Tell es-Sakan () is a mound created by the accumulation of the remains of consecutive settlements, located about south of Gaza City in Palestine. This tell was the site of two separate Early Bronze Age urban settlements. During Ancient Egypt's expansion into southwestern Canaan in the latter half of the 4th millennium BCE, Tell es-Sakan was founded as an administrative centre for the Egyptian colonies in the region. It was inhabited from about 3300 BCE to 3000 BCE. After a period of abandonment, a Canaanite city was established around 2600 BCE and inhabited until about 2250 BCE, after which Tell es-Sakan was permanently abandoned.
Tell es-Sakan functioned as a trading post and was positioned along what was probably a dried-up channel of the Wadi Ghazzeha watercourse that is dry most of the year but in the Bronze Age would have been navigable. The settlement may have been a successor to Taur Ikhbeineh, a nearby site inhabited in the 34th century BCE. At its discovery in 1998, Tell es-Sakan was the oldest known Egyptian fortification and the only known Egyptian fortified settlement beyond the Nile Valley. A fortification of a potentially similar age was found at the Egyptian settlement of Tel Erani in 2013. After the Canaanite city of Tell es-Sakan was abandoned in the 23rd century BCE, Tell el-Ajjul was established to the south, likely as a replacement.
The tell was discovered during a building project and subsequently investigated as part of an international collaboration between Palestine's Department of Antiquities and Cultural Heritage and the French National Centre for Scientific Research. Though there were plans for further archaeological research, fieldwork halted after the 2000 season due to the start of the Second Intifada, a Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation. Finds from Tell es-Sakan have been exhibited in France and Switzerland.
The site covered around , of which has undergone archaeological excavation; a much larger area has been destroyed as a result of construction and conflict. In 2017, the Hamas government's Land Authority began bulldozing part of the site to clear the way for a building project. Still, it halted following opposition from various groups, including the government's Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities and the Islamic University of Gaza. The site was further damaged as a result of the Gaza war.
Location Tell es-Sakan is located in the Gaza Strip, north of the present course of the Wadi Ghazzeh and less than inland from Palestine's modern Mediterranean coast. It is in the al-Zahra neighbourhood, south of Gaza City. Wadis are watercourses that are dry most of the year and are found in arid locations; the Wadi Gazzeh in the Gaza Strip has a dry season typically beginning in May and lasting until September, and a wet season from October to April.
When Tell es-Sakan was rediscovered, the area was fertile and suitable for agriculture. The landscape includes ancient sand dunes which have turned into rock, or lithified. One such dune concealed Tell es-Sakan so that the site's full extent is uncertain, but it covers an estimated . From the late 1990s al-Zahra developed as a residential area, and population growth has led to homes being built close to the archaeological site.
A tell is a mound created by layers upon layers of human occupation on a site over an extended period. The mound rose more than above the coastal plain. In the Bronze Age, the coast was closer to Tell es-Sakan than today. The settlement likely possessed a harbour on a now silted-up channel of the Wadi Ghazzeh, which was navigable to at least this point. A change in the Wadi Ghazzeh's course may have led to Tell es-Sakan's final abandonment in the late 3rd millennium BCE. The area was a frontier between ancient Egypt and Canaan, with both Egyptians and Canaanites inhabiting Tell es-Sakan in different stages of the city's history.
History In 1998, the accidental exposure of the Early Bronze Age site during the construction of a housing complex brought to light the only settlement discovered in the Gaza Strip that was inhabited between 3300 BCE and 2250 BCE, with remains of mud-brick constructions and a wealth of other findings dating exclusively to that period. Tell es-Sakan was located near a ford on the coastal road leading to Egypt, the Via Maris, and has enabled archaeologists to study the interaction between Egypt and Canaan during the period the tell was occupied. It appears to be the predecessor to Tell el-Ajjul, a major city of the 2nd millennium BCE located further south.
The site was occupied during two distinct periods: the lower levels of "Sounding A" produced the earliest evidence of activity, which dated to the end of the 4th millennium BCE and belonged to a city of the Egyptian Protodynastic Periodwhich corresponds to the Early Bronze Age IB period in the history of the southern Levant. The middle and upper levels of "Sounding B" and "Sounding C" belonged to a Canaanite settlement of the 3rd millennium BCE. The majority of the animal remains were sheep and goat; cattle and pig bones were also discovered, as well as shells and fish bones. The occurrence of pig bones was largely restricted to Tell es-Sakan's Egyptian phase. Cereals and legumes were cultivated, along with olives, grapes, and figs. (the part about zooarchaeology by Naomi Sykes is in English)
Egyptian city (3300–3000 BCE)
The first settlement at Tell es-Sakan was established around 3300 BCE. It was an Egyptian colony, and archaeologists discovered the remains of mud-brick buildings, defensive walls, and ceramic materials from this phase of habitation. The remains provided dating evidence for activity at Tell es-Sakan through radiocarbon dating of seed samples and comparison of artefacts to other Egyptian archaeological sites. Tell es-Sakan began as an unfortified settlement, and an enclosing wall was added later. The wall of the Egyptian city was initially thick and then widened to . Tell es-Sakan's defences were then demolished and replaced with another wall, this time thick and enhanced by a glacis.
The excavators found the remains of houses and domestic structures. The oldest remains on the site had been damaged by the mechanical diggers. Though no single house was fully excavated, some of the buildings had hearths and brick-built silosof a type typical of Egyptian architecture. Such silos were typically used for storing grain. One building also had a structure that may be a bread oven. The pottery associated with the first city was mostly (90%–95%) Egyptian in style, and at least three-quarters of the portable material culture was produced locally, emulating Egyptian styles. Sherds of pottery bearing serekhs from wine jars were also recovered from the Egyptian phase of the site. Serekhs were emblems bearing the names of pharaohs, and can help with dating activity at a site. Amongst the serekhs found at Tell es-Sakan was one that may feature the name of Pharaoh Narmer who established the First Dynasty of Egypt.
The archaeologists who led the excavations at Tell es-Sakan, Pierre de Miroschedji and Moain Sadeq, proposed that there were three areas of Egyptian expansion into the southern Levant during the late 4th millennium BCE, and Tell es-Sakan was one of the major settlements in the region. Tell es-Sakan and the much smaller settlement at En Besor were part of an area of permanent Egyptian settlement. Extending north along the coast were areas of Egyptian influence (including sites such as Tel Erani and Ascalon), with Egyptian and Canaanite populations living in the same areas, sometimes with seasonal movement. Beyond this area, extending further north and east inland, sites such as Tell Abu al-Kharaz and Tel Megiddo had trading contacts with Egypt. Taur Ikhbeineh was a nearby Egyptian settlement inhabited during the 34th century BCE. De Miroschedji and Sadeq suggest that Tell es-Sakan may have effectively been a successor settlement to Taur Ikhbeineh.
Tell es-Sakan was exceptional in possessing fortifications, which may indicate that it was essential in the region, and may have acted as the administrative centre of the colonial domain established by the Egyptians in southwestern Canaan. It functioned as a trading post and the quantity of wine jars discovered at the site led the excavators to suggest that wine from the region was being exported to Egypt. Archaeobotanical evidence consisting of plant remains found at Tell es-Sakan demonstrates that the inhabitants consumed cereals, legumes, and figs.
De Miroschedji suggests that Tell es-Sakan may correspond to the settlement of Wenet, an Egyptian fortified settlement recorded in the First Dynasty period which roughly spanned 3000 to 2840 BCE. Habitation at Egyptian Tell es-Sakan lasted until about 3000 BCE (the very end of Early Bronze Age I and the beginning of Early Bronze Age II). This conclusion is based on a small amount of finds at Tell es-Sakan post-dating this period, either discovered through excavations or through recovery during the demolition of parts of the site. The abandonment was likely peaceful. It may have coincided with the beginning of the First Dynasty of Egypt, perhaps under the reign of one of the successors of Pharaoh Narmer, such as Hor-Aha or Den.
Canaanite city (2600–2250 BCE)
The Egyptian colonial domain in the region eventually disappeared, and the site lay abandoned for several centuries. Consequently, there were very few active settlements in the southern coastal area during the Early Bronze Age II. Around 2600 BCE, during the Early Bronze Age III period and near the beginning of the Egyptian Fourth Dynasty, the Canaanites reoccupied the site. They created a new fortified city that served as a capital. (also see the chart on p. 80) At this point the Wadi Ghazzeh formed a natural border between Canaan and Egypt. The earliest phases from the reoccupation of the site were found in "Sounding C"; pottery vessels recovered from this area were Canaanite in style, and similar to pottery found at Tel Yarmuth dating from the Early Bronze Age IIIA.
De Miroschedji and Sadeq described Tell es-Sakan as having "both a strong local particularism and close ties with the sites of inner Canaan". The walls enclosing the settlement at that time were thick and built of sun-dried mud brickslarger than the walls of the Egyptian settlement. Based on the size of the defences, Tell es-Sakan was a major Canaanite settlement. As well as the fortification, the archaeologists found a residential area with buildings surviving in parts to a height of nearly .
The walls and floors were limewashed. Despite the discovery of multiple buildings, only one doorway was found, which suggests that these structures typically had entrances above ground-floor level. The excavators noted that "The overlapping of dwellings ... implies a high degree of urbanization" (). At the edge of the excavated area was the corner of a building; though this was not excavated to determine its use, the thickness of the walls may indicate that it was a public building rather than a house.
Animal bones found at Tell es-Sakan indicate that the consumption of pigs ceased during the Canaanite settlement, in contrast to the Egyptian settlement, from which porcine bones comprised 24% of the bones recovered from the site. The archaeozoologist Naomi Sykes wrote that "The reasons for this shift are uncertain, but it may reflect a change in cultural dietary preferences following the break in Egyptian occupation. Alternatively, it could be related to broader economic trends."