Jezebel, the queen whose name became synonymous with all things lewd and wicked, probably wielded a fair bit of power in ancient Israel, suggests a stone document seal newly traced to the Biblical "bad girl."

The seal confirms that Jezebel, who eventually met a gory demise, was a powerful figure in the ancient world who conducted business independent of her husband.

Complete results of the University of Utrecht study are published in a recent volume of the Journal for Semitics.

The Bible says nothing of her own seal, but archaeologists have long believed that the stone discovered in 1964 was Jezebel's, despite the ambiguity of the symbols and the name depicted on it.

Multiple icons on the seal, as well as its above-average size, indicate that it belonged to a queen, the recent investigations concluded.

Pagan queen had power
With her own seal, Queen Jezebel was able to exert a powerful influence upon people around her, much like the Egyptian queens, Korpel said.