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Hosted by Leonard Nimoy, this episode of the documentary series investigates the historical and archaeological evidence surrounding the legendary wealth of the biblical King Solomon.
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00:00This series presents information based in part on theory and conjecture.
00:15The producer's purpose is to suggest some possible explanations, but not necessarily the only ones, to the mysteries we will examine.
00:23There is an age-old legend that somewhere in these forgotten wastelands lie the fabled Solomon's Mines.
00:35The Bible states that Solomon exceeded all the kings of the earth for riches.
00:42Now the weight of gold that came to Solomon in one year was six hundred threescore and six talents of gold.
00:49In modern terms, that means thirteen and a half tons.
00:53The Bible also lists great quantities of other valuables.
00:59Where did they come from?
01:02Where did his caravans travel to find his fabled mines?
01:23For centuries, the Israelites had been nomads.
01:39From the time they left Egypt, they had no land to call their own.
01:42King David, according to the Bible, brought them a dream.
01:55A city of their own.
01:57Jerusalem.
01:59Having at last won his kingdom, David felt his own hands were too stained with blood to be the builder of God's house.
02:06So he abdicated to his favorite son, Solomon.
02:12Here in the spring of Siloam, outside the walls of Jerusalem, Solomon was anointed king.
02:18The first temple was built by Solomon, and it made Jerusalem the center of the Jewish religion for all time.
02:29It was Solomon who transformed Jerusalem into an ancient wonder.
02:33Today, it's the center of three great religions.
02:39For Christians, it's the scene of the crucifixion.
02:42For Muslims, it's the place where Mohammed climbed to heaven.
02:47And for Jews, the Wailing Wall has special significance because it is all that remains of the Western Wall.
02:53Solomon had to secure and develop the territories David had won.
03:08It was the largest land empire in the Near East.
03:11By defeating the Philistines, the Israelites created a kingdom which stretched from Beersheba in the south to Dan in the north.
03:23Caravan trails crossed the kingdom from north to south and east to west.
03:39Solomon found himself controlling the crossroads of trade for the civilized world,
03:44and so was able to command a steady income in tolls for safe passage.
03:48Solomon built six mighty fortresses, which secured the main trade routes of the Middle East.
03:59To the northeast, stretching along what is now the Lebanese coast, were the kingdoms of Phoenicia.
04:08The Phoenicians had great resources of timber and metal, and skill in working them.
04:14What they lacked were agricultural products.
04:18To compensate, the Phoenicians turned to trade.
04:22Solomon had an abundance of grain.
04:26The Phoenicians were a great maritime power.
04:30Their alliance with Solomon would make him the richest merchant prince in the world.
04:34In exchange for grain, Phoenicians sailed the oceans and traveled to the limits of the known world and beyond, seeking trade goods.
04:47Solomon's harbors assumed a new importance.
04:50They would become bases for a Phoenician sea trade and provide homes for Phoenician skills and technology.
04:57He sent 10,000 men to cut the cedars of Lebanon, timber for his great building projects and for his new shipyards.
05:08And even today, the remains of slipways still run down to the sea.
05:18Phoenicians built and manned the ships.
05:20Not just vessels to ply the coastal trade, but ships which could go on a three-year voyage to the land of Tharshish.
05:32The Israelites were, by tradition, a nation of nomadic farmers.
05:37And without his Phoenician allies, Solomon could have achieved none of his greatness.
05:44This ship's stove, like all Phoenician work, was of distinctive design.
05:48Phoenician style became the art nouveau of Solomon's kingdom, using techniques which became traditional, and have changed little since.
05:58Phoenician style became the art nouveau of Solomon's kingdom, using techniques which became traditional, and have changed little since.
05:58Metalworking 2 was virtually a Phoenician monopoly.
06:23they had the skills for making not only the necessities of life but for working rare metals
06:33as well the metal arrived already refined in ingots along with the cargoes of precious metals
06:41the ships brought apes and peacocks and ivory their skill at working with gold keystone the
06:50craft of the Phoenicians and creates the mystery where did Solomon's gold come from the answer to
06:58the question may be found in the extraordinary relationship that develops between the Israelites
07:03and the Phoenicians each had what the other needed to find Solomon's minds it's important
07:08to understand the trade between the two nations the Phoenicians opened up to Solomon the trade
07:15routes of the world in return Solomon guaranteed them a regular supply of oil and wheat this
07:25agricultural surplus gave him his purchasing power and was the real basis of his wealth
07:31a sledge with stones bedded in his bottom is still used for threshing on remote Bedouin farms the wheat
07:46is spread on the threshing floor and the continual circulation of the sledge gradually separates the
07:51grain it is a timeless method common throughout the Near East and is probably not so different
07:58on the tombs the other hand meets a little but there are no cohesive methods in use at the time of Solomon
08:00this is also important to be a large part of the Oldland
08:02Ah
08:05the idea of my friends
08:09tossing the wheat in the air separates the chap which is blown away in the wind
08:13it is then winnowed before being ground in a stone turn
08:26The grain is poured into the center of the kern and emerges as flour for the baker.
08:47Agricultural produce was brought in to be stored in great warehouses and granaries.
08:52For one month in the year, each of the twelve provinces had to feed the capital.
08:59These new cities were built under the supervision of Phoenician craftsmen.
09:04Theirs were the skills which crafted the masonry, walls and staircases, cutting the stone into accurate geometric blocks.
09:13This doorway, with its decorated capitals, is typical of Solomon's style of architecture.
09:19Their greatest work, however, was the building of Solomon's New Jerusalem, where the workmen were personally supervised by the Phoenician king.
09:29The stone was quarried locally, and the city was transformed from a small fortress town into one of the wonders of the ancient world.
09:38Deep under the present city lie the remains of Solomon's buildings.
09:46Solomon's palace once stood here.
09:50And the walled-up arches of the Golden Gate are on the site of the entrance to the temple.
09:55The layout was similar to a much smaller temple found at Arad, near the Dead Sea.
10:04At one end was the Holy of Holies, and in the center of Jerusalem was the sacrificial altar.
10:12Quoted from the Bible, three times in a year did Solomon offer burnt offerings and peace offerings upon the altar which he built unto the Lord.
10:26Solomon's temple was furnished in gold, and gold leaf decorated the richly carved cedar paneling.
10:33The fame of his magnificence spread far beyond the frontiers of Solomon's own kingdom, and the great of the world came to see for themselves and wonder.
10:47Ezekiel refers to silver, iron, tin, and lead coming from Tharshish.
10:54These metals with gold could come from Spain.
10:58The ivory, apes, peacocks, and additional gold could have been shipped from North Africa.
11:04Such a voyage might well have taken three years.
11:09Solomon struck a deal with the Phoenician king Hiram.
11:12In view of the success of their joint operations in the Mediterranean, they agreed that together they would open up new trade routes to the south in the Red Sea.
11:25The Bible tells us that a joint fleet was built at Etziongeber.
11:30Was this the port from which the Phoenician gold ships sailed?
11:33A world-renowned metallurgist undertook archaeological excavations.
11:40Professor Rothenberg.
11:42This would not be a possible site for a port.
11:47You wouldn't possibly be able to build a ship there.
11:50The winds are so strong, the south winds are devastating.
11:53It's the worst place in the world to look for a port.
11:55The only site I can see is a small island called Jezirat Faraon, the coral island, Zarzevelat, which has a natural port.
12:08A beautiful anchorage.
12:10Even in the biggest storm it will be quiet in that small bay.
12:14It's the only natural port and I'm sure this is the site.
12:17Here, excavations unearthed warehouses and workshops.
12:24Were the remains of caulking pitch and tar, which were found beside the small fortified harbor, used on Solomon's new fleet?
12:32The whole island was enclosed in a fortified wall, part of which still exists at the base of later fortifications.
12:40This new port would open up a whole new hemisphere.
12:46It would challenge the land routes across Arabia.
12:49Eventually, the Phoenicians would reach India and circumnavigate Africa.
12:57Could Solomon's mines have been in one of these new and distant lands?
13:04The existence of Solomon's sea trade brought strength and wealth to his land.
13:08It also brought the most famous woman of the time to him with a sense of need and humility.
13:17The Queen of Sheba came from southern Arabia, the wealthiest region of the Semitic world.
13:26She brought gold, supposedly from her mines, frankincense and myrrh from deserts in her kingdom.
13:33And spices and other goods derived from her trades in India.
13:42Solomon, with his Phoenician ships, obviously disturbed very much the overland route.
13:48And as they were after the same raw materials and after the same trading partners, the obvious thing was to do was to make a common enterprise.
14:01And so the lady came up to talk to the king and he was clever enough in this case to say, okay, let's do it together.
14:09She had arrived with a great train of camels.
14:18The camel had only recently been domesticated.
14:20It had opened up the possibilities of trade across the waterless desert.
14:24So it seems they concluded their trade treaty.
14:32In return, Israel would have provided her with agricultural produce and manufactured products of third countries like Phoenicia.
14:40The Queen was certainly impressed by what she had seen.
14:46Thy prosperity exceeded the fame which I heard.
14:51Silver was nothing accounted of in the days of Solomon.
14:56Everything at his court was made of gold.
14:59But where did it all come from?
15:01While the Queen was in Jerusalem, another cargo of gold and precious stones arrived from Solomon's port in the Red Sea.
15:13This jar was labeled Gold of Ophir.
15:18Ophir certainly existed.
15:21And it has fascinated biblical scholars for centuries.
15:24Where was it?
15:27Was it in the East?
15:29In Africa?
15:31Even America?
15:33Modern Israelis called this new town Ophira.
15:37Because they believe that Solomon's mines are somewhere nearby in the mountains of Southern Sinai.
15:42The landscape is littered with the debris of recent war.
15:55But there is no trace of Solomon's mines.
16:02Merchants traveling north from the Red Sea towards Jerusalem may have left a clue.
16:08En route, they sought shelter from the heat of the day in the shade of a canyon.
16:22As they whiled away the hours, they sometimes carved their names on the rocks.
16:31And once someone carved a Phoenician ship.
16:33This is a much larger and more seaworthy vessel than the small inshore craft which plied the Mediterranean coast.
16:44These could have been the ships that sailed the Arabian coast in search of gold.
16:49From the size and number of amphora jars they carried,
16:53we conclude that these ships were large and strong enough to sustain long voyages.
16:57The Red Sea is full of coral reefs and sudden winds.
17:04It is a graveyard of ships.
17:06And even today, the local fishermen cast their nets in the shallows rather than venture upon the waters.
17:14To avoid the monsoons, the ships would have to leave in July and return in December.
17:19So, exactly where did these ships travel?
17:25Where was Ophir?
17:29What actually is hidden in the deserts of Arabia?
17:31We have now geological reports mentioning hundreds of mines, gold, silver and copper along the western side of Arabia.
17:42Where a lot of ancient remains have been found.
17:47Traces of metal making.
17:49And I think we should consider this as one of the major centers of early metallurgy in the Near East or in the ancient world.
17:57Which so far had not been recognized.
17:59So, with increased knowledge our ideas change.
18:03In the desolate mountains of the Sinai lie the great mines of Timna.
18:09For decades they have been called Solomon's mines.
18:13But are they?
18:16The possibility of locating the mines long excited archaeologists.
18:22Timna was untouched.
18:24All we had to do is to kind of dust it.
18:27Very shallow excavations and here you had complete factories standing with all the remains, working tools, the pottery and the furnaces.
18:35So it's a unique site in the world.
18:38The earliest mining operations we have are from the 4th millennium BC, the very beginning of copper making, the end of the Stone Edge.
18:46Then again we have the large workings, thousands of mine shafts actually date to the time of the New Kingdom of Egypt.
18:56Roughly the time of the Exodus.
18:57In this small temple the Egyptian landlords and their Midianite workers worshipped the goddess Hathor.
19:08The artifacts found by Rothenberg were made by Midianites from Arabia, famed for their skill in metal making.
19:16They were made over a period of about 150 years.
19:20Then quite suddenly mining stopped.
19:26I think it was abundant mainly because the energy problem became too complicated.
19:33They had chopped down all the trees.
19:36They must have carried charcoal from great distances.
19:38But we should of course take in consideration that in the middle of the 12th century the Egyptian empire collapsed.
19:47The Egyptians retreated into Egypt, left the Asian provinces.
19:50We have not found any remains whatsoever that could be collected to Israel.
19:59There are no traces whatsoever of King Solomon or any other Israelite king in the area.
20:06The mines were mined out already long before and have never been worked since.
20:10And we know from the Bible that the Midianites or the Cainites as they were called in the Midianite tribe, family groups, were the earliest metallurgists.
20:21But we have no traces whatsoever of any metallurgy in Israel in the sources or in the towns excavated.
20:30In Arabia today's gold is black, the rich oil found there.
20:35Perhaps this area was also once the origin of Solomon's gold.
20:47Did Solomon ever have his own mines or did he simply trade with people that did?
20:54After his death, his kingdom fragmented and his ships rotted on the shore.
21:01Solomon's trading partnership with the Phoenicians had made him the richest man in the world.
21:10The magnificence of his wealth was never to be seen again in Israel.
21:15Historians who wrote about it long after his death made it a legend in its own right.
21:21Where it came from was forgotten.
21:26All that was left was a memory of untarnished glory.
21:34The sun had set on the greatest maritime adventure of the ancient world.
21:39They began as simple squabbles but held too long.
21:50These are the few that devastated hundreds.
21:53They thought it would be a clean operation aided by the element of surprise.
21:58They were dead wrong.
21:59Vendettas.
22:00All this week at 9 on the History Channel.
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