KIRYAT ATA, ISRAEL—Ynet News reports that volunteers assisting at an Israel Antiquities Authority excavation at the site of Usha in northwestern Israel uncovered slag, a hammer, and nails. The artifacts suggest iron tools were manufactured at the site some 1,400 years ago, according to excavation directors Yair Amitzur and Eyad Bisharat. Previous excavations have uncovered fragments of wine glasses, glass lamps, and glass lumps, which indicate glass was also produced at Usha. Jewish workers may have used 1,800-year-old rock-hewn ritual baths with plastered walls and steps at the site in order to produce ritually pure oil and wine from olives and grapes grown nearby, the archaeologists added. To read about a community on the Dead Sea that endured for more than a millennium, go to "Letter from the Dead Sea: Life in a Busy Oasis."
