Tel Khatzor

Today, we decided to visit a national park near us (in fact, it's probably the nearest to us of any national park) called Tel Khatzor. We had never been there before, although we had, of course, driven by many times. It's located just down the hill, a little north of Rosh Pinna and Khatzor HaGlilit (the modern-day city).

In the Canaanite Period, Khatzor was the largest and most important city in this entire country, with about 15,000 inhabitants. The city and one of its kings are mentioned in the Tanach (the Bible), and it is also mentioned in documents from Mesopotamia and from Egypt. According to the Tanach, the Israelites conquered and destroyed Khatzor by fire, and, indeed, archeologists have found the the city was destroyed around that time by a major catastrophic fire.

Later, part of the city was re-built, by Solomon, according to the Tanach. We also saw some of this part, including the foundations of the main gate of the city. Later still, King Ahab, of the northern kingdom of Israel (whose wife was the infamous Jezebel) enlarged the city considerably. He also dug a huge pit within the city walls with a tunnel connecting it to the ground water. This was so that the people in the city would have access to water even during a siege, a very important factor in such a situation. The original steps around the side of the pit are still visible, but a pair of spiral staircases has been constructed so the modern visitors (including yours truly) can go down and see the bottom of the pit and the tunnel to the water source (which was dry today). I'm attaching 3 pictures of this amazing piece of ancient engineering (not to mention the cool modern spiral staircases!), which, according to the signs there, is similar to several others found in this country by archeologists. Enjoy!