The Temple Mount Sifting Project allows non-specialists of all ages to aid archaeologists sorting through large piles of soil displaced from the area of Judaism’s holiest site. After suspending operations for some time due to the coronavirus, it recently resumed, which led a Jerusalem schoolboy named Binyamin Milt to discover a gold bead that the experts at first dismissed as a modern object. Later it was shown to Gabriel Barkay, one of the project’s directors.

When Barkay held the bead, his first response was, “I recognize this type of bead,” and he recalled that he had found several similar items when excavating burial systems from the First Temple period in Katef Hinom in Jerusalem. There the beads were made of silver, but were identical in shape and in their manufacturing method, called granulation.

Beads of this type were found also in several other sites over the country, and the layers in which they were found were dated to various periods, from the 13th century BCE [believed to be the era of the Exodus] up to the 4th century BCE [the early Second Temple period], with the overwhelming majority dating to the Iron Age [12th to 6th centuries BCE.] Several similar beads made of gold were also found at other Iron Age sites in Israel.

The bead is roughly cylindrical, with a hole at its center. Its diameter measures 6mm and its height 4mm, and it is built of four layers, each made of tiny gold balls adhered one to the other in a flower shape. Gold being a precious metal that does not tarnish or rust, the bead’s state of preservation is excellent.

Archaeologists believe the bead likely was used as a decoration on a priestly vestment.