Tel Haror (

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

name) or Tell Abu Hureyra (

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic languages, Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C ...

name; also spelled Hureira and Hareira), also known as ''Tel Heror'', is an archaeological site in the western

Negev Desert The Negev or Negeb (; he, הַנֶּגֶב, hanNegév; ar, ٱلنَّقَب, an-Naqab) is a desert and semidesert region of southern Israel. The region's largest city and administrative capital is Beersheba (pop. ), in the north. At its southe ...

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

, northwest of

Beersheba Beersheba or Beer Sheva, officially Be'er-Sheva ( he, בְּאֵר שֶׁבַע, ''Bəʾēr Ševaʿ'', ; ar, بئر السبع, Biʾr as-Sabʿ, Well of the Oath or Well of the Seven), is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. ...

, about 20 km east of the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...

, situated on the north bank of Wadi Gerar, a

wadi Wadi ( ar, وَادِي, wādī), alternatively ''wād'' ( ar, وَاد), North African Arabic Oued, is the Arabic term traditionally referring to a valley. In some instances, it may refer to a wet (ephemeral) riverbed that contains water onl ...

known in Arabic as Wadi esh-Sheri'a. During the Middle Bronze Age II it was one of the largest urban centres in the area, occupying about 40 acres. The city contains substantial remains of Middle Bronze Age II through to Persian-period settlement strata.

Excavations

W.F. Albright William Foxwell Albright (May 24, 1891– September 19, 1971) was an American archaeologist, biblical scholar, philologist, and expert on ceramics. He is considered "one of the twentieth century's most influential American biblical scholars." ...

suggested as early as 1924 that there was a Cushite colony here founded in the tenth century BCE. In 1956 Yohanan Aharoni identified biblical

Gerar Gerar ( ''Gərār'', "lodging-place") was a Philistine town and district in what is today south central Israel, mentioned in the Book of Genesis and in the Second Book of Chronicles of the Hebrew Bible. Identification According to the Internatio ...

with the site of Tell Abu Hureira (Tel Haror). Tel Haror was excavated by Eliezer Oren of the Ben Gurion University of the Negev between 1982 and 1992. In 2010, there were also further explorations by Oren with P. Nahshoni and G. Bar-Oz. Substantial remains of Middle Bronze to late Iron Age settlement strata were uncovered.

History

Middle Bronze II city

Fortifications

The extensive MBIII fortified city of Tel Haror was enclosed by an elaborate system of earthen ramparts fronted by a deep ditch.

''Migdol'' temple

Within the city a sacred precinct was excavated, including a ''

migdol Migdol, or migdal, is a Hebrew word (מגדּלה מגדּל, מגדּל מגדּול) which means either a tower (from its size or height), an elevated stage (a rostrum or pulpit), or a raised bed (within a river). Physically, it can mean fo ...

'' temple that contained numerous remains of animal sacrifice, as well as cultic pottery, some of it imported. Numerous ritual deposits (favissae) were found. The ''migdol'' temple had external dimensions of 9×15 m with massive walls that may have originally been as high as 10m. Within the fortifications, there is a well, more than 10m deep. A

Minoan The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age Aegean civilization on the island of Crete and other Aegean Islands, whose earliest beginnings were from 3500BC, with the complex urban civilization beginning around 2000BC, and then declining from 1450B ...

graffito was found in the sacred precinct dating to ca. 1600 BCE. Analyses of the sherd determined that it originated in

Crete Crete ( el, Κρήτη, translit=, Modern: , Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the 88th largest island in the world and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, and ...

, most likely the south coast. The three signs were inscribed prior to firing. The signs may either represent Linear A writing, or the Cretan hieroglyphs.

Identification with ancient cities

Archaeologist

Anson Rainey Anson Frank Rainey (January 11, 1930 – February 19, 2011) was professor emeritus of ancient Near Eastern cultures and Semitic linguistics at Tel Aviv University. He is known in particular for contributions to the study of the Amarna table ...

proposed Tel Haror as the site of the fortress of Sharuhen, known from ancient Egyptian sources. This identification is also supported by

Donald Redford Donald Bruce Redford (born September 2, 1934) is a Canadian Egyptologist and archaeologist, currently Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies at Pennsylvania State University. He is married to Susan Redford, who is also an Egyptolo ...

, because of the site's immense size and important geographical position. Tel Haror is also widely accepted as the site of ancient

, an identification for which it competes with the other three large tells between Gaza and Beersheba, Tell Jemmeh,

Tell esh-Sharia Tell may refer to: *Tell (archaeology), a type of archaeological site *Tell (name), a name used as a given name and a surname *Tell (poker), a subconscious behavior that can betray information to an observant opponent Arts, entertainment, and m ...

(see Tel Sera at Hebrew-language Wikipedia: :he:תל שרע) and

Tell et-Tuwail Tell may refer to: *Tell (archaeology), a type of archaeological site *Tell (name), a name used as a given name and a surname *Tell (poker), a subconscious behavior that can betray information to an observant opponent Arts, entertainment, and m ...

(also spelled Tell et-Tuwaiyil; by the Byzantine site of Be'er Osnat, near Kibbutz Tze'elim). This was one of the cities of the

Philistines The Philistines ( he, פְּלִשְׁתִּים, Pəlīštīm; Koine Greek (LXX): Φυλιστιείμ, romanized: ''Phulistieím'') were an ancient people who lived on the south coast of Canaan from the 12th century BC until 604 BC, when ...

. Philistine pottery was found on the site.

Notes

Bibliography

*Day, Peter M., et al. 1999 Petrographic Analysis of the Tel Haror Inscribed Sherd: Seeking Provenance Within Crete. Aegaeum 20: 191–96. *E.D. OREN, "The 'kingdom of Sharuhen' and the Hyksos kingdom," in E.D. OREN (ed.), The Hyksos: new historical and archaeological perspectives (1997) 253-283 *Oren, Eliezer D., et al. 1996 A Minoan Graffito from Tel Haror (Negev, Israel). Cretan Studies 5: 91–118. *E.D. OREN, "Tel Haror," in E. STERN (ed.), The New Encyclopedia of archaeological excavations in the Holy Land (1993) 580-584

External links

Prof. Eliezer Oren site
at academia.edu {{Coord, 31.382117, N, 34.606522, E, type:landmark, display=title Bronze Age sites in Israel Philistine cities Archaeology of the Near East