8.1.3. Avoidance of Imported Pottery

Another well-known Israelite trait is the rarity of imported pottery (e.g., Dever 1995, p. 204; Bloch-Smith and Nakhai 1999, p. 76; Faust 2006a, 2006b, 2013). Obviously, this trait is much more significant in the Iron II, following the resumption of trade in the eastern Mediterranean, but is manifested in the Iron Age I by the almost total absence of Philistine pottery in the highlands. Indeed, imported pottery is extremely rare, and is often missing altogether, in Israelite sites, despite extensive evidence for trade in the very same sites (as was suggested in the past for various sites and regions, for example the Beersheba-Arad valleys in the seventh century BCE; Faust 2006a, pp. 49–64; 2006b; see also Lipschitz and Biger 1991). I will exemplify this phenomenon, again, with Building 101 at Tel 'Eton. Although cedars were discovered in the building, indicating wealth and participation in international trade, and despite additional evidence for wealth (above; see also Faust et al. 2017), not even one out of the nearly 200 complete pottery vessels unearthed in the building was imported. The rarity of imported pottery seems to reflect the same ethos of simplicity.
