The Holy Scriptures present Jezebel as the queen who pulled the strings of Israel's shadow government, and claim that she even used the seal of her husband, the weak and impressionable King Ahab, to achieve her goals. However, the sovereign could also have signed her orders with a seal of her own, a dark opal that came to light in 1964. That year, the seal arrived at the Israeli Department of Antiquities along with other relics from the private collection. Voss-Hahn.
It soon caught the attention of archaeologist Nahman Avigad. Of uncertain origin, he had four letters engraved never seen before on an object of these characteristics: YZBL. Should Jezebel be read? The dates fit – it dated to the 9th century BC. C.–, and, in the opinion of the expert, it was a piece worthy of a queen. However, something did not add up: there was no trace of the letter alef, which the Hebrews wrote just before a name. Hence Avigad was cautious about linking the seal to the queen.
The matter was put aside until, in 2006, the Dutch researcher Marjo Korpel analyzed the gem in depth and concluded, this time without the prudence of her predecessor, that the defamed biblical queen used it as a rubric. According to this associate professor at the University of Utrecht, this showed that Jezebel had taken an active part in the government of Israel, something that is not documented.
The Book of Kings of the Old Testament traces the profile of a Machiavellian Jezebel. This text relates that Ahab arrived at his house one day distraught because a peasant named Naboth had refused to sell him a vineyard located right next to his summer palace. The popularly called Ahab's Ivory House was a beautiful place, built with materials brought from distant countries, but if Naboth did not transfer its land, the king could not fulfill his dream of surrounding it with a large garden.
Jezebel criticized her husband for his lack of spirit and decided to act on her own. She wrote a letter in the name of the king with a false complaint against Naboth, and sealed it with the seal of her husband. As a result, the peasant was stoned to death at the city gates, and Ahab was able to take possession of the vineyard to make a garden out of it.
It is clear that Jezebel did not have the sympathy of the first biblical chroniclers. In fact, she was always seen as a foreigner in Israel, due to her Phoenician origin. According to the Book of Kings, her father, King Ethbaal, introduced her to palace brawls. He himself had acceded to the throne after murdering his two older brothers. The marriage between Jezebel and Ahab was a state alliance between two neighboring kingdoms, but everything indicates that a great complicity was established between them.
The new Israeli queen, intelligent and sure of her principles, not only remained faithful to her gods, Baal and Ashera, but she attracted her husband to her devotion. Together they established the cult in Israel of these divinities and rites such as sacred prostitution. In the eyes of traditional religious leaders, Jezebel became the very image of perversion.
The queen assigned 450 priests to the service of Baal and 400 to that of Ashera, a provocation that gave rise to a popular uprising in Israel. Jezebel, educated in despotic forms of government, immediately had her opponents killed. But a hundred of them managed to save themselves. Led by the prophet Elijah, they continued to plot against her, until Ahab's death allowed them to take action against her.
Yehu, one of the fallen king's generals, allied himself with Elijah and took up arms against the queen. After murdering his two sons and heirs, Ahaziah and Joram, he headed to the city of Jezreel. The sacred texts report that Jezebel painted her eyes with kohl, decorated her hair and waited for Yehu from the window of her palace with the purpose of seducing him. Although it makes more sense to think that she, certain of his imminent death, prepared herself to die beautifully and with dignity.
Yehu, upon seeing her, ordered his soldiers to throw her out the window. Once on the ground, her horses trampled her and, just as Elijah had prophesied, the dogs devoured her. They only left part of her head, her hands and her feet safe.
With her lineage eliminated and her temples dismantled, the figure of Jezebel was reduced to what her religious rivals wrote about her: pure evil and lasciviousness. Centuries later, archeology discovered the remains of her refined ivory palace in Samaria...and, perhaps also, the seal she used in her governance. At least, this is the thesis that Korpel defended in an article published in the academic journal Journal of Semitics in 2006, based on a detailed study of the symbology of the seal.
Various factors led her to think that the opal in question, now on display in the Israel Museum, belonged to a queen. To begin with, the material it is made of is extremely fragile, so it could only be carved by the most skilled craftsmen. Furthermore, the size is extraordinary: 31 mm high by 22 wide and 10 mm thick. According to Korpel, these measurements suggest that the owner of the seal must not have used it as a ring, but as a pendant.
The researcher considers it very unlikely that in the time of Jezebel there was another woman in the extremely patriarchal Israeli people with enough power to be the owner of such a seal and that, furthermore, her name was Jezebel, a Phoenician name that practically became a offense. “Who else in Israel would want to take the name of this hated lady?” asks Korpel. And she offered a logical answer as to why the name carved on the seal is not preceded by an aleph, as it appears in the Hebrew Bible. Korpel thinks the letter was on a small stray piece from the top of the piece.
Based on the type of symbols contained in it, the professor believes that Jezebel may have needed her own seal in the last stage of her life, when circumstances forced her to serve as a de facto ruler. That is, after the death of her husband and her successor, Ahaziah, she could only be on the throne for two years.
Some experts were quick to criticize Korpel's theory even before a definitive study was published. One of the opponents, the prestigious paleographer Ryan Byrne, pointed out that it is impossible to ensure that the missing letter of YZBL appeared in the broken space of the seal. Others, such as the archaeologist Amihai Mazar or the paleographer Christopher Rollston, recalled that no other seals from the same period have been found throughout the territory of Israel that have engraved names. Perhaps time will offer conclusive data.
This text is part of an article published in number 536 of the magazine Historia y Vida. Do you have something to contribute? Write to us at redaccionhyv@historiayvida.com.
