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Wednesday, 29th October 2008 (1089 views)

A team of specialists working on a site in the desert in Jordan claim that they may have discovered the legendary mines of King Solomon, rumoured to have held a treasure of gold.

Referred to in the Old Testament, the fabled mines may lie at Khirbat en-Nahas, which means 'ruins of copper' in Arabic and lies south of the Dead Sea in Faynan.

Thomas Levy of the University of California San Diego has revealed that the find "represents a confluence between the archaeological and scientific data and the Bible" and the site contains evidence that complex societies were active in the area around the period King Solomon might have lived.

King Solomon was famed for his wisdom and wealth and accumulated a fortune from mining and trading operations, part of which was used to create the grand temple and palace of Jerusalem.

Researchers have published their information about the site in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The mines, which have been the subject of hunts by archaeologists and treasure hunters for many years, have been regularly used as the inspiration for several films and were immortalised in the H Rider Haggard novel King Solomon's Mines, published in 1885.

 

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