2022The House of David Inscription - First Day Cover

The House of David inscription was discovered at Tel Dan in northern Israel on July 21, 1993 by Gila Cook, the site surveyor of the Tel Dan expedition, led by Dr. Avraham Biran. The text is inscribed on a basalt stele (standing stone, mazzevah in Hebrew), of which three fragments remain. The stele was purposely shattered and its fragments were incorporated into the walls and pavements of a building complex located in a plaza outside the walls of the ancient town. The surviving part of the inscription contains 13 lines in Aramaic, closely related to Hebrew, in a style and content characteristic of the 9th-8th centuries BCE. Most scholars date it in the second half of the 9th century BCE, due to the content and historical context of the inscription.