Qumran cemetery

The Qumran cemetery is in eastern Qumran, in the West Bank area of Israel. It is a large area leading to a descent from which four finger-like ridges point eastward. On these ridges more tombs are located. The current estimate of tombs in the cemetery is over 1100. The largest section, that on the plateau proper, has two east-west paths which divide it into three parts. There are also two small cemeteries near Qumran, one ten minutes' walk north of the main cemetery and one to the south, on the other side of Wadi Qumran.ExcavationThe cemetery at the Qumran site is said to be a unique cemetery because how all of the graves differ from each other in one way or another. The characteristics of some graves point towards one tradition, while other characteristics point towards another. This makes it very difficult to determine to whom all the skeletons belong. There are up to 1,200 graves, found throughout all six cemeteries: the primary cemetery, the three extensions of the primary, the north cemetery (about 10 minutes away from the primary cemetery) and one south of Wadi Qumran. Despite the large number of tombs present in the cemeteries, Roland de Vaux only excavated 43 graves, while Solomon H. Steckoll examined ten. and Broshi and Eshel three, However, excavation of Jewish burials has been halted. Of de Vaux's 43 tombs, forty skeletons were fit to examine. Twenty-two of these are now in Germany (Collectio Kurth) and eighteen are in French institutions (Musee de l’Homme, Paris and Ecole Biblique, Jerusalem).The majority of the graves are aligned very neatly with the heads to the south and the feet to the north. Within the southern extension of the primary cemetery, there are also some graves with the head to the east and their feet to the west. The graves themselves are made seen through the piling of field stones on top in an oval shape. Some have larger stones at the head, some at the feet. The graves are dug straight down with the depth ranging from 0.8 meter to 2.5 meters. At the bottom of the graves, is a small cavity, or a loculi. Here the body is laid. From there the body is protected by a stone or clay brick, meant to act as a cap. The bodies themselves are laid on their backs in solitude, or in some cases with a second body. Some of the bodies were buried in coffins, while others merely wrapped in shrouds. They were buried with no possessions except for a minimal amount that had some second temple period pottery buried with them at their feet and some were found with jewelry.