Cultural contacts in Judaea-Palaestina during Roman Period: coin circulation and urbanisation studies in Tel Dor, Israel

Abstract

Cultural Contacts in Judaea-Palaestina during Roman Period: Coin Circulation and Urbanisation Studies in Tel Dor, Israel is an abroad inter-institutional program, composed by the University of São Paulo, the University of Jerusalem, the University of Haifa, and theUniversity of Bristol, which aims to deepen our knowledge regarding the mechanisms of cultural contact and the processes of urban transformation in northern Israel during the Roman period. We intend to understand better the Roman presence in the region of Judaea-Palaestina from reflections on how the Romans sought to impose their conceptions of urbanism in the Eastern portion of the Empire, and likewise, to verify how the local populations received suchconceptions, emulating them and adapting them to their realities. Tel Dor, locus of this study, is located 130 km north of Jerusalem. The project is divided into two distinct stages that complement each other: 1) It aims to analyze the coins found in the excavations of thearchaeological site of Tel Dor, observing their finding places in the strata of Roman occupation. The unpublished material - the result of excavations carried out since the 1980s - which we will use to carry out our research, is stored both in the Department of Archeology at the University of Jerusalem and in the Archeological Museum of Tel Dor, the Mizgaga Museum. Seeking to understand issues of urbanity of this period, we intend to plot the coins for better associate themwith the finding places, and creating maps, we want to understand the monetary circulation in the city in Roman times. Thus, to better understand the level of monetization of society in that period and, eventually, to shed light on possible interpretations of the use of the spaces in which the coins were found. The investigation will be done through the survey of the archeological / numismatic data available in the excavation reports and the available bibliography. 2) A fundamental part of this project will be the carrying out of systematic excavations in Tel Dor, in the expectation of broadening our understanding of the urban organization of Roman times.We plan to develop these archaeological excavations in the area known to be from the Roman city cardo and decumanus based on previous remote sensing studies. Another equally importantstage of the research will be the documentary confrontation between the coins found by us in the excavations that we will undertake in the extension of the cardo and decumanus and in its underlying structures with the coins found in previous expeditions, already documented, and the structures of Roman times in which have been associated. Considering that the Brazilian participation in Tel Dor takes place in an effective scientific partnership, directly interfering in the planning and carrying out of the excavations, as well as in the general goals of the project, the development of these related partnerships is being ensured since the beginning and also inrelation more and more to archaeological exploration and urbanistic interpretation of the Roman city in the light of numismatic analyzes in the context of cultural contacts and the transformation processes of the Mediterranean during Roman times. This thought is because, in addition to participation in the research, we are mainly interested in scientific development related to the background themes of the Laboratory for Roman Provincial Archeology (LARP), in which Iam the coordinator. (AU)