Lachish Jar Inscription (Bʻlšlṭ)

Overview

The Lachish jar inscription is a short Canaanite inscription found during the 2025 excavation season at Tel Lachish. It consists of six letters written in red ink on the shoulder of a ceramic jar, partly preserved, and it came from a twelfth-century BC context belonging to the last Late Bronze Age settlement at the site. The surviving parts of the letters allow it to be read as the personal name Bʻlšlṭ.

Publication

The inscription was published in 2026 in the Jerusalem Journal of Archaeology by Daniel Vainstub, Itamar Weissbein, Hoo-Goo Kang, Shai Halevi and Yosef Garfinkel. The paper dates the inscription to the Late Bronze Age and treats the word as a personal name. Its authors note that the name is built on the root šlṭ, which had generally been regarded as a much later loan from Aramaic, of the Persian period, so that its appearance here is considerably earlier than expected. Lachish has produced more Bronze Age Canaanite inscriptions than any other site.

Biblical Significance

The root šlṭ is the root of the word used of Joseph as governor over the land of Egypt (Genesis 42:6). The Armstrong Institute, which describes the find as a "Judges-period" inscription, has presented it as evidence for the early use of Joseph's title; that connection is the Institute's popular presentation, not a conclusion of the published paper. On the early-date chronology of the conquest, the twelfth century BC falls within the period of the Judges, when Lachish was still a Canaanite city.