 the tel dan stele is a broken stele (inscribed stone) discovered in 1993-94 during excavations at tel dan in northern israel. it consists of several fragments making up part of a triumphal inscription in aramaic, left most probably by hazael of aram-damascus, an important regional figure in the late 9th-century bce. hazael (or more accurately, the unnamed king) boasts of his victories over the king of israel and his ally the king of the "house of david" (bytdwd), the first time the name david had been found outside of the bible. the tel dan inscription generated considerable debate and a flurry of articles, debating its age, authorship, and even some accusations of forgery, "but it is now widely regarded (a) as genuine and (b) as referring to the davidic dynasty and the aramaic kingdom of damascus."it is currently on display in the israel museum in jerusalem. ==discovery and description== ===discovery=== the stele was discovered by avraham biran at tel dan in the northern part of modern israel (fragment a in july 1993 and fragments b1 and b2 in june 1994). the fragments were published by biran and his colleague joseph naveh in 1993 and 1995. ===text=== thumbnail|300px|left|the tel dan stele: fragment a is to the right, fragments b1 and b2 to the left the following is the transcription using hebrew letters provided by biran and naveh. dots separate words (as in the original), empty square brackets indicate damaged/missing text, and text inside square brackets is reconstructed by biran and naveh:  the followin
1993_archaeological_discoveries Ancient_Near_East_steles Aramaic_inscriptions Archaeology_of_Israel History_of_Israel Victory_steles