New insights into the Philistines in light of excavations at Tell es-Sâfi/Gath

Even though the arrival of the Philistines in the southern Levant is an event that happens "off camera, " that is, before the appearance of their settlement remains, it is an event that was narrativized in the recent past by archaeolo-gists working in Philistia who interpreted the local production of Aegean style pottery as evidence of a massive colonization by Mycenaean migrants (Hitchcock and Maeir 2016a). By and large, the understanding of the Philistines and their culture was centered around the biblical and Egyptian images of the Philistines, and their continued reception and interpretation until modern times.