Radioactivity in Dead Sea springs

Interesting.

I mean, the Jews have a history of describing things that sound like nuclear weapons like the Ark....

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1475-4754.1967.tb00623.x

RADIOACTIVJTY OF JERICHO BONES

BY I. M. B,LAKE* and J. CYNTHIA WEBERt+

‘Balliol College, Oxford University. 7 Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the

History of Art, Oxford University.

Research into the hydrology of springs at the Dead Sea shore (west bank) south

of Qumran has revealed that some are radioactive. The radioactivity is peculiarly

localised and not necessarily permanent, the onset of such contamination being

unpredictable (Moyle and Thomas). That the spring Ain es-Sultan (site of ancient

Jericho) is also in the Jordan Valley and may draw water from the same basic

source suggests that, although it is clean today, it may in the past have suffered

similar contamination.

Archaeologically Jericho has seen two major periods of desertion. The first

followed the “Pre-Pottery Neolithic B” period (Kenyon, personal communication).

The second began about 1325 B.C. and lasted until after 800 B.C. (Kenyon 1965,

p. 21 1). This latter desertion is Biblically attested and attributed to a curse laid

by Joshua on Jericho (Joshua, 6. v/26). Subsequent reoccupation is recorded in

connection with the “miracle” whereby Elisha is popularly supposed to have healed

the water with salt (Kings 11, 2,v/ 19-22).

Hebrew phraseology, particularly that of the passage often translated as “the

water is naught, and the land miscarryeth” (Kings 11, 2v 19) offers a clear suggestion that the effect of the curse was a form of sterility. It has been argued that

radioactive contamination of the spring would explain the observed effect recorded

in the Old Testament (Blake 1967).

The alpha radioactivity of 20 animal bones from Jericho has been measured.

‘Two of the samples are from the end of the Middle Bronze age (prior to the

second desertion) the rest being Pre-Pottery Neolithic (PPN). The bones were

crushed and the alpha radioactivity measured using a thick sample on a 2”

diameter ZnS screen observed by a photomultiplier tube. Seventeen of the samples

ranged in activity from 3.2 to 9.5 counts per kilosecond. The most recent of the

PPN B bones was 15.3 cts/ks and the two MI3 bones were 24.3 and 31.7 cts/ks.

The alpha ray energy spectrum was kindly measured for two of these samples by

Dr. R. D. Cherry and Mr. Julian Hobbs of the University of Capetown. For a

3.6 cts/ks sample they found apparently the conventional Uranium series, whereas

the radioactivity of the 31.7 cts/ks sample was composed almost entirely of 5.24k

0.06 MeV alphas, probably from 210Po supported by its parent zlnPb. If it is

Z1oPb, which has a half life of only twenty-two years, the radioactivity measured at

present cannot be the remnant of radioactivity acquired several thousand years ago.

but must instead be contamination from more recent times. The data may thus

indicate the presence of high radioactivity in the ground water at Jericho within

the last few hundred years.

Measurements on more bones from the area are planned. It is hoped to

confirm the presence of 210Po and zloPb. and to determine the nature of the higher

radioactivity in the most recent PPN (B) bone.

Skeletal material from Jericho was made available through the good offices of

Miss K. M. Kenyon. C.B.E., Litt.D.. F.S.A., Principal of St. Hugh’s College, Oxford.