Tall el-Hammam

4

What archaeologists found

A destruction layer dated roughly ~1650 BC:

• a large prosperous city suddenly abandoned
• violently collapsed walls
• extreme temperatures (estimated ~2000°C)
• pottery melted into glass
• shocked quartz crystals (impact/explosion evidence)
• soil rich in salt → land uninhabitable ~600 years

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Biblical account

Genesis 19:24–25
“The Lord rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah… and destroyed the cities.”

The description includes:

• fire from the sky
• instantaneous destruction
• a devastated and barren region afterward

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What researchers suggest

Some geologists propose:
➡️ an airburst explosion (similar to Tunguska / atmospheric meteor)

This would produce:

• shockwave
• extreme heat
• total firestorm
• salt thrown across the plain

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Bible – Archaeology correlation

Biblical description	Discovery
fire from heaven	airburst explosion
total destruction	city instantly wiped out
cursed land	salinized soil
long abandonment	~600 years uninhabited

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Important

Not all archaeologists agree this is Sodom.
The debate is still open.

But most accept:
➡️ a major Bronze Age city in Abraham’s era was destroyed by an extreme catastrophe in that region.

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Conclusion

We do not have an inscription saying “this is Sodom,”
but we do have a real event that closely matches the biblical description.

Archaeology confirms a catastrophe.
The Bible provides its interpretation.