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| The parchment and papyrus Dead Sea Scrolls contain Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic and include some of the earliest-known texts from the Bible, including the oldest surviving copy of the Ten Commandments (AFP Photo/MENAHEM KAHANA) |
Jerusalem (AFP) - DNA research on the Dead Sea Scrolls has revealed that not all of the ancient manuscripts came from the desert landscape where they were discovered, according to a study published Tuesday.
Numbering
around 900, the manuscripts were found between 1947 -- first by Bedouin
shepherds -- and 1956 in the Qumran caves above the Dead Sea that are today
located in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The
parchment and papyrus scrolls contain Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic and include
some of the earliest-known texts from the Bible, including the oldest surviving
copy of the Ten Commandments.
Research on
the texts has been ongoing for decades and in the latest study, DNA tests on
manuscript fragments indicate that some were not originally from the area
around the caves.
"We
have discovered through analysing parchment fragments that some texts were
written on the skin of cows and sheep, whereas before we thought they had all
been written on goat skin," said researcher Pnina Shor, who heads the
Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) project studying the manuscripts.
"This
proves that the manuscripts do not come from the desert where they were
found," she told AFP.
The
researchers from the IAA and Tel Aviv University were unable to pinpoint where
the fragments came from during their seven-year study, which focused on 13
texts.
The Dead
Sea Scrolls date from the third century BC to the first century AD.
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Some 25,000
parchment fragments have been discovered and the Dead Sea Scrolls
texts have
been continuously studied for more than 60 years (AFP Photo/
MENAHEM KAHANA)
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'Parts of
a puzzle'
Many
experts believe the manuscripts were written by the Essenes, a dissident Jewish
sect that had retreated into the Judaean desert around Qumran and its caves.
Others argue that some of the texts were hidden by Jews fleeing the advance of
the Romans.
"These
initial results will have repercussions on the study of the life of Jews during
the period of the Second Temple" in Jerusalem that was destroyed by the
Romans in AD70, said Shor.
Such
archaeological research remains a sensitive subject in Israel and the
Palestinian territories, as findings are sometimes used by organisations or
political parties to justify their claims to contested land.
Beatriz
Riestra, a researcher who took part in the study, pointed to "differences
at the same time in the content and the style of calligraphy, but also in the
animal skin used for the parchment, proving they are of different origin".
In total,
some 25,000 parchment fragments have been discovered and the texts have been
continuously studied for more than 60 years.
"It's
like piecing together parts of a puzzle," said Oded Rechavi, a professor
who led the Tel Aviv University team.
"There
are many scrolls fragments that we don't know how to connect, and if we connect
wrong pieces together it can change dramatically the interpretation of any
scroll," he said.
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