Tel Hashash or Tell el-Hashash () is an archaeological site in the heart of the

Bavli Bavli (), or Shikun Bavli, is a neighborhood in central Tel Aviv, Israel, named after the Babylonian Talmud, and bounded by Yarkon Park on the north, Ayalon highway to the east, Namir road to the west, and Park Tzameret to the south. History ...

neighborhood of

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

. It is one of the ancient sites along the

Yarkon River The Yarkon River, also Yarqon River or Jarkon River (, ''Nahal HaYarkon''; , ''Nahr al-Auja''), is a river in central Israel. The source of the Yarkon ("Greenish" in Hebrew) is at Tel Afek (Antipatris), north of Petah Tikva. It flows west throu ...

, located 800 meters south of the river, overlooking

Tell Qasile Tell Qasile is an archaeological site near the Yarkon River in Tel Aviv, Israel. Over 3,000 years old, the site contains the remains of a port city founded by the Philistines in the 12th century BC. Prior to 1948, it was on the village lands of ...

on the northern bank of the river. The site was excavated in the 1960s by Jacob Kaplan on behalf of the Old Jaffa Museum of Antiquities, and in the 1980s by Haya Ritter Kaplan of the

Israel Antiquities Authority The Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA, ; , before 1990, the Israel Department of Antiquities) is an independent Israeli governmental authority responsible for enforcing the 1978 Law of Antiquities. The IAA regulates excavation and conservatio ...

. The excavations exposed remains of the first century CE and the late Byzantine period.

Excavations

In 1953, Jacob Kaplan surveyed the site and found mostly Roman pottery from the 1st century CE as well as Early Bronze Age pottery. Kaplan later excavated the site in 1966 and discovered tombs and pottery from the 1st century BCE to the 1st century CE as well as a structure and tombs from the 4th century CE. In 1980, Haya Ritter-Kaplan excavated the site and discovered a small fortress from the time of

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

emperor

Heraclius Heraclius (; 11 February 641) was Byzantine emperor from 610 to 641. His rise to power began in 608, when he and his father, Heraclius the Elder, the Exarch of Africa, led a revolt against the unpopular emperor Phocas. Heraclius's reign was ...

in the early 7th century CE. Ritter Kaplan returned to the site in 1983-1984 and found more Byzantine remains as well as Hellenistic remains including two coins of

Ptolemy II Philadelphus Ptolemy II Philadelphus (, ''Ptolemaîos Philádelphos'', "Ptolemy, sibling-lover"; 309 – 28 January 246 BC) was the pharaoh of Ptolemaic Egypt from 284 to 246 BC. He was the son of Ptolemy I, the Macedonian Greek general of Alexander the G ...

(3rd century BCE). In 2014 a salvage excavation was undertaken south of Tel Hashash under the direction of Yitzhak Marmelstein and Amir Gorzalczany. The excavation discovered tombs from the Middle and Late Bronze Age, Hellenistic pottery and an Ottoman well.

References

Bibliography

*{{Cite journal, last=Itamar Taxel, date=July 2010, title=A Re-Appraisal of the Archaeological Findings at Tel Hashash: On the Archaeology of the Yarqon Estuary from Classical Times to Late Antiquity, url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233633430, journal=

Palestine Exploration Quarterly The Palestine Exploration Fund is a British society based in London. It was founded in 1865, shortly after the completion of the Ordnance Survey of Jerusalem by Royal Engineers of the War Department. The Fund is the oldest known organization i ...

, volume=142, issue=2, pages=95–126, doi=10.1179/003103210X12717682047177, via=ResearchGate Archaeological sites in Israel