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Ain Dara Temple Footsteps

Tell Ain Dara Temple, Early Iron Age, ca. 1200–550 BCE, Northwest Syria.
 
The Ain Dara temple was the best-preserved example of Early Iron Age Syro-Hittite temple architecture.  The temple was elaborately decorated with lion and sphinx imagery and geometric reliefs. A series of limestone thresholds in the temple’s main doorways were adorned with carvings of larger-than-life human footprints that lead inward, conveying the idea that a deity has entered the temple. The presence of these impressions was unique to this building. It was considered to be a close parallel to the contemporary Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem as described in descriptions in the Hebrew Bible. The Ain Dara temple was seriously damaged by an airstrike in January 2018.
 
First Temple 4

A West Semitic language, in which most of the Hebrew Bible is written except for parts of Daniel and Ezra. Hebrew is regarded as the spoken language of ancient Israel but is largely replaced by Aramaic in the Persian period.

The set of Biblical books shared by Jews and Christians. A more neutral alternative to "Old Testament."

The stage of development during which humans used iron weapons; in the ancient Near East, approx. 1200 to 500 B.C.E.

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