Texts, Architecture, and Ritual in the Iron II Levant

Abstract

Studies of ancient Israelite religion have long assumed that texts played some role in its public expression. This role is often reconstructed using depictions in the Hebrew Bible and ritual texts from neighboring regions or the Bronze Age Levant. However, no such ritual texts have been uncovered in the Iron Age Levant. Nevertheless, an analysis of architecturally embedded texts alongside their associated assemblages makes it possible to reconstruct ancient Levantine ritual practices and the roles of texts within them. As components of built environments, texts drew attention to particular areas, directing traffic along particular routes and halting it at waypoints. Texts of various genres occasionally prescribe specific ritual actions to carry out at these waypoints. Even texts lacking prescriptions were often accompanied by iconography depicting ritual practices or functional artifacts implying them. Analyzing architectural, textual, iconographic, and artifactual evidence together allows us to reconstruct ritual sequences performed in ancient built environments. This article demonstrates this method using case studies derived from four Iron Age Levantine sites: Karatepe, Karkemish, Kuntillet ʿAjrud, and Deir ʿAlla.

1. Introduction

The importance of texts in the life of Ancient Israel has long been recognized. Consequently, it has been assumed that texts played some role in ritual in the Iron Age Levant. However, while Late Bronze Age Levantine corpora attest a wide variety of prescriptive ritual texts, no such archives were preserved from the Iron Age. Nevertheless, ongoing work in the archaeology of performance has made it possible to reconstruct Iron Age rituals using inscriptions, iconography, artifacts, and, most importantly, architecture. Architecture affords and constrains movement and other activities within a built environment. Texts, images, and other materials found in situ in such environments—or ones that can be restored to their environments with reasonable confidence—provide traces, depictions, and occasionally even prescriptions for the activities carried out there. This study aims to delimit the roles that texts played in these performances based on their relationship to their built environments and their associated assemblages.

1.1. Texts in Levantine Rituals

Although valuable studies have been produced on Levantine rituals, these have generally remained siloed into either philology or archaeology, each with its own difficulties. Much of the philological work in this area has been narrowly focused on prescriptive ritual texts. While explicit ritual instructions provide essential evidence for ritual performances, their relationship to performance has rightly been problematized in the absence of additional evidence (Watts 2021). Outside of the Hebrew Bible, such texts are relatively rare in the epigraphic remains of the Iron Age Levant (Thompson 2023, p. 23). Iron Age texts that prescribe ritual practices tend to be relegated to other genres by philologists (such as memorial or mortuary inscriptions), with less emphasis placed on their relationship to ritual. Of course, scholars have attempted reconstructions of the ritual use of other types of texts, beginning with the pioneering work of Hermann Gunkel and Sigmund Mowinckel with their form critical studies of biblical texts (Gunkel 1926; Mowinckel 1962). Some of this work has been rightly criticized as conjectural, with some suggesting that the Sitz im Leben of ancient texts—biblical texts in particular—is unrecoverable (Charney 2024; Cf. Frolov 2020). This study takes the perspective that such work is still valuable, although it requires theoretical and methodological controls.

Archaeological work often identifies cultic artifacts in the material record to reconstruct Levantine rituals, but connecting these artifacts to texts can sometimes verge into speculation (Boertien 2008, pp. 139–40). Studies of Levantine ritual are often preoccupied with questions of sacred space, with a false separation assumed between cultic, political, and mundane practices. While the cultures of the Iron Age Levant had concepts of sacred space (such as temples and shrines), the concept of ritual is ultimately an etic one that can apply to Levantine practices that were carried out in a variety of contexts. Moreover, the bifurcation between sacred and mundane or profane has been increasingly challenged in theoretical work on ritual that privileges performances over their contexts (DeMarrais 2014, p. 160; Angelo 2014, p. 272).

1.2. Ritual in the Archaeology of Performance

One of the most significant contributions to research on Levantine rituals has been the ongoing work of Alessandra Gilibert (Gilibert 2011, 2013, 2022). Gilibert redefines ritual in terms of spectacle—a key concept in the archaeology of performance. ‘Spectacle’ is often used in a narrow sense to refer to large-scale public performances (Inomata and Coben 2006, p. 5). However, ‘spectacle’ may also broadly refer to any perceivable activity that socially molds its participants and observers; in Ian Hodder’s words, it is constituted by “showing” and “looking” (Hodder 2006). Despite differences in scale, both approaches emphasize that spectacles consist of movements and interactions between people and things that are displayed to an audience (Thompson 2023, pp. 37–38).

Building on this previous work in the archaeology of performance, Dante Angelo proposes redefining ritual as “an assemblage at work.” Assemblages are put to work by “the discursive script and bodily practices that surround them” (Angelo 2014, p. 271). Ritual performance is one means by which humans become entangled with material assemblages, and new social realities are created in the process. In other words, ritual consists of human interactions with assemblages that promote a variety of social transformations (DeMarrais 2014, p. 160; Micu 2022, p. 1; Cf. Hodder 2012; Malafouris 2013). Assemblages of texts, images, architecture, and other artifacts have already been utilized to reconstruct ancient Levantine rituals and their social impact (Denel 2007, p. 188; Gilibert 2011; Mandell 2022b, pp. 263–64; Hogue 2025b). Defining rituals as assemblages at work makes it possible to determine a text’s role in a ritual by analyzing its place within the assemblage.

Ritual performances consist of sequences of actions (Turner 1986, p. 75; Hull 2014, pp. 165–67; Cf. DeMarrais 2014, p. 158). For an assemblage to be put to work in rituals, human interactions with the assemblage must be carried out in a particular order. In the case of ancient rituals, the sequence of these interactions can be partially reconstructed on the basis of architecture (Hamilakis 2013, p. 127). As Elizabeth DeMarrais argues, following Inomata and Coben, “architecture reflects efforts to coordinate the movements of audiences during an event” (DeMarrais 2014, p. 156). The locations of inscriptions and iconography in ancient Levantine built environments have already been used to reconstruct the order in which they were engaged by audiences (Hogue 2023b, p. 24; 2024). This approach can now be expanded by incorporating other components of assemblages to create a fuller reconstruction of sequenced ritual performances.

1.3. Reconstructing the Roles of Texts in Levantine Rituals

Using the above theoretical considerations, I propose a preliminary method for reconstructing the roles of texts in Levantine rituals. First, as already emphasized by scholars like Elif Denel, texts must be treated as one part of larger assemblages. For the purposes of this study, I will emphasize the iconography that often accompanied texts in the Iron Age Levant and the artifacts in their vicinity that facilitated additional ritual acts (Denel 2007, p. 188). In some cases, images include epigraphs and artifacts include dedicatory inscriptions that delineate their relationship to ritual performances. In other cases, the relationship must simply be inferred based on proximity. When images and objects accompany texts, they can disambiguate opaque actions described in a text. They might also reveal practices carried out in a text’s vicinity that were not verbally described or prescribed.

In addition, iconography and ritual objects provide a model for understanding non-prescriptive texts embedded in ritual assemblages. While functional artifacts imply a particular use, iconographic depictions of activities serve as what Margaret Cool Root calls “hypertexts.” These depictions motivate those viewing them to reenact the activities they see (Root 2015, p. 47). Figures engaged in processions or various ritual activities invite human participants to join in, as it were (Bahrani 2014, p. 132). Moreover, these figures may reveal the intended direction of traffic through a built environment, making it possible to determine the sequence of activities carried out there. I propose that narratives about rituals may function analogously. That is, when it was possible, textual descriptions of activities may have motivated their reenactment.

Architecturally embedded texts acted as focal points, drawing the gaze and attention of the people visually experiencing the space and motivating their movement in specific directions (Smoak 2017, pp. 321–25; Hogue 2021a, 2022, 2024; Virnelson 2024, p. 477). By drawing attention—perhaps even motivating participants to stop and look—architecturally embedded texts draw people to specific points within built environments. The layout of a text on an object could emulate the posture of an implied speaker or reader, inviting the viewer to adjust their own posture accordingly (Vayntrub 2024, pp. 419–20). Finally, the spatial distribution of texts within a built environment could promote specific routes through the space, guiding processors to different waypoints or implying a direction of traffic by direction of reading. Furthermore, the architectonic features of built environments—especially the size of rooms or courtyards, locations of walls and portals, vertical layout of platforms, and access routes within them—allow us to reconstruct the sequences in which texts were used in rituals.

In addition, the mere acts of writing and reading, whether made explicit within the text or not, may be treated as ritual acts insofar as they represent engaging—or even adding to—an assemblage in a particular sequence. In the Levant, we find multiple examples of the deposition of new texts alongside earlier ones. A number of texts explicitly prescribe that they or portions of them be read aloud, and various features of Levantine display texts broadly imply that they were read aloud during ritual performances (Gilibert 2011, p. 4; Hogue 2021b, p. 247). Such texts constitute discrete artifacts within assemblages promoting particular bodily actions, as well as the discursive scripts framing the greater assemblage.

The remainder of this article presents case studies from the Iron II Levant to develop how texts were embedded in rituals. I begin with the sites of Karatepe-Aslantaş and Karkemish in the Northern Levant because these sites preserve larger text-rich assemblages and have already been the subject of research grounded in the archaeology of performance. I then turn to the sites of Kuntillet ʿAjrud and Tell Deir ʿAlla in the Southern Levant, using their Northern Levantine counterparts to analyze their rituals in new ways. Each case study will consist of a description of the relevant components of their assemblages, a description of the architecture where they are embedded, and discussions of how texts related to the assemblages and architectural settings. I conclude with a reconstruction of the ritual sequence afforded by the assemblage and the roles texts played within it. Together, these case studies suggest that while Iron Age Levantine sites do not currently attest prescriptive ritual texts, these cultures developed common practices for ritualizing texts of various genres.

2. Texts in Northern Levantine Rituals

The northern Levant provides an essential starting point for analyzing the ritual roles of texts in the Levant more broadly. Northern Levantine sites attest dense assemblages of texts in well-defined architectural contexts. Of these, orthostat inscriptions displayed on walls are arguably the most important. Because they were encountered while moving through a built environment, they allow us to reconstruct the sequence in which texts were used and ritual activities were performed. Texts written on ritual implements or votives provide further evidence for ritual activity in each space. I will illustrate this using the 8th-century assemblages from Karatepe-Aslantaş and Karkemish, although the same approach could be applied elsewhere.1

2.1. Karatepe-Aslantaş

Karatepe-Aslantaş (or simply Karatepe; ancient Azatiwatya) was an 8th-century fortress of the kingdom of Que in Cilicia built by the ruler Azatiwada. The assemblage at Azatiwataya includes nine inscriptions alongside one of the most extensive iconographic sequences currently known from the Iron Age Levant. Because the sequence of orthostats is so extensive, no museum was judged suitable for holding the entire collection. Instead, the site itself was converted into an open-air museum and was the subject of a major conservation project aimed at preserving the sculpture and exhibiting it in its original sequence. Many of the orthostats at Karatepe and their socles were found in situ, although in some cases, orthostats were found fallen immediately before the portions of the gateways they originally occupied. However, others had to be restored to their places by conservators by paying special attention to how their breakages joined with pieces already in situ or to other fragments found in the same area. As such, almost the entire sculptural program at Karatepe has been confidently restored (Çambel 1999, pp. 3–11, 30–31).

Most research has focused on five texts in particular: near-duplicate gateway inscriptions of Azatiwada himself that were written in both Hieroglyphic Luwian and Phoenician. These are conventionally labeled Ho (the Hieroglyphic Luwian version in the south gate), Pho (the Phoenician version in the south gate), Hu (the Hieroglyphic Luwian version in the north gate), Phu (the Phoenician version in the north gate), and PhSt (a Phoenician version carved on a statue, which departs significantly from the other four).2 These provide essential data for the embedding of text in architecture, but the present topic necessitates that they be situated alongside the understudied inscriptions found in the same context (KARATEPE 2–4 and Pho/S.I. a–b). The associated reliefs and other sculptures in some cases illustrate these texts, but they also depict ritual engagements that are not reflected in the inscriptions.

Azatiwataya was a relatively small site at roughly 7.4 ha. Most of the inscriptions were concentrated in the south gate of the fortress, which led to a plaza containing the statue inscribed with PhSt. Two copies of KARATEPE 1 stood in the north gate in a different configuration from the texts of the south gate. Both gates permitted a bent-axis approach to the city, obscuring the line of sight between the inside and outside and emphasizing the importance of the fortress. This design may have increased the gateways’ liminality, highlighting the transition from landscape to cityscape or from wilderness to civilization (Mandell 2022b, p. 269). Both gateways included “traverse chambers”—rectangular vestibules perpendicular to the primary route through the gateway that were extensively decorated, suggesting that they were utilized for ritual engagements before proceeding into the city (see Figure 1) (Özyar 2021, pp. 481–82). The gates slowed traffic into the city and drew attention to that transition, and the artworks and inscriptions deposited there mark this transition as a ritual one (Denel 2007, p. 187; Mandell 2022b, p. 263).

Upon entering the south gate (see Figure 2), one would discover Pho on a portal lion on the left. This text ran in the opposite direction of traffic into the city. Ho began on the portal lion on the right and continued on a series of orthostats preceding it. While this required the potential reader to begin at the lion and then move backwards, the rest of the inscription was presented prominently on the orthostats and could be read in order with the direction of traffic. Simply because the texts were distributed across multiple orthostats and statues, they prompted back-and-forth motion within the south gate in order to be viewed and potentially read properly. That these inscriptions were read is implied by their placement at eye level in this context, their rendering in first person, and, in particular, the Hieroglyphic Luwian versions’ consistent use of quotative particles marking the text as direct speech (Payne 2010, p. 40; Mandell 2022b, p. 275; Hogue 2023b, p. 43). Perhaps the pause and potential pacing in the gateway motivated by the texts’ placement provided an opportunity for literate celebrants to read the inscriptions aloud during processions into the city. The use of these inscriptions to motivate motion is even more striking when we consider the ritual movements prescribed in the text and represented in the iconography accompanying them.

The gateway inscriptions explicitly prescribe triannual pilgrimages to Azatiwataya. After narrating Azatiwada’s establishment of the cult of the storm-god in the city, Hu/Ho §48 read as follows:

wa/i-na |i-zi-sa-tu-na ta-ia (“FLUMEN”)há-pa + ra/i-sá |OMNIS-MI-i-sá |(ANNUS)u-si mara/i^+ra/i BOS.ANIMA-sá (L.486)REL-tu-na-ha (OVIS.ANIMA)há-wa/i-sá |”VITIS”(-)há + ra/i-ha |OVIS.(ANIMA)-wa/i-sa

“And every river-land will begin to honour him: by(?) the year an ox, and at the cutting(?) a sheep and at the vintage a sheep.”3

(Hawkins 2012, p. 54)

Ilya Yakubovich argues that the verb izzista- “to honor”that describes this triannual practice always occurs in cultic contexts and describes a specific ritual performance (Yakubovich 2020, pp. 470–71). This is confirmed by the Phoenician description of this ritual in Phu (KAI 26 A) II:19-III:2:

wylk zbḥ l kl hmskt zbḥ ymm ʾlp wb[ʿt ḥ]rš š wbʿt qṣr š

“and the whole district will bring him a sacrifice: the annual sacrifice is an ox, at the time of ploughing a sheep, and at the time of reaping a sheep.”4

Here, the Luwian verb izzista- is translated by Phoenician ylk zbḥ “bring a sacrifice,” highlighting two elements of this ritual: travel and offering. These inscriptions thus prescribe a pilgrimage from the river-land to Azatiwataya.

The pilgrimage prescribed in KARATEPE 1 is depicted visually in the orthostats immediately preceding the portal lion bearing Phu (see Figure 3). The first two reliefs consist of two registers each. In the top register, a procession of people carrying food walks towards a banquet. In the bottom register, a procession of musicians walks towards a group sacrificing a bull and sheep (Demir 2022, pp. 90–91). On the basis of parallel visual grammar in Hittite art, Aslı Özyar interprets this as the sequential depiction of a festival. The sacrificial bull in the final scene on these two orthostats is led to a taller figure in an elaborate costume. Özyar argues that this figure is Azatiwada, who here acts as a priest officiating the annual sacrifice (Özyar 2021, pp. 492–94). In this case at least, the visual hypertext complements the text. We can expand on Özyar’s analysis and note that this entire procession culminates in the next slab with the figure of a deity standing on a bull that takes up the entire orthostat. This depicts the target of the pilgrimage to Azatiwataya: the divine statue standing just beyond the south gate. Significantly, all of the processing figures walk into the city, with only the priestly figure facing out. Perhaps the priestly figure’s egress towards the entering celebrants explains the movement of the text both into and out of the city.

Visitors passing through the south gate would find themselves standing before a statue of the storm-god Tarhunzas/Baal KRNTYRŠ, who is depicted standing on the back of a pair of bulls exactly like the divine image in relief in the south gate (see Figure 4). The variant inscription PhSt on this statue reveals that this was the target of the procession motivated and prescribed by the texts and depicted in the accompanying iconography. In PhSt (KAI 26 C) IV:2, instead of the district bringing “him” a sacrifice, as shown above, they are to bring the sacrifice lʾlm “to the god.” PhSt III:16 and IV:16 designate the statue itself as ʾlm z “this god” (Younger 1998, pp. 28–30). Instead of pointing to a target outside itself as in Pho, Phu, Ho, and Hu, PhSt designates itself—or, at least, the statue it is inscribed upon—as the recipient of ritual practice. The spatial layout of the gate and the statue thus matches the arrangement of figures on the wall of the south gate that depicts the procession. We might even analyze the depiction of the statue in the south gate as a depiction of the text PhSt itself as a target for the procession.5

The sacrifice prescribed in KARATEPE 1 implies that a feast will follow. The statue inscribed with PhSt stood before a larger plaza that may have facilitated such a feast (Özyar 2013, p. 123). The iconography accompanying Phu as well as a scene in the south gate’s traverse chamber includes scenes of feasting (see Figure 5). KARATEPE 2—a free-standing stele found without a base—may have originally been placed in the traverse chamber and may provide a textual reference to this feast. Only two lines of this fragmentary inscription survive. The second line concludes á-za-ti, which may either be translated “he (or they) will love” or “he (or they) will eat.” However, the verb lacks the determinatives (LITUUS or OCULUS) necessary to read “love” rather than “eat” (Hawkins 2012, pp. 68–70). Because the nearby iconography depicts feasting, I propose reading this line as “they will eat.” Although the subject is ambiguous, we can infer from KARATEPE 1 that this refers to the people of the river-land completing the pilgrimage to Azatiwataya. This reading is supported by the neighboring inscriptions KARATEPE 3 and 4.

KARATEPE 4 was found in situ in the western traverse chamber of the south gate. The inscription is complete but difficult to interpret on its own, so it has been proposed that KARATEPE 3 be restored beside it and the two be read as a single text. KARATEPE 3 is a dedicatory inscription of a River-Lord whose name is unpreserved. KARATEPE 3 §2 describes this River-Lord transporting an unmentioned object, while its possible continuation in KARATEPE 4 §1 implies movement between two cities outside of Azatiwataya (Hawkins 2012, pp. 68–70). These inscriptions reveal that elites from surrounding cities did travel to Azatiwataya as directed, perhaps passing through a sequence of other cities to reach it. This River-Lord was from the river-land that was commanded to travel to Azatiwataya, and his dedicatory inscription may describe his bringing of a sacrifice.

In addition to the spectacles of travel, feasting, and sacrifice, the non-royal elites who came to Azatiwataya deposited new inscriptions. Because it required the concerted movement of laborers and materials in a public setting, the production of a text can itself be analyzed as a spectacle (Gilibert 2011, p. 4; Hogue 2021b, p. 247). KARATEPE 4 §2 reads:

|za-ia-pa-wa/i SCRIBA-la-li-ia ^IDEUS-ni-i-sa ^IDEUS-na-(OCULUS)a-za-mi-sa-ha |(“CAPERE + SCALPRUM”) REL-za-ta

“These writings Masani and Masanazami incised.”

(Hawkins 2012, p. 70)

This inscription draws attention to its own production in response to the assemblage in the south gate. The same may be true of a fragmentary Phoenician inscription found in the same context. Pho/S.I. a–b preserves personal names that do not occur in KARATEPE 1, suggesting that it was installed by someone other than Azatiwada (Çambel 1999, p. 35). Multiple elites thus engaged in this practice of erecting inscriptions alongside Azatiwada’s in the south gate.

The north gate preserves a somewhat different assemblage. The iconography depicts figures moving both into and out of the city, and this motion in both directions is emphasized by the layout of the text. The Phoenician version of KARATEPE 1 (Phu) began on a portal sphinx (see Figure 6) and continued across multiple orthostats and their bases before finishing on a lion. Reading would require moving towards the city but then back through the gateway. While this matches the motion in the south gate, the inclusion of portal sphinxes in this context heightens the liminality of the motion. Hybrid creatures like sphinxes were themselves in between realities, suggesting a ritual transition to happen on the threshold they protected (Bahrani 2014, p. 47). These sphinxes indicate complex artistic interactions on the part of the artisans at Azatiwataya. Sphinxes are typical of Phoenician and Egyptian art, as are the images of Bes (see Figure 7). The image of the Egyptian deity Bes apparently replaces the typical Syro-Anatolian image of the storm-god that was used in the south gate (Winter 1979, p. 121).

The layout of Hu was significantly more confusing. The text began in the eastern traverse chamber but continues out of order on orthostats and orthostat bases distributed between both traverse chambers, before concluding in the gateway. Reading the text would require an unusual procession back and forth between the traverse chambers before finally exiting the city and following the right-hand wall of the gate back in to complete the inscription (see Figure 8). This intrepid reader would spend most of their time on their knees to find much of the text on the bases. Özyar argues that this text was likely intended as an image, but even visually apprehending it would require changes in posture and motion through the full sequence of reliefs (Özyar 2013, pp. 128–32). Given the unusual flow of these inscriptions and their accompanying iconography, the north gate appears to have functioned somewhat differently from the south gate. Ritual here was clearly meant primarily to mark the transition from landscape to cityscape, but practices associated with the festivals were restricted to the south.

The ritual assemblage at Azatiwataya primarily facilitated triannual pilgrimages. Participants in these festivals would travel to the city, bringing animal sacrifices with them. Participants would enter through the south or north gate, both of which heightened the transition into the city through their layout and décor. Texts especially marked these as spaces of ritual engagement, and they were laid out in the gateways both to direct and slow traffic into the city. The texts prescribed which sacrifices were to be brought to each festival. Some elite participants deposited dedicatory inscriptions within the south gate to mark their participation in these festivals. Participants would then proceed to the statue of the storm-god in the plaza before Azatiwada’s palace, where they would make their sacrifices and engage in a feast. Within this sequence, texts marked waypoints in processions, provided instructions for specific ritual activities, and were even the recipients of ritual engagement.

2.2. Karkemish

Karkemish was a city on the western bank of the Euphrates skirting what is now the border between Turkey and Syria. Although it was originally settled in the Late Neolithic Period, it rose to special prominence as the seat of Hittite power in Syria during the Late Bronze Age (Falsone and Sconzo 2007; Lawrence and Ricci 2016; Giusfredi 2010, pp. 45–51). Karkemish then became the seat of the most significant successor state to the Hittite Empire during the Iron Age, and the city grew to around 100 ha (de Martino 2014, pp. 86–88; Hawkins and Weeden 2016, p. 9). It was during the Iron II period that elites at Karkemish began utilizing writing in ritual contexts at such a scale that it may represent the largest corpus of texts from the Iron Age Levant. This is best represented by the 8th-century assemblage in the city’s ceremonial center—the Lower Palace Area (see Figure 9).

The Lower Palace Area was an approximately 3000 m² plaza in the northeastern part of the city (Gilibert 2011, p. 103). Nearly the entirety of the plaza’s perimeter was lined with orthostats decorated with iconographic sequences and inscriptions. Most of these sculptural remains were discovered in situ, and others can be confidently restored based on their material, size, and shape (Gilibert 2011, pp. 20, 36). The plaza was primarily accessed from the south via the King’s Gate. The reliefs of the King’s Gate continued into the Processional Way, which formed the eastern façade of the palace of Katuwas—the primary royal residence of Iron II Karkemish. The Processional Way is interrupted by the Royal Buttress, an 8th-century installation in the otherwise 9th-century façade. The northern façade of the palace was the Herald’s Wall, which continued east towards the Water Gate. The northern perimeter of the plaza is formed by the temenos of the Storm-God Temple, which is lined on its southern and eastern walls by the Long Wall of Sculpture. The Long Wall of Sculpture continues up the Great Staircase, which terminates in a gate chamber providing access to the acropolis beyond. It is theorized that a matching sequence of reliefs continued along the wall of the Lower Palace Area on the other side of the Great Staircase as well. The plaza was equipped with various other ritual paraphernalia, including statues, podiums, offering tables, stone libation bowls, and cup marks.6 During the 8th century, inscriptions were visible in the King’s Gate, the Processional Way, the Royal Buttress, the Herald’s Wall, and the Long Wall of Sculpture.

Like the installations at Azatiwataya, the Long Wall of Sculpture prescribes a spectacle to be seasonally repeated, although the timing is not preserved. This assemblage was installed in the 10th century by the Country Lord Suhis II, but it was still used for ritual performances in the 8th century (Gilibert 2011, p. 125). The first inscription in this assemblage (KARKAMIŠ A1a) describes a military parade through the Lower Palace Area, especially around the Storm-God Temple. This procession was led by Suhis and his wife Wastis, but it was preceded by statues of the primary deities of Karkemish: the storm-god Tarhunza as well as Kubaba and Karhuha. The inscription reports that these statues were set up on podia near the Great Staircase, where they were the recipients of animal sacrifices, bread offerings, and libations that were to be regularly repeated. These podia were found in situ beside the Great Staircase along with tables that included depressions for loaves and cups to facilitate these various offerings (Hogue 2025a, p. 88). The text embedded in this assemblage provided instructions for how to use it as well as a description of the original ritual sequence for which it was used. Its placement within the Long Wall of Sculpture itself allowed it to act as a waypoint in the procession it directed.

KARKAMIŠ A1b—an inscription of Suhis’ wife Wastis—acted as an additional waypoint in the procession following the Long Wall of Sculpture. This inscription stood behind a raised platform accessible via the Great Staircase and broadly visible from the Lower Palace Area. The inscription prescribes a ritual targeting Suhis and Wastis that is described using the same Luwian verb used to describe the ritual targeted at the storm-god statue at Azatiwataya (izzista-). Wastis is notably depicted enthroned beside this inscription to receive the prescribed ritual practice, which may have included sacrifices as well as an invocation of her and Suhis’ names (Hogue 2025a, pp. 84–90). The contents of such an invocation are included in a neighboring inscription of Suhis’ successor, Katuwas, although it is difficult to translate. It reads:

wa/i-da-*a |NEG₂ |REL-a-ha |sa-ha-si

wa/i-da-*a mu-*a sa-ha-si

“You will(?) not SAHA it/them anything,

you will(?) SAHA it/them me.”7

The rest of that inscription implies that this invocation was directed at the goddess Kubaba. While the verb in this invocation is uncertain, it and KARKAMIŠ A1b demonstrate that texts could function as ritual scripts at Karkemish.

Katuwas embedded several inscriptions within new iconographic sequences in the Lower Palace Area (see Figure 10). These marked waypoints in an implied procession from the King’s Gate, around Katuwa’s Palace, across the plaza and partially up the Great Staircase, and finally into the Storm-God Temple (Hogue 2021a). Katuwas’ inscriptions provided instructions for specific ritual actions to be carried out as each waypoint was reached. Upon entering the Lower Palace Area through the King’s Gate, KARKAMIŠ A11b + c §§17–18 direct ritual participants to offer sacrifices to a group of divine statues installed there. These include bread, oxen, and sheep to be offered annually, providing a close parallel to the offerings prescribed at Azatiwataya. An additional annual offering of bread, ox, and sheep is to be presented before the statue of Atrisuha within the Processional Way (KARKAMIŠ A4d §1). An inscription at the end of the Processional Way then prescribes the offering of “a ninth” to Tarhunza, Kubaba, and Karhuha, along with an additional bread offering (KARKAMIŠ A13d §4, 7). The iconographic sequences accompanying these inscriptions show a broad cross-section of the city’s population bringing these offerings and participating in the procession (Gilibert 2011, pp. 120–21).

In the 8th century, the regent Yarrari installed the Royal Buttress within Katuwas’ sequence in the Processional Way. This implies that Yarrari was layering additional practices within Katuwas’ ritual sequence or perhaps proffering an alternative sequence to carry out using the same assemblage (Hogue 2023b, pp. 192–93). The reliefs of the Royal Buttress depict two processions approaching each other and meeting at a right angle that juts into the plaza, designating a natural waypoint for new ritual actions (see Figure 11). On the left, a procession of eunuchs dressed in regalia denoting their high status and carrying weapons that are especially associated with the cult of the storm-god approaches Yarrari and the young king Kamani. On the right, Yarrari is followed by Kamani’s younger brothers, who wear varying costumes and carry specific toys that sort them into five age groups connected to their social status. The placement of the eunuchs at different heights and the organization of the princes into two registers both indicate an intricately choreographed ritual sequence (Gilibert 2022, pp. 4–17). What is most remarkable about this composition is that the two groups converge on a text taking up the entirety of the slabs at the right angle where the processions meet (Gilibert 2011, pp. 47–49). This text is thus no longer a waypoint but rather the centerpiece of the depicted spectacle.

In the text at the center of the Royal Buttress (KARKAMIŠ A6, especially §§8–22), Yarrari describes the depicted ritual sequence. Most significantly, in §§19–20, Yarrari leads the royal heir Kamani to the Lower Palace Area to stand him on a pedestal before the deities of Karkemish (Yakubovich 2017, pp. 22–23), likely referring to statues standing on podia in the plaza or to the temples surrounding it. This is followed by a short invocation in KARKAMIŠ A6 §§21–22 that Kamani is directed to read aloud. These lines read:

|a-wa/i (LOQUI)ha + ra/i-nu-wa/i (DEUS)ku + AVIS-pa-pa-a

u-zu^?-sa-wa/i-ma-ta^-a (MANUS)i-sà-tara/i-i |MAGNUS + ra/i-nu-wa/i-ta-ni-i

I shall make speak: “O Kubaba,

you yourself shall make him great in my hand.”

(Hawkins 2024, p. 200)

This is the only ritual action prescribed by this text. Yarrari’s text is focused on an act of reading. This action may be repeated given that Kamani is made to stand on the pedestal “three times and four times” in §19. This focus on the text is unprecedented at Karkemish. The text is the endpoint for a procession, which involves a royal elite ascending a stage to read a portion of it aloud. This engagement with the text solidifies the heir’s relationship to the city gods and his authority over the city’s denizens (Gilibert 2022).

The layered assemblage at Karkemish facilitated multiple ritual sequences, and it may be possible that each one included the sequence of its predecessor. The texts of Suhis and Wastis, Katuwas, and Yarrari all directed ritual processions through the Lower Palace Area. The texts acted as waypoints in these processions, where participants were to pause and engage in other ritual activities. The texts gave explicit instructions for these activities, which included libations, sacrifices, bread offerings, and reading some of the texts aloud.

3. Texts in Southern Levantine Rituals

Although Iron Age sites from the northern Levant currently attest more epigraphic remains than their Southern Levantine contemporaries, northern Levantine sites show a significant degree of continuity with southern ones (von Dassow 2020; Hogue 2023b, pp. 22–23). Although their materials were different, southern Levantine cultures also displayed texts on walls and ritual implements that were strategically installed in built environments. Comparing these distributions to those of the northern Levant allows us to tentatively reconstruct routes through these spaces and the order in which texts were encountered and put to work. I illustrate this with a new study of the assemblages at Kuntillet ʿAjrud and Tell Deir ʿAlla. These sites attest similar artistic motifs and architectural layouts to those found at Karatepe and Karkemish, suggesting a common Levantine ritual culture that was expressed using the distinct material resources of the north and south.

3.1. Kuntillet ʿAjrud

Kuntillet ʿAjrud (Ḥorvat Teman) was an Israelite fort in northern Sinai dating to the late 9th–8th century BCE. The site has repeatedly drawn attention for its potential to shed light on ancient Israelite religion and especiallythe possible veneration of a consort to Yahweh (Dever 1984; 2005, pp. 160–66). The site was built on a hill roughly 15 km from the Darb el-Ghazza, which connected the Mediterranean coast to the port at Eilat. The site was constructed by one of the Nimshide monarchs of Israel, although possibly with Judahite collaborators (Mandell 2022b, p. 267). The site appears to have been a caravanserai that gave Israel access to the Arabian trade routed towards the Mediterranean via the Darb el-Ghazza (Na’aman 2013; Finkelstein 2013). Some contexts in the fortress served a ritual purpose, and these attest a relatively large corpus of inscriptions.

The assemblage at Kuntillet ʿAjrud is eclectic because the site was provisioned entirely from outside and likely served traders, military personnel, and pilgrims from Israel, Judah, the Negev, Sinai, Arabia, and possibly Philistia and Transjordan as well (Trinka 2022). The site’s high-quality textiles and associated production instruments have been plausibly interpreted as evidence for ritual activity (Boertien 2008, pp. 146–48). Somewhat exotic fishbones and shells have been interpreted as votive offerings, and evidence for food production may imply small-scale feasting at the site (Horwitz et al. 2012, p. 333; Mandell 2022b, p. 273). Multiple inscriptions incised on pottery, inked on pottery, inked on plaster, and carved into stone bowls were distributed around the site, as were a variety of paintings.

Many of the inscriptions on ceramic or stone bowls were found in situ or in favissae closely associated with the space of those in situ inscriptions (Dever 2005, pp. 160–62). This includes the inscriptions on Pithos A and B, which were found within the bench-room and the courtyard of Building A, respectively. Only one of the plaster inscriptions was found in situ on the door jamb of the bench-room, but fragments of other plaster inscriptions and paintings were found near the walls they may have originally adorned. What remains unknown is whether all of these plaster inscriptions and paintings were visible at the same time. The content of the inscriptions in different media seems to complement the images on the walls and pithoi, suggesting that they were visible at the same time (Mandell 2022b, pp. 268–75). The short timespan during which the site was occupied also supports the conclusion that many, if not all, of the inscriptions and images were visible alongside each other.

Kuntillet ʿAjrud consisted of two buildings, labeled Buildings A and B. Those entering the fort from the outside would first encounter Building B. Although its design is unprecedented in this period, the layout of this building relative to the approach to the fort creates a narrow chokepoint (Mandell 2022b, p. 268). Although not precisely a gateway, this structure may have functioned like the King’s Gate at Karkemish, slowing movement into the fortress. Visitors would have been motivated to pause here by the iconographic sequences painted on the outer plaster walls of Building B. These notably included some scenes of battle that may have been inspired by Assyrian palatial art.8 The connection between these scenes and an enthroned figure painted on the outer wall of Building A implies that the plaza between was to be used for ceremonial events. Apart from the Assyrian parallels, this layout as well as other artistic parallels suggest influence by North Syrian sites like Karkemish (Ziffer 2014, pp. 16, 26; Ornan 2016, p. 8). At roughly 140 m², the plaza defined by these buildings could hold a crowd of 300–400 people at a medium crowd density, suggesting ritual practice on a greater than local scale.

The enthroned figure on Building A designated that the space beyond was intended for specific ritual engagements (Mandell 2022b, p. 268). This was the function of enthroned figures in the northern Levant, like the image of the enthroned queen Wasti discussed above.9 This was suggested by the layout of Building A, which consisted of a bent-axis entrance, a “bench-room” flanking the entry way, a central courtyard, and storage rooms surrounding the courtyard (see Figure 12).

People entered Building A by means of a bent-axis approach that obscured any line of sight between the outer plaza and the building’s interior, signaling the greater exclusivity of the space beyond. Upon turning to face the building’s interior, entrants would find themselves in a double doorway flanked on either side with vestibules equipped with benches. The combination of a bent-axis entry with a traverse chamber is attested at Karatepe. The layout of this bench-room also closely resembles that of the gateway to the throne-room courtyard at Nimrud. Similar rooms excavated at Susa have been interpreted as “pincer doorways” (see Figure 13) (Perrot 2013, p. 284; Groß and Kertai 2019, pp. 8–12; Cf. May 2014). As at Karatepe, these chambers facilitated ritual activity.

The walls of the bench-room were plastered and decorated with inscriptions in black ink. Two inscriptions (KA 4.1 and 4.2) were written on the walls of the bench-room and may have been intended to be read aloud. KA 4.1 may even prescribe this performance. Line 1 concludes with the enjoinder:

[W]ytnw.l[y]hwh[.]tymn.wlʾšrth

“And may they recount to Yahweh of Teman and Asherata.”10

This same inscription was directly addressed to an audience—perhaps the personnel responsible for reading to Yahweh and Asherata. KA 4.1 begins with the heading [l]nʿry.˹ś˺rʿr “[For] the Apprentices of the Commander of the Fortress,” an address reminiscent of biblical psalm headings (Schniedewind 2019, p. 42). The text following this address and indeed all the plaster texts at Kuntillet ʿAjrud are poetic or “hymno-epic” compositions that may represent extra-biblical Israelite psalms (Mandell 2012, pp. 134–50; Schniedewind 2019, pp. 158–64; Smoak and Schniedewind 2019). While most of these inscriptions had fallen when they were discovered, the only plaster inscription found in situ on a wall at Kuntillet ʿAjrud (KA 4.3) was presented at eye level, implying that it was to be read (Mandell 2022b, p. 275). One of the duties of personnel stationed at similar gateways in Assyrian palaces was to guide those allowed entry through the space beyond, perhaps reading the inscriptions there (Groß and Kertai 2019, pp. 12–18).

The bench-room facilitated several other ritual activities as well. This was where most of the fish bones and shells were discovered, leading the excavators to propose that the benches were used for votive depositions (Horwitz et al. 2012, p. 333). A pithos covered in ink inscriptions and drawings (Pithos A) was installed within the northern chamber of the bench-room (see Figure 14). Pithos A includes drawings of two Bes-like figures. Though Bes is of Egyptian origin, these figures are reminiscent of the image from the north gate at Karatepe. The pithos also includes a drawing of a lyre player with northern Levantine parallels (Ornan 2016, p. 9). Brian Schmidt interprets these figures as indicative of divine presence—perhaps Yahweh and Asherata—during a public procession passing through the bench-room (Schmidt 2002, pp. 112–15). Gareth Wearne takes this a step further, reading them hypertextually as representations of masked dancers accompanied by music performing in the neighboring courtyard (Wearne 2018, p. 136).11

As was the case at Azatiwataya, pilgrims processing through Kuntillet ʿAjrud deposited additional inscriptions. Multiple inscriptions on pottery found in the bench-room may have originally been placed there as dedicatory inscriptions (Mandell 2022b, p. 272). This suggestion is strengthened by the discovery of two inscribed stone bowls in the same space (KA 1.1 and 1.4) (Mandell 2012, p. 134). The inscriptions on both are fragmentary, but the complete inscription on KA 1.2 allows us to extrapolate the basic contents of the other stone bowls.12 It reads:

lʿbdyw bn ʿdnh brk hʾ lyhw

“Belonging to Ōbadyāw, son of ʿAdnā. May he be blessed by YHW.”

KA 1.3—and likely the other stone bowls—performatively claims a blessing upon the individual who donated it (Mandell 2022a, pp. 353–4). These bowls were likely ritual implements themselves. Stone bowls with dedicatory inscriptions are also known from Karkemish, including a bowl installed by Yarrari that specifies that it was a libation basin (Hawkins 2012, pp. 139–40).13 The text draws attention to the ritual use of the artifact even without making its function explicit.

After these engagements in the bench-room, additional texts guided a procession into the courtyard of Building A. KA 4.3—a plaster inscription on the door jamb of the bench-room—guided ritual participants out of the bench-room and towards the courtyard. The plaster inscriptions broadly imply exterior-to-interior motion and, specifically, pilgrimage. Mandell argues that what can be read of the plaster texts primarily concerns “the power of divine beings to control nature and bless their worshipers,” suggesting that these texts were chosen to highlight the contrast of the protected ritual space in the fortress with the wilderness outside (Mandell 2022b, p. 275). For example, line 7 in KA 4.3 reads:

šḥt qyn šdh wmrm h[rm…]

the Kênite destroyed a mountain and lofty mou[ntain range…]”

(Schniedewind 2019, p. 162)

In the same context, KA 4.2 line 2 announces:

wbzrḥ.ʾl.br[m]

“And when Ell shines forth on the hei[ghts.]”

(Schniedewind 2019, p. 161)

It is notable that these references to the topography of the site and its surroundings appear in the inscriptions near the entrance of the fortress, where they emphasize the transition from wilderness to civilization.

Travel from the outside is implied by the headers of the pithoi. Pithos A is headed by an inscription (KA 3.1) that reads as follows:

ʾmr.ʾ[šyw.]hm[l]k.ʾmr.lyhl˹y˺.wlywʿśh.wl[…]brkt.ʾtkm.

lyhwh.šmrn.wʾšrth

“Message of A[šyaw,] the k[in]g: “Say to Yaheli and to Yoʿasah and to [PN]. I have blessed you by Yahweh of Samaria and Asherata.”14

This blessing is given by a king ʾšyw “Ashyaw.” Schniedewind reads this as a sample letter from a fictional king, but nevertheless one who has an Israelite name to match the northern toponym (Schniedewind 2023, pp. 209–10). Some scholars have proposed that Ashyaw is simply a transposed reading of the name Joash, who may have been the builder of the site (Meshel 1986; Hadley 1987, p. 182). The inscription might represent a real charter from Samaria installed at this southern fort that took the form of an invocation (Mandell 2012). Perhaps this was performed aloud like the invocations at Karkemish when the pithos was installed. In any case, it implies the personnel stationed in the fortress were operating under the aegis of the Israelite king and perhaps even implies travel from Samaria to Kuntillet ʿAjrud.

The header of Pithos A stands in stark contrast to the header on Pithos B, which ritual participants would find in the courtyard immediately after leaving the bench-room and passing KA 4.3. This pithos opened with a blessing by yhwh htymn “Yahweh of Teman” or “Yahweh of the South” (KA 3.6), highlighting the transition to the southern space. Indeed, all of the surrounding inscriptions mentioning Yahweh call him yhwh htymn; only KA 3.1 calls him yhwh šmrn. Furthermore, Pithos B is painted with an image of a procession of worshipers (see Figure 15). Ziony Zevit argues that this represents a ritual procession through the fortress, and this argument is strengthened by the apparent function of such scenes in the northern Levant (Zevit 2001, pp. 393–94). The two pithoi thus represent possible start and end points in a journey to Kuntillet ʿAjrud, similar to KARATEPE 4’s designation of origin settlements for the offerings brought to Azatiwataya.

The procession into Building A apparently concluded by the western wall of the courtyard, as marked by the last plaster inscriptions (KA 4.4–4.6) and an inscribed stone libation basin (KA 1.3). One of these (KA 4.6.4) reports that [š]mm[.y]šmʿ “the heavens will hear,” perhaps referring to the performance of the text aloud. The plaster inscriptions stood beside a doorway into a storage room that contained inscriptions on ceramic bowls. The stone bowl stood before these plaster inscriptions. Some participants may have proceeded across the courtyard, made libations in the stone bowl or presented offerings to enter the store-room, and read the hymns on the far wall.

Before concluding, we should note that elements of the same assemblage could be used for another significant spectacle, namely, education. Aside from the dedicatory formulae, Pithoi A and B preserve practice numerals, abecedaries and single letters, lexical lists, and sample proverbial sayings and epistolary formulae (Lemaire 1981, pp. 7–33; 2016; Schniedewind 2019, pp. 23–48). The drawings on the pithoi have also been interpreted as educational exercises (Ornan 2016; Uehlinger 2016). While these might stretch the boundaries of what some scholars would consider ritual, in as much as they represent an assemblage at work in an evocative sequence of actions, these exercises can still be analyzed as ritual practices. At the very least, they were spectacles in that they molded people at the site into particular social roles (especially, master and apprentice). Moreover, because these scribal and artistic exercises appear to follow models otherwise known from Samaria, they were political rituals. They were a means of extending Israelite hegemony to this fort in the Sinai (Hogue 2023a, pp. 393–94).

Schniedewind has previously suggested that some of the texts at Kuntillet ʿAjrud were derived from a liturgy (Schniedewind 2019, p. 163). That liturgical order may be recoverable using the approach advanced here. Visitors to Kuntillet ʿAjrud approached the fort from the outside, perhaps stopping in the plaza between Buildings A and B for an unrecoverable performance. They then entered Building A, where their first stop was the bench-room. Here, they might hear the invocation recorded in KA 3.1, make a libation into KA 1.1 or 1.4, hear the hymns in KA 4.1 and 4.2, and deposit votive offerings of their own (such as shells, fish, or incised pottery). Leaving the bench-room, they might hear KA 4.3 performed, followed by the invocation recorded in KA 3.6. They would then proceed to the western side of the courtyard to make a libation in KA 1.3, perform the hymns in KA 4.4–4.6, and deposit a votive in the storage room. As in the northern Levantine examples explored above, texts marked waypoints in this ritual sequence, motivated ritual activities, marked ritual implements, and served as ritual scripts to be performed aloud.

3.2. Tell Deir ʿAlla

Tell Deir ʿAlla was a settlement in the east Jordan Valley that is most famous for its plaster text with its focus on Balaam son of Beor, who is also known from the Hebrew Bible (see especially Num 22–24). Remarkably, even though the site attests one of the longest texts found in the southern Levant, the dialect is not clearly identifiable with any of the so-called “national languages” of the region (Garr 2004, p. 229). This and other pieces of evidence have caused some debate as to the site’s political orientation (Burnett 2018, pp. 144–46). Shane Thompson argues that although the site may have experienced the influence of the nearby kingdoms of Aram-Damascus and Israel, the text ultimately represents a local tradition stated in contradistinction to these kingdoms (Thompson 2023, pp. 146–50). As such, Tell Deir ʿAlla preserves an example of the use of text in ritual with little to no royal interference. Nevertheless, the people of this village apparently still utilized texts according to the model developed by Levantine kings, albeit on a smaller scale.

The Iron II levels at Tell Deir ʿAlla include a complex of some 40 rooms. Though originally interpreted as a sanctuary, the architecture is not consistent with any known temple or shrine. The assemblage, however, has been plausibly connected to cultic activity at the site (Burnett 2018, pp. 147–49). The Deir ʿAlla Plaster Texts were written in red and black ink on plaster and displayed in a bench-room at the center of the complex labeled EE335 (Hackett 1980, pp. 1–8). Other contexts in the complex attested 675 loom weights and some fragments of very fine transparent cloth. A particularly well-preserved sample of this cloth was found in the room directly south of EE335. The quantity of loom weights suggests that production was being carried out on a larger scale than was necessary for local use, and the quality of fabrics produced suggests an intended ritual use (Boertien 2008). Two of the rooms connected to weaving included inscriptions: an oversized loom weight labeled ʿbn šrʿʾ “stone of Sharʿa” and a libation goblet labeled zy šrʿʾ “of Sharʿa.” Both have been interpreted as ritual implements related to a local divine or semi-divine figure (Franken 2008, p. 44; Puech 2008, p. 26). The room north of EE335—from which people would have entered the bench-room—attests multiple ovens, and the complex attests additional evidence for food production (Ibrahim and Van der Kooij 1991, p. 21). Because the architecture is inconsistent with domestic architecture in the region, this implies the complex may have been used for feasting outside the home.15 This is all consistent with a ritual use for the assemblage regardless of whether the complex itself was a cultic space (Steiner 2019, pp. 3–4).

EE335 was one of the least accessible rooms in the complex, having no exterior walls or windows. Like the bench-room at Kuntillet ʿAjrud, the room was lined with benches that could have facilitated sitting and the deposition of offerings. Five other plastered walls are attested without inscriptions in the complex; it is suspected that the plaster was used to reflect light, as the large complex was relatively dim inside. The excavators note that EE335 would have been even dimmer than the surrounding rooms, and a lamp was found in the room’s northwest corner beside where the text was displayed (Ibrahim and Van der Kooij 1991, pp. 20–21). The interplay of light and darkness has been noted as a key element of ritual processions into dark places (Skeates 2016). This bodily experience may have been heightened at Deir ʿAlla, where the darkness of EE335 was pierced by the flickering light of the lamp reflecting off the plaster text. This was heightened by the site’s unique weather patterns.

Tell Deir ʿAlla is subject to severe storms that render the site notably darker than settlements in its immediate vicinity (Franken 2008, pp. 29–31). Virnelson argues that these storms—or at least the darkness of the room—are referenced within the text itself. The relevant lines (I.6-7) are reconstructed by Bryan Elliff and Robert Coleman, as follows:

ṫṗry . skry . šmyn . bʿbky . šm . ḥšk . wʾl . ngh . ʿṭm . wʾ[l .] skrky . thby . ḥt[m . ] ḃ . ḥšk . wʾl[.]thgy . ʿd . ʿlm

“Fasten the bolts of the heavens with your cloud. There, there will be darkness, and for brightness there will be gloom. And on your bolt, you shall place a dark seal, and do not remove it forever.”

(Elliff and Coleman 2023, p. 45)

The text marks its location by reference to its environment, much like the references to the surrounding desert in the Kuntillet ʿAjrud plaster texts (Virnelson 2024, p. 479). If the text were encountered during a storm, the flickering light reflecting off the surface would have heightened the viewer’s experience of the storm outside. This would have been particularly palpable when the text was performed aloud. Special ritual invocations performed alongside thunderstorms are attested in the northern Levant, though only in the Late Bronze Age (Barsacchi 2019).

The text includes a line that has plausibly been interpreted as an enjoinder to perform it aloud (Blum 2016, pp. 38–39). Wearne reconstructs II.17 as follows:

ldʿt . spr . dbr . lšmr . ʿl . lšn . lk

”Heed the text! Speak and retain it orally (literally, “on tongue”)!”

(Wearne 2018, p. 134)16

Wearne suggests that a ritual specialist would have performed the text before a seated audience, who were imitating the posture of the addressees within the narrative. The narrative thus served a partially hypertextual function. He argues that the text was used as a mnemonic aid rather than as a script (Wearne 2018, pp. 135–38). A similar argument has been advanced for Mesopotamian ritual texts and some biblical texts (Abusch 2015, p. 175; Ramos 2021, pp. 57, 120–21), so this is a plausible reconstruction for all of the performances analyzed thus far. In any case, the text was directly engaged in a performance before an audience.

The plaster text’s relationship to EE335 suggests that it was guiding people into the room. While there was initially some discussion over whether all of the inscribed fragments belonged to the same room and regarding how they related to each other, it is now recognized that Combinations I and II formed a single long column of text in the same space (Hackett 1980, p. 3; Puech 2008, p. 27). The way portions of the inscription bend along a corner suggests that it may have wrapped partially around the entryway (Wearne 2018, p. 135). The text was accompanied by the painted image of a sphinx (Burnett 2018, p. 148). The inclusion of a hybrid figure like this near a portal draws attention to the liminality of the space, implying that passing through the doorway and engaging the text was a transformative ritual experience, as seen above at Azatiwataya (Wearne 2018, p. 136). The text and sphinx may have marked the final stop in a procession within the complex.

As at Kuntillet ʿAjrud, the assemblage at Tell Deir ʿAlla may have been used for educational purposes. In addition to the fact that the room is clearly devoted to engaging the text and the text’s enjoinder to recite, Schniedewind posits that the layout of benches in the room and the text’s poetic structure contributed to its use as an educational text that could be memorized and copied by apprentice scribes (Schniedewind 2019, pp. 147–51). In this regard, it is essential to note that a nearly complete abecedary was found inscribed on a ceramic bowl at the site (Boertien 2008, p. 137). As already argued for Kuntillet ʿAjrud, however, such educational engagements are still spectacular and may be analyzed as a form of ritual.

A ritual sequence is difficult to reconstruct for Tell Deir ʿAlla, but the text’s relationship to its built environment still allows for some tentative suggestions. The site’s commercial textile production may have drawn a variety of people to the site for purposes of trade and possibly pilgrimage. As a part of producing and/or acquiring textiles, people at the site may have performed libations using the inscribed goblet or perhaps even anointed the oversized loom weight (Franken 2008, p. 44). They might then process to the courtyard outside the bench-room, perhaps to share a meal facilitated by the ovens found there. Finally, they would enter the bench-room, take a seat on the benches, and listen to the text as it was read by flickering lamp light, perhaps during a storm.

4. Discussion: The Sitz im Leben of Ritualized Texts in the Iron II Levant

While not all of the texts discussed above were prescriptive ritual texts, they were all ritualized to a certain extent. That is, they were utilized within rituals, whether as objects of viewing, objects of reading, or ritual implements themselves. This ritualization was accomplished by depositing texts into a larger assemblage that could be put to work in an evocative sequence of actions. It is only by analyzing the whole assemblage and its architectural setting that we can reconstruct the rituals in which ancient Levantine texts were embedded. Nevertheless, these provide the model for texts with less available data, like those in the biblical corpus.

Most simply, texts marked waypoints in ritual processions. They showed ritual performers where to stop to look at the text and its associated iconography and artifacts. Aside from motivating motion through a built environment, texts could promote other ritual activities. Many of the texts examined imply that they were to be read aloud, with some specifying this explicitly. Some prescribe actions like sacrifice, libation, and invocation. Texts could also be placed on ritual implements like loom weights or libation bowls, drawing attention to those objects and inviting performers to engage them even without a ritual prescription.

Texts were used in this way by both royals and non-royals. At Karatepe, non-royal elites installed their own inscriptions alongside those of the ruler to mark their participation in the prescribed rituals. At Karkemish, people of every social status participated in the rituals in the Lower Palace Area. At Kuntillet ʿAjrud, elite and possibly non-elite pilgrims deposited votive offerings (both inscribed and uninscribed) to show participation. In addition, Tell Deir ʿAlla exemplifies a ritual use of text—both in religious practice and in education—with no evidence for royal initiation. In short, texts could be used in ritual practice by both elite and non-elite actors.

This study is a preliminary attempt at reconstructing the ritual uses of texts in the ancient Levant by resituating them within larger assemblages that were strategically embedded in built environments. Because this approach does not rely upon identifying cultic space nor on identifying so-called ritual texts, it can be applied in still more Iron II Levantine contexts. Perhaps most significantly, the case studies above reveal that northern and southern Levantine sites participated in a Levantine ritual koine to a degree. Despite distinct features of material culture at each site, all four share artistic motifs and features of their architectural layouts. Most importantly, texts at Karatepe, Karkemish, Kuntillet ʿAjrud, and Deir ʿAlla were inscribed on the same architectural and artifactual features, suggesting a common practice for embedding texts within ritual assemblages.

Future research in this direction may allow us to further delimit the ritual uses of texts discussed here and perhaps to find some additional ones. Because built environments were designed to direct traffic in particular directions, we can tentatively reconstruct the sequences in which texts were read, along with the other actions they motivated. A close reading of their architectural setting thus allows us to restore texts to a liturgy of sorts. Current evidence suggests that Iron II Levantine liturgies took the form of decorated built environments, rather than as archives of prescriptive ritual texts. This is the only known Sitz im Leben of ritualized texts in the Iron II Levant.