of Megiddo,” Finkelstein said.
“Perhaps the theological idea is that a savior from the line of David will return to the place where the last and most righteous Davidic king, Josiah, died.”
A long history of excavations at Megiddo
“Megiddo has been excavated by four expeditions since the early 20th century,” Finkelstein said.
“The ancient excavations did not use modern methods, and as a result, many of the results have been questioned.” This history of destructive excavations, carried out using techniques now considered outdated, makes the new discoveries all the more exciting.
“Finding untouched remains from the Assyrian period at Megiddo has always been a passion of mine, since it was believed that these remains had been completely removed by the early 20th-century expedition,” Kleiman said.
In 2016, the team finally found an ideal area to study this fascinating period, near the site’s administrative area.
“For the past two years, I have been analyzing the finds in my lab at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev,” Kleiman told The Times of Israel in an email.
In the area called “Area X,” the archaeologists discovered the remains of a seventh-century B.C.
building from the time of the battle between Josiah and Necho.
The building had several rooms and an open courtyard, with many ceramics.
“Ceramics are the most common find in archaeological excavations,” Kleiman explained.
“They give us a lot of information about life in ancient societies, such as their culinary habits, trade relations and, in specific cases, group identities.
In our excavation, we found what appears to be a house from the late seventh century B.C., with both local and imported ceramics.”
Among the local ceramics were fragments of Assyrian vases and a piece of a Judaean pot (identified by the type and origin of the clay, which came from Moza, near Jerusalem).
An army marches on a full stomach
In addition to the possible Assyrian remains, the researchers found more than 100 pieces of Egyptian pottery.
“Since Late Iron Age Egyptian ceramics had never been seen at Megiddo before, we were initially surprised by the number of simple vessels at the site,” Kleiman said.
“But given the shape and the use of straw in their manufacture, we suspect they were Egyptian.
Petrographic analyses, which identify the place where the objects were produced, confirmed this.”
According to the researchers, finding so much Egyptian pottery-used for serving food, cooking, and storage-is unprecedented in the entire Levant.
Furthermore, the number of simple, poorly fired vessels suggests that they were not brought to market.
“Given the amount of pottery in the excavated building, and since it is unlikely that the local population suddenly began importing simple pottery from Egypt, we conclude that the simplest explanation is the presence of foreign groups, perhaps an Egyptian garrison that took over Megiddo after the Assyrians withdrew from the region,” Kleiman said.
Published in 03/30/2025 08h58
Text adapted by AI (Grok) and translated via Google API in the English version. Images from public image libraries or credits in the caption.
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