His son Ahab continued building Samaria, evidently extending its fortifications with thick walls. He also built a temple to Baal and a palace for himself and his Phoenician wife, Jezebel. Excavations have revealed the ruins of Ahab’s palace, shown on the next page. That palace was known for luxury and exceeding wickedness. (1 Kings 16:29-33) Picture the prophet Elijah climbing to this city and walking the broad road to the palace, there to denounce Ahab’s Baal-centered evil.​—1 Kings 17:1.

In 1910 archaeologists found there potsherds with writing on them, recording wine and olive-oil shipments or taxes paid. But many of the personal names on them had the component baʹal. It may be of interest to you that archaeologists also discovered fragments of ivory inlay or panels, as shown here. Remember that 1 Kings 22:39 long ago mentioned that Ahab built a “house of ivory.” Perhaps this included furniture with carved ivory inlays, such as the splendid “couches of ivory” that the prophet Amos referred to a century later. (Amos 3:12, 15; 6:1, 4) Among the motifs on them were winged sphinxes and other symbols from Egyptian mythology.

[Picture Credit Lines on page 17]

Pictorial Archive (Near Eastern History) Est.

Garo Nalbandian

Inset: Israel Department of Antiquities and Museums; photograph from Israel Museum, Jerusalem