The Linchpin

When this Bronze medallion was found in 1997 in an excavation of a house at El Ahwat the nature of the piece was much in doubt. The site being excavated was believed to be 12th or 13th-century bc and perhaps the site of a biblical battle between the Egyptian army and the Israelites.

Now thirteen years later scientist Oren Cohen of Haifa University believes he has solved the mystery in an Egyptian relief of Pharaoh riding his chariot. The relief shows a human faced linchpin in the center of the wheel and may show that the biblical battle took place on the site and that at least one Egyptian nobles chariot became damaged.