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Revision as of 00:14, 4 January 2025 by Richard Nevell (talk | contribs) (Start article - still need to add more on the Egyptian links but this is somewhere to start)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)  Shown within State of Palestine | |
| Alternative name | Tour Ikhbeineh |
|---|---|
| Location | Palestine |
| Coordinates | 31°27′13.3″N 34°24′50.8″E / 31.453694°N 34.414111°E / 31.453694; 34.414111 |
| Area | c. 1.0 hectare (2.5 acres), possibly up to 3.2 hectares (8 acres) |
| History | |
| Periods | Bronze Age |
| Associated with | Egyptians, Canaanites |
| Site notes | |
| Excavation dates | 1977, 1987 |
| Archaeologists |
|
Taur Ikhbeineh was a prehistoric settlement in what is today the Gaza Strip in Palestine. It was inhabited in the 4th millennium BC. Excavations in the 20th century provided evidence of Egyptian links to the region.
Location and topography
Taur Ikhbeineh is located 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) inland from Gaza's Mediterranean coast. When the site was established in the prehistoric period it was likely located near a estuary of the Wadi Gaza, and the coast was closer.
The extent of the site is uncertain though it is likely that it has been reduced by erosion over the millennia. Archaeological investigations identified three areas of activity (A, B, and C) within an area of 3.2 hectares (8 acres); area A was the main habited and occupied an area of at least 1.0 hectare (2.5 acres) but it is unclear whether the three areas are part of the same settlement or whether areas B and C are peripheral to the main settlement.
History
The EBI period saw the development of the first urban settlements. The history of Taur Ikhbeineh is understood from partial archaeological excavations. The investigations identified four phases of occupation in the Early Bronze Age (referred to as EBI) corresponding roughly to 3900/3700–3200/3000BC. Organic material in the second oldest of the phases was radiocarbon dated to the 34th century BC.
The settlement was abandoned in the Early Bronze Age, though there were later prehistoric burials at Taur Ikhbeineh. Human remains were found at the site and broadly dated to the Early Bronze Age IV or Middle Bronze Age I periods based on pottery found with the burials (corresponding to 2500/2300BC–1750BC). The bones belonged to an adult, aged 20–30 and a 3-month-old infant. The burial practice was similar to the burials found at Tell el-Ajjul, a nearby Bronze Age settlement.
Investigations and later history
The site was investigated by Ram Gophna (Tel Aviv University) in 1977 and Eliezer Oren and Yekutieli Yuval (Ben Gurion University) in 1987, with surveys of the area and excavations conducted. Pottery discovered at Taur Ikhbeineh in the 1930s is in the Rockefeller Archeological Museum's collection.
In 2004 the site was used agriculturally. Since then, construction work has taken place nearby, along with clearances and the widening of the Salah al-Din Road which passed north-west of Taur Ikhbeineh. During the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip the area around Taur Ikhbeineh was affected by airstrikes. In late 2023, the Gaza Maritime Archaeology Project (GAZAMAP) used satellite imagery to identify a damaged building but the extent of the damage to the archaeological site could not be determined.
See also
- Naqada culture – culture in Egypt partly contemporaneous with Taur Ikhbeineh
Notes
- Taur Ikhbeineh is sometimes referred to as a Chalcolithic site, see eg: Morhange et al. 2005. There are different naming schemes for this period, and the earliest part of EBI is sometimes considered to be Late Chalcolithic.
References
- Morhange et al. 2005.
- Oren & Yekutieli 1992, pp. 365, 377–378.
- Sharon 2013, pp. 50–52.
- Sharon 2013, note 16.
- Oren & Yekutieli 1992, pp. 363, 381.
- Sharon 2014, p. 63. sfn error: no target: CITEREFSharon2014 (help)
- Oren & Yekutieli 1992, p. 380.
- Oren & Yekutieli 1992, p. 363.
- Horwitz et al. 2002, p. 113.
- Sharon 2013, p. 63.
- Oren & Yekutieli 1992, p. 361.
- Andreou et al. 2024, pp. 21–22, 24.
- Andreou 2023, p. 12.
Bibliography
- Andreou, Georgia M. (2023). Gaza Maritime Archaeology Project (PDF) (Report). Honor Frost Foundation. Archived (PDF) from the original on 7 June 2024. Retrieved 7 June 2024.
- Andreou, Georgia M.; Fradley, Michael; Blue, Lucy; Breen, Colin (2024). "Establishing a baseline for the study of maritime cultural heritage in the Gaza Strip" (PDF). Palestine Exploration Quarterly. 156 (1): 4-42. doi:10.1080/00310328.2022.2037923. ISSN 0031-0328.
- Horwitz, Liora Kolska; Tchernov, Eitan; Mienis, Henk K.; Hakker-Orion, Dalia; Bar-Yosef Mayer, Daniella (2002). "The archaeozoology of three Early Bronze Age sites in Nahal Besor, northwestern Negev". In van den Brink, Edwin C. M.; Yannai, Eli (eds.). In Quest of Ancient Settlement and Landscapes: Archaeological Studies in Honour of Ram Gophna. Ramot Publishing and Tel Aviv University. pp. 107–133.
- Morhange, Christophe; Hamdan Taha, Mohamed; Humbert, Jean-Baptiste; Marriner, Nick (2005). "Human settlement and coastal change in Gaza since the Bronze Age". Méditerranée: Revue géographique des pays méditerranéens. 104: 75–78. doi:10.4000/mediterranee.2252.
- Oren, Eliezer D.; Yekutieli, Yuval (1992). "Taur Ikhbeineh: Earliest Evidence for Egyptian Interconnections". In van den Brink, Edwin C. M. (ed.). The Nile Delta in Transition: 4th–3rd Millennium B.C. Tel Aviv: Israel Exploration Society. pp. 361–384.
- Sharon, Ilan (2013). "Levantine chronology". The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of the Levant. Oxford: Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199212972.013.004. ISBN 978-0-19-921297-2.
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