The next set of arrowheads (described as javelin heads) were published in 1954; three inscribed arrowheads were purchased separately on the antiquities market in 1953–54, by
Gerald Lankester Harding,
Frank Moore Cross and
Józef Milik. They were later ascertained to have been part of a hoard of 26 javelin and arrowheads (mostly uninscribed) found by a
fellah from
al-Khader, just west of
Bethlehem. Given their age, these three artifacts are considered perhaps the most significant in the known
corpus. They used vertical and left-to-right letters, representing a transitional stage between early Iron Age Phoenician scripts and the prior proto-Canaanite inscriptions. Cross and Milik wrote in 1954: "As there is no evidence for the occupation of the site earlier than the Roman period, the cache may have been lost or buried with its owner, during or after a battle." The name mentioned in the three inscriptions is almost exactly the same, ˁbdlb(ˀ)t. Surprisingly, this same name appears on the Ruweiseh arrowhead. Cross and Milik wrote that “if it is not pure coincidence, this may be an indication that a hereditary and/or mercenary archer class existed." ==List==