In 1871, Clermont-Ganneau identified the biblical city of Gezer (Joshua 16:11) with that of Abu Shusha, formerly known as Tell el Jezer.[5] In the same year he discovered the Temple Warning inscription in Jerusalem. In 1874 he was employed by the British government to take charge of an archaeological expedition to Palestine.[6] Among his discoveries there was the rock-cut tomb of the Biblical Shebna.[7] He explored/discovered many tombs in Wady Yasul, a valley immediately south of Jerusalem, which he claimed served as an auxiliary cemetery for Jerusalem at some ancient period(s). Based on geographic and linguistic evidence he theorized that this valley was Azal mentioned in Zechariah 14:5 in the Bible.[8] He was the first to make archeological soundings at Emmaus-Nicopolis. He was subsequently entrusted by his own government with similar missions to Syria and the Red Sea. He was made chevalier of the Legion of Honour in 1875. After serving as vice-consul at Jaffa from 1880 to 1882, he returned to Paris as secrétaire interpréte for oriental languages, and in 1886 was appointed consul of the first class. He subsequently accepted the post of director of the École des Langues Orientales and professor at the Collège de France.[9]
In 1873, after the Jerusalem antiquities dealer Moses Wilhelm Shapira offered a set of Moabite artifacts (known as the Shapira Collection) for sale, Clermont-Ganneau attacked the collection as a forgery. In 1883, Shapira offered the so-called "Shapira Strips," fragments of ancient parchment allegedly found near the Dead Sea, for sale to the British Museum, which exhibited two of the strips. Clermont-Ganneau attended the exhibition, and was the first person in England to attack their authenticity.[10] In 1903 he took a prominent part in the investigation of the so-called Tiara of Saitaferne. This tiara had been purchased by the Louvre for 200,000 francs, and exhibited as a genuine antique. Much discussion arose as to the perpetrators of the fraud, some believing that it came from southern Russia. It was agreed, however, that the whole object, except perhaps the band round the tiara, was of modern manufacture.[9]
^André Dupont-Sommer, "Un dépisteur de fraudes archéologiques : Charles Clermont-Ganneau (1846-1923), membre de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres", Comptes rendus des séances de l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, April 1974, pp. 591-592
^Gustave Vapereau, Dictionnaire universel des contemporains, 5th edition (Paris, Hachette, 1880), p. 444
^The Necropolis from the Time of the Kingdom of Judah at Silwan, Jerusalem, David Ussishkin, The Biblical Archaeologist, Vol. 33, No. 2 (May, 1970), pp. 33-46,
^Charles Clermont-Ganneau, Archaeological Researches in Palestine, Vol. 1. pg. 420, 1899; Charles Clermont-Ganneau, Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement, April 1874, pg. 102
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Clermont-Ganneau, Charles Simon". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 6 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 498–499.
