Historicity
The first scientific investigation of the site of Jericho was carried out by Charles Warren in 1868, but amounted to no more than a site-survey (Warren's prime interest was in establishing the modern equivalents of Biblical locales). In 1907-09 and again in 1911 digging was carried out by two German archaeologists, Carl Watzinger and Ernest Sellin. Watzinger and Sellin believed that they would be able to validate the Biblical story of Jericho's destruction by Joshua and the Israelites, but concluded instead that the city was unoccupied at the generally-accepted time of Joshua, ca. 1400 B.C.
These results were tested in 1930-36 by John Garstang, at the suggestion of William F. Albright, the doyen of Palestinian archaeology at the time. Garstang discovered the remains of a network of collapsed walls which he dated to about 1400 BCE, the time he believed the Israelites were on their conquest, that had apparently fallen in a dramatic fashion as opposed to being ruined by abandonment or decay from natural forces. Garstang's work thus reversed the conclusions of the earlier diggings.
By the post-war period a revolution had occurred in archaeological methodology, and Albright accordingly asked Kathleen Kenyon, one of the most respected practitioners of the new archaeology, to excavate at Jericho once more. Kenyon dug over 1952-1958 and traced the entire history of the city from the earliest Neolithic settlement. She did this by digging a narrow deep trench maintaining clean, squared off edges, rigorously examining the soil and recording its stratification, and thus building up a cross-section of the tell. When presented with an area that would require wider areas to be excavated - the floor plan of a house for example - she carefully dug in measured squares while leaving an untouched strip between each section to allow the stratification to remain visible. Kenyon reported that her work showed Garstang to have been wrong and the Germans right - Jericho had been deserted at the accepted Biblical date of the Conquest.
In 1990, biblical archaeologist and Canaanite pottery specialist Bryant G. Wood proposed that the pottery recovered during the excavations of Garstang and Kenyon pointed to a destruction date of the city ca. 1400 B.C. rather than 1550 B.C., as concluded by Kenyon. Dr. Wood's main argument was that Kenyon's conclusion was based on the expensive, imported Cypriot pottery that was not found at the excavation site and that she ignored the vast amount of local pottery that was recovered. In addition to the ceramic data, Wood appealed to stratigraphy, a scarab series uncovered by Garstang, and a carbon-14 sample of a single charcoal piece found in the destruction debris as further evidence in favor of the later 1400 B.C. destruction date. Wood's proposal did not settle the debate and he was forced to defend his argument against direct criticism, specifically from Piotr Bienkowski.
In 1995, Kenyon's result was corroborated by radiocarbon tests which dated test samples taken from the site to 1562 BCE (plus/minus 38 years) with a certainty of 95%. The specific charcoal sample Wood referenced in his proposition was found to be in error and corrected to 1590 or 1527 +/- 110 B.C.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Jericho