Ancient Hebrews Unit Study

The ancient Hebrews were farmers, shepherds, potters, and traders who lived in the hill country between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River more than 3,000 years ago. Their land sat on the busy road between Egypt and Mesopotamia, so caravans, armies, and new ideas passed through it all the time. Archaeologists have dug up their stone houses, olive presses, clay lamps, water tunnels, and some of the oldest Hebrew writing ever found.

This Ancient Hebrews Unit Study looks at that world through history and archaeology: daily life in a village, the Hebrew alphabet, farming through the year, the Assyrian and Babylonian conquests, Roman rule, and the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947. Most of it can be done with library books, free museum websites, a map, some cardboard, and a pot of lentils on the stove.

Learning Objectives

• Find the land of the ancient Hebrews on a map and name the bodies of water and neighboring peoples around it.
• Describe a day in an ancient Hebrew village: the house, the chores, the food, the clothing, and the work of children.
• Follow the farming year, from the olive harvest in the fall to the summer fruit, using the Gezer Calendar.
• Learn how the Hebrew alphabet grew out of earlier letters, why it is written from right to left, and how to write a few words in it.
• Place the Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Greek, and Roman empires in order and tell how each one ruled the region.
• Explain how archaeologists use layers of soil, pottery, and inscriptions to learn about people who lived long ago.
• Tell the story of the Dead Sea Scrolls, from the shepherds who found the first cave to the scholars who study them today.
• Compare the ancient Hebrews with their neighbors in Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Phoenicia.

Timeline

Add these dates to a timeline of the ancient Near East. Many early dates are approximate.

• About 1208 BC: An Egyptian victory stone carved for Pharaoh Merneptah lists “Israel” among the peoples of Canaan, the oldest known written mention of the name.
• About 1200 to 1000 BC: Small farming villages with four-room stone houses spread across the central hill country.
• About 950 BC: Someone scratches the Gezer Calendar, a short list of farming months, onto a small limestone tablet. Some scholars think it was a school writing exercise.
• About 840 BC: King Mesha of Moab sets up a stone describing his wars with the kingdom of Israel. It is now in the Louvre in Paris.
• 722 BC: The Assyrian Empire conquers the northern kingdom of Israel and its capital, Samaria.
• About 701 BC: The Assyrian king Sennacherib besieges the city of Lachish and later has the battle carved on the walls of his palace in Nineveh. Around the same time, workers carve a water tunnel under Jerusalem, starting at both ends and meeting in the middle.
• 586 BC: The Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II destroys Jerusalem, and many families are taken to Babylon.
• 539 BC: Cyrus the Great of Persia captures Babylon and lets exiled peoples go home.
• 332 BC: Alexander the Great takes control of the region, and Greek ideas and language spread.
• 167 to 164 BC: The Maccabees lead a revolt against the Seleucid king Antiochus IV. Jewish families still remember the victory each winter at Hanukkah.
• 63 BC: The Roman general Pompey captures Jerusalem, and the region comes under Roman rule.
• AD 70: Roman soldiers destroy Jerusalem and its Temple after a four-year war.
• AD 73 or 74: The Romans take Masada, a desert fortress on a mountaintop near the Dead Sea.
• 1947: Bedouin shepherds looking for a lost goat find the first Dead Sea Scrolls in a cave near Qumran.
• 1963 to 1965: Archaeologist Yigael Yadin leads the excavation of Masada with help from volunteers from many countries.

Vocabulary

Hebrew	Israelite	Canaan
Levant	Semitic	alphabet
aleph	scroll	parchment
ostracon	inscription	stele
archaeologist	tel	artifact
cistern	olive press	threshing floor
nomad	tribe	caravan
exile	Diaspora	synagogue
Shabbat	shofar	menorah
Qumran	Masada	Dead Sea

• WordWeb: Free downloadable dictionary software.
• Dictionary.com: Online definitions and pronunciation.

Book Resources

• Ancient Israelites and Their Neighbors: An Activity Guide by Marian Broida: Hands-on projects about the Israelites, Philistines, and Phoenicians, from cooking to weaving to writing.
• The Ancient Hebrews by Kathryn Hinds: A Cultures of the Past book for upper elementary and middle school readers.
• The Dead Sea Scrolls by Ilene Cooper: How the scrolls were found, sold, pieced together, and studied, written for ages 9 to 12.
• Alef-Bet: A Hebrew Alphabet Book by Michelle Edwards: A picture book that shows each Hebrew letter with a word from family life.
• Early Civilization by Jane Chisholm and Anne Millard: An Usborne book with drawings of daily life across the ancient Near East.
• Archaeologists Dig for Clues by Kate Duke: A Let’s-Read-and-Find-Out book that shows young children how a dig works.
• The Story of Hanukkah by David A. Adler: A picture book about the Maccabees and the holiday that remembers them.
• Masada: The Last Fortress by Gloria D. Miklowitz: A novel about the Roman siege of Masada for teens. Preview it first, since the ending is sad.

Poetry and Music

• Read a translation of the Gezer Calendar out loud. It works like a short chant that lists the farm jobs for each part of the year. Write your own calendar poem with one line for each season at your house.
• Listen to a recording of a shofar, a horn made from a ram’s horn. Talk about how a sound that carries so far could be used to call people together.
• Find pictures of the kinnor, a small lyre, and the tof, a hand drum. Both show up in carvings and on clay figures from the region.
• Learn “Shalom Chaverim,” a simple round sung in many schools. Shalom means peace, and it is also used to say hello and goodbye.
• Make the lyre and drum from the Art and Craft Ideas below and play along.

Activities

• Write Right to Left: Copy the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet, then try writing your name in Hebrew letters. Remember to start on the right side of the page.
• Alphabet Family Tree: Look at the old Paleo-Hebrew letters on the Omniglot chart listed below and compare them to Phoenician, Greek, and English letters. Which shapes still look alike?
• Four-Room House Model: Build a model of an Israelite house from a shoebox or a cereal box. Most had a courtyard in the middle, rooms along the sides for animals and storage, a back room, and a flat roof where families dried flax and figs and slept on hot nights.
• Farming Year Wheel: Divide a paper plate into 12 sections and label each month with the job from the Gezer Calendar: olive picking, planting grain, hoeing flax, the barley harvest, the wheat harvest, pruning vines, and picking summer fruit.
• Backyard Dig: Bury a few “artifacts” in layers in a sandbox or a dishpan of dirt, such as a broken flowerpot, a button, and a bottle cap. Dig them out with a spoon and a paintbrush, draw where each one was found, and decide which layer is oldest.
• Layers in a Jar: Pour different colors of sand, soil, rice, or beans into a clear jar to show how a tel, a hill of ruined towns, builds up over hundreds of years.
• Tunnel from Both Ends: Pack a long mound of damp sand. Two people start digging from opposite ends and try to meet in the middle, just like the workers who carved the water tunnel under Jerusalem.
• Olive Oil Tasting: Taste two or three olive oils on gluten-free crackers or the flatbread below. Then press a few olives in a bowl with the back of a spoon to see how oil was pressed out by hand.
• Map Work: Draw the region and label the Mediterranean Sea, the Sea of Galilee, the Jordan River, the Dead Sea, Jerusalem, Lachish, Megiddo, Qumran, and Masada. Add Egypt to the southwest and Assyria and Babylon to the east.
• Empire Comparison Chart: Older students can make a chart of the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans with how each one treated the peoples it conquered.
• Older Students: Look at photos of the Lachish reliefs at the British Museum and write a short report on what the carvings show about armor, siege ramps, and the families leaving the city.

• Caravan Road Board Game: On a file folder, draw a road from Egypt up the coast, through Canaan, and on to Mesopotamia. Add spaces like “Sandstorm. Lose a turn” and “Trade olive oil for copper. Move ahead 2.” Players roll a die and answer a question card to move.
• Artifact Mystery Bag: Put a clay pot, a stone, a piece of wool, and a wooden spoon in a bag. Players reach in without looking, describe what they feel, and guess how an ancient family would have used it.
• Who Ruled Next?: Write the five empires from the timeline on cards, mix them up, and race to put them in order.
• Hebrew Word Hunt: Hide cards with simple Hebrew words, such as shalom, and send players to find them and match each one to its meaning.

Aleph-Bet Match Card Game

Make 44 cards. On 22 of them, write one Hebrew letter in large print. On the other 22, write that letter’s name and the sound it makes, such as “bet, B” or “shin, SH.” Older players can also draw the old Paleo-Hebrew shape of the letter. Shuffle the cards and lay them face down in rows. Players take turns turning over two cards. If the letter matches its name, the player keeps the pair and goes again. The player with the most pairs at the end wins. For a harder game, play Go Fish and ask for letters by name.

The same cards also work as question cards for the Caravan Road board game and the other homemade board games in this unit.

GeoSafari Card Ideas

• Land and Water: Locate the Mediterranean Sea, the Sea of Galilee, the Jordan River, the Dead Sea, and the Negev Desert.
• Ancient Cities: Find Jerusalem, Lachish, Megiddo, Gezer, Samaria, Qumran, and Masada on a map.
• Neighbors: Match the Egyptians, Phoenicians, Philistines, Assyrians, and Babylonians to where they lived.
• Hebrew Letters: Match every Hebrew letter to its name and sound.
• Artifacts: Match the Merneptah Stele, the Mesha Stele, the Gezer Calendar, the Lachish reliefs, and the Dead Sea Scrolls to what each one tells us.
• Timeline: Match each event on the timeline to its date.

Recipes

Lentils, olive oil, onions, garlic, and flatbread baked on a hot stone were everyday foods in an ancient Hebrew home. This simple stew and griddle bread make a good lunch while you work on your map or house model.

Red Lentil Stew

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 carrot, chopped (optional)
• 1 cup red lentils
• 4 cups water or broth labeled gluten-free
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon salt, or to taste
• Juice of half a lemon

Lentils are naturally gluten-free, but stray grains of wheat or barley sometimes turn up in the bag. For celiac safety, buy lentils labeled gluten-free when you can, and always spread them on a plate and pick out anything that isn’t a lentil before rinsing.

Warm the olive oil in a large pot over medium heat. Cook the onion, garlic, and carrot for about 5 minutes until soft. Stir in the lentils, water or broth, cumin, and salt. Bring it to a boil, then turn the heat down and simmer for 20 to 25 minutes, stirring now and then, until the lentils fall apart and the stew is thick. Stir in the lemon juice. If you like a smooth stew, mash it with a potato masher.

Gluten-Free Griddle Flatbread

• 1 cup gluten-free 1-to-1 flour blend (one that already has xanthan gum in it)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• About 1/2 cup warm water

Whisk the flour blend and salt in a bowl. Add the olive oil and most of the water and stir until a soft dough forms, adding the rest of the water a little at a time if it is too dry. Divide it into 4 balls. Press or roll each one flat between two sheets of parchment paper. Cook in a dry, hot skillet for 2 to 3 minutes on each side until brown spots appear. Tear the bread into pieces and use it to scoop up the stew. If the dough cracks while you roll it, pinch it back together or make smaller rounds.

Field Trips

• Visit a museum with artifacts from the ancient Near East. Chicago’s ISAC Museum at the University of Chicago has a gallery of finds from Megiddo, and the Penn Museum in Philadelphia has a Canaan and Ancient Israel Gallery. Michigan families can see ancient pottery, lamps, and coins at the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology in Ann Arbor.
• Call a local synagogue and ask whether they welcome homeschool groups. Many are happy to show visitors a shofar and the Hebrew letters used around their building.
• Shop at a Middle Eastern or kosher grocery store and look for olives, dates, figs, lentils, tahini, and pomegranates.
• Visit a pottery studio or a farm that keeps sheep or goats to see how clay pots were shaped and how wool was spun.
• Take a virtual trip to the caves at Qumran and look closely at the scrolls in the Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library listed below.

Art and Craft Ideas

• Clay Oil Lamp: Shape a small open bowl with a pinched spout from air-dry clay, or make a gluten-free clay from 1 cup baking soda, 1/2 cup cornstarch, and 2/3 cup water cooked until thick. Use it for display only, not with a real flame.
• Ostraca Notes: Ancient people wrote short notes on broken pottery. Write Hebrew letters or a message on pieces of a cracked flowerpot, a clay saucer, or a cardboard “shard” with a marker.
• Scroll: Tape a long strip of paper, a brown paper bag, or adding machine tape between two dowels, pencils, or paper towel tubes. Write a timeline or the Hebrew alphabet on it and roll it up from both ends.
• Shoebox Lyre: Stretch rubber bands of different thicknesses across an open shoebox or a sturdy tissue box. Add a pencil under the bands as a bridge and pluck away.
• Hand Drum: Stretch a balloon or a piece of plastic over an oatmeal canister or a coffee can and hold it with a rubber band. Decorate the sides with paper.
• Cardboard Loom Weaving: Cut notches along two ends of a piece of cardboard, wrap it with string, and weave over and under with yarn scraps, the way families wove wool and linen at home.
• Pottery Jar: Paint or color a paper bag, a yogurt cup, or a juice bottle to look like the tall clay jars that held the Dead Sea Scrolls.
• Tunic: Cut a head hole in an old pillowcase or wear a large T-shirt with a scarf or rope for a belt to dress like an ancient villager.

Information Web Resources

• Canaan and Ancient Israel: Daily Life (Penn Museum): Houses, food, clothing, and work, with photos of objects from the museum’s collection.
• Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library (Israel Antiquities Authority): Zoom in on high-resolution photos of the scrolls and read how they were found.
• Lachish Relief (British Museum): A panel from the Assyrian palace carvings of the siege of Lachish.
• The Gezer Calendar (World History Encyclopedia): A photo of the limestone tablet with a description of the farming months.
• Paleo-Hebrew Alphabet (Omniglot): A chart of the old Hebrew letters next to the modern ones.

Worksheets

Lapbook Ideas

• Map of the Land: A small map with the seas, the Jordan River, and the main cities labeled.
• Four-Room House Flap Book: Lift each flap to see what happened in that part of the house.
• Farming Year Wheel: A small turning wheel with the months of the Gezer Calendar.
• Aleph-Bet Pocket: Letter cards from the card game tucked into an envelope pocket.
• Empires Layer Book: Stacked pages for the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans.
• Dead Sea Scrolls Mini Scroll: A tiny paper scroll that tells how and when the scrolls were found.
• Artifact Cards: A drawing and one fact for each artifact on the timeline.
• Vocabulary Matchbook: Each vocabulary word outside and its definition inside.

Evaluation Ideas

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Related Unit Studies from Homeschooling on a Shoestring

• Ancient Egypt Unit Study
• Ancient Mesopotamia Unit Study
• Ancient Rome Unit Study