John Basil Hennessy AO (10 February 1925 – 27 October 2013),[1] was an Australian archaeologist of the Ancient Near East and Emeritus Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Sydney.
[2] Hennessy returned to Jerusalem at the end of 1951 in order to join the first season of renewed excavations at Jericho under the direction of Kathleen Kenyon.
During these years, Hennessy directed excavations at the Damascus Gate in the Old City of Jerusalem (1964–66), at the Amman Airport Temple (1966), at Teleilat Ghassul (1967) and at Samaria in 1968.
[2] Hennessy left Jerusalem in 1970 because of the outbreak of Arab-Israeli hostilities,[2] taking up the Edwin Cuthbert Hall Visiting Professorship in Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Sydney.
Hennessy was appointed Emeritus Professor of Archaeology after his retirement in 1990 and in 1993 received an Honorary Doctor of Letters from his alma mater, the University of Sydney.