Kinneret () is the name of an important

Bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals, such as phosphorus, or metalloids suc ...

and

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly ...

city situated on the northwestern shore of the

Sea of Galilee The Sea of Galilee ( he, יָם כִּנֶּרֶת, Judeo-Aramaic: יַמּא דטבריא, גִּנֵּיסַר, ar, بحيرة طبريا), also called Lake Tiberias, Kinneret or Kinnereth, is a freshwater lake in Israel. It is the lowest ...

, mentioned in the 14th century BC Aqhat Epic of

Ugarit ) , image =Ugarit Corbel.jpg , image_size=300 , alt = , caption = Entrance to the Royal Palace of Ugarit , map_type = Near East#Syria , map_alt = , map_size = 300 , relief=yes , location = Latakia Governorate, Syria , region = ...

, and in the

Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...

and

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chris ...

. Older Bible translations spell the name alternatively Kinnereth or Chinnereth, and sometimes in the plural as Chinneroth. In time the name became Gennesaret and Ginosar (). The remains of Kinneret have been excavated at a site called Tell el-'Oreimeh (Tell el-‘Orēme) in

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

and Tel Kinrot in

Modern Hebrew Modern Hebrew ( he, עברית חדשה, ''ʿivrít ḥadašá ', , '' lit.'' "Modern Hebrew" or "New Hebrew"), also known as Israeli Hebrew or Israeli, and generally referred to by speakers simply as Hebrew ( ), is the standard form of the He ...

Etymology

"Kinneret"

Talmud

According to the

Jerusalem Talmud The Jerusalem Talmud ( he, תַּלְמוּד יְרוּשַׁלְמִי, translit=Talmud Yerushalmi, often for short), also known as the Palestinian Talmud or Talmud of the Land of Israel, is a collection of rabbinic notes on the second-century ...

(Megillah 1:1), the name Kinneret is derived from the name of the ''kinnar'' trees which grow in its vicinity, explained by lexicographer M. Jastrow to mean the Christ's thorn jujube ( Ziziphus spina-christi), and by

Moses Margolies Moses Margolies or Moshe ben Shimon Margalit ( he, משה מרגלית; c. 1715 in Kėdainiai, Lithuania – 1781 in Brody, then a private town of the Polish Crown) was a Lithuanian Jewish rabbi and a commentator on the Jerusalem Talmud. Works M ...

to mean cane reeds. Another Talmud passage says that it is so-called because its fruits are as sweet as those of the ''kinnara'' (Ziziphus spina-christi).

"Gennesaret" and "Ginosar"

Adrian Room sees the origin of 'Ginosar' in a combination of Hebrew words, ('

valley A valley is an elongated low area often running between hills or mountains, which will typically contain a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams ove ...

') and either ('

branch A branch, sometimes called a ramus in botany, is a woody structural member connected to the central trunk of a tree (or sometimes a shrub). Large branches are known as boughs and small branches are known as twigs. The term '' twig'' usuall ...

') or ('to guard', 'to watch'). The late-19th-century Easton's Bible Dictionary offers a very different etymology, by stating that the initial Hebrew name 'Kinneret', in the plural 'Kinnerot', was Grecized to Gennesaret, with Ginosar as yet another transformation of the Hebrew name.Easton's Revised Bible Dictionary
"Gennesaret"
/ref>

Historical use of the name

The lake

Due to its prominence, the city gave its name to the lake (the "

") for long periods of history, as the Sea of Kinneret, Kinnerot, Gennesaret, or Ginosar. As other places around the lake rose to prominence, such as

Tiberias Tiberias ( ; he, טְבֶרְיָה, ; ar, طبريا, Ṭabariyyā) is an Israeli city on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. A major Jewish center during Late Antiquity, it has been considered since the 16th century one of Judaism's F ...

and Qasr al-Minya, the name of the lake also changed to Lake Tiberias or Lake Minya ("Bahr el-Minya").

The plain

The name has also been used for the "Plain of Gennesaret", which stretches south of the ancient city. The plain's modern names are Plain of Ginosar in Hebrew and el-Ghuweir in Arabic.

Modern settlements

The Israeli

kibbutz A kibbutz ( he, קִבּוּץ / , lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming h ...

Ginosar derives its name from the ancient town, though it is not located on its precise site. The settlements of Moshavat Kinneret and Kvutzat Kinneret are even further south, on the southwestern shore of the lake.

Biblical and other ancient sources

Annals of Thutmose III

Kinneret is mentioned as Kennartou in the 15th-century BCE

Annals of Thutmose III The Annals of Thutmose III are composed of numerous inscriptions of ancient Egyptian military records gathered from the 18th Dynasty campaigns of Thutmose III's armies in Syro-Palestine, from regnal years 22 (1458 BCE) to 42 (1438 BCE). These r ...

at Temple of Karnak.

Hebrew Bible

Kinneret was a town allotted to the

tribe of Naphtali The Tribe of Naphtali () was one of the northernmost of the twelve tribes of Israel. It is one of the ten lost tribes. Biblical narratives In the biblical account, following the completion of the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites, Josh ...

(). The name appears in the singular form as "Kinneret" (, ) or in the plural as "Kinneroth" ().

New Testament Gospels

In the

the name appears changed to Gennesaret (). This city or area is also a place where

Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and relig ...

visited and performed healing (). The Douay-Rheims Bible uses the form "Genesar", see

Gospel of Matthew The Gospel of Matthew), or simply Matthew. It is most commonly abbreviated as "Matt." is the first book of the New Testament of the Bible and one of the three synoptic Gospels. It tells how Israel's Messiah, Jesus, comes to his people and form ...

: 4And having passed the water, they came into the country of Genesar.
Matthew 14:34
.

Josephus and Babylonian Talmud

Flavius Josephus, as well as the

Babylonian Talmud The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cent ...

mention the lake by the name "Sea of Ginosar" after the small fertile plain of Ginosar that lies at the foot of Tell el-'Oreimeh, ancient Kinneret. Josephus refers to the area as having very rich soil.

Identification and location

The site of the fortified

and

city of Kinneret is identified with the mound known in Arabic as Tell el-'Oreimeh and in

modern Hebrew Modern Hebrew ( he, עברית חדשה, ''ʿivrít ḥadašá ', , '' lit.'' "Modern Hebrew" or "New Hebrew"), also known as Israeli Hebrew or Israeli, and generally referred to by speakers simply as Hebrew ( ), is the standard form of the He ...

as Tel Kinrot, halfway between Capernaum and

Magdala Magdala (Aramaic: מגדלא, ''Magdala'', meaning "tower"; Hebrew: , ''Migdal''; ar, المجدل, ''al-Majdal'') was an ancient Jewish city on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, north of Tiberias. In the Babylonian Talmud it is known as Magda ...

.Lamar Williamson 1983 ''Mark'' pages 129-130 Situated on an important trade route, its elevated position meant that it also overlooked and guarded the Plain of Ginosar from its northern end. The site has the ICS Coordinates: 200805-1252830; Aharoni, Yochanan. ''The Land of the Bible, A Historical Geography''. The Westminster Press, Philadelphia, 1979, p. 433. ca. 32.87000 N, 35.539312 E.

Archaeological exploration

The tell is being excavated as part of a large archaeological project which is ongoing since 2002.

References

* Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897)
Catholic Encyclopedia

External links

Tel Kinrot page on the website of the "Kinneret Regional Project" international archaeological expedition
{{Authority control archaeological sites in Israel New Testament places Hebrew Bible places Former populated places in Southwest Asia Tells (archaeology) Sea of Galilee