With an area of about 30 acres, Aphek-Antipatris is one of the largest mounds in the land of Israel. It is situated near the source of the Yarkon River and was, for this reason, called Tel Ras el-’Ain in Arabic, meaning “Mound at the Head of the Spring.” In antiquity the main international highway of the ancient Near East, the Via Maris (Way of the Sea), passed by Aphek-Antipatris. This highway ran along the coast and connected the great civilizations of Mesopotamia and Egypt. The city was important for it guarded the Yarkon Pass formed by the mountains to the east and the Yarkon River to the west. The position of the site, its size and its remains, led to its identification with Aphek of the Old Testament and Antipatris of the New Testament.
Aphek is first mentioned in the Bible as a Canaanite town conquered by Joshua (Joshua 12:18). In 1 Samuel, Aphek emerges as the northern border town of Philistia. It was from here that the Philistines waged the decisive battle at Ebenezer when the ark was captured (1 Samuel 4:1–11). It was again at Aphek that they summoned their armies to battle against King Saul at Mount Gilboa: “Now the Philistines gathered together all their armies to Aphek: and the Israelites pitched by a fountain which is in Jezreel (1 Samuel 29:1). During the period of the divided kingdom, Aphek became an Israelite town and was mentioned as a town in the region of Samaria in the Assyrian king Esarhaddon’s account of his march against Egypt in 671 B.C.
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Map of Israel showing the location of Aphek-Antipatris.
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View of Aphek-Antipatris. The remains of a Turkish fort are still standing on the top of the mound.
In the year 9 B.C. Herod built a new town and named it Antipatris after his father. It was by this name that the site was known for the next 1, 000 years. It is mentioned in the New Testament as being a stopping point when Paul, as a prisoner of the Romans, was taken from Jerusalem to Caesarea (Acts 23:31).
One of the startling results of the excavations is that there was an unbroken chain of urban living at the site which continued for at least 5, 000 years. “We have a site here with all the urban history of Palestine. There appear to be no gaps since the beginning of urban civilization around 3, 000 B.C.,” Dr. Moshe Kochavi, head of the excavation, said in an interview.
According to Kochavi, until now there has usually been a break in the continuation of walled cities of ancient Palestine in the early part of the Middle Bronze Age Period (ca. 2,000-1, 750 B.C.), when the population was largely nomadic. “Here, starting around 3, 000 B.C., urban civilization appears to continue without interruption until
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modern times, but particularly interesting is the continuation from the third millennium through to the second,” Kochavi said.
The earliest settlement was found on the northern slope of the mound where a stone and mud-brick fortification waif, about nine feet wide, was revealed. Inside the city, on the opposite side of a narrow lane running parallel to this wall, some stone house foundations were excavated. Additional houses, dating to the second phase of the Early Bronze Age (ca. 2, 700 B.C.) were found in the northwest section of the tell; urban planning at this date is evident from the lay-out of these houses. Noteworthy are some sherds of Egyptian vessels of the First Dynasty found in the ruins of this settlement.
Area A at Aphek where remains from the Early Bronze Age and Middle Bronze Age have been found.
On top of the debris of this earlier city were found fortification walls, a palace and private dwellings dating to the time of the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (beginning of the Middle Bronze Age, (ca. 2,000-1, 750 B.C.). On the northern slope of the tell
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two superimposed city walls of this period were exposed to a length of 82 feet. These walls, about eight feet wide, were strengthened by buttresses supporting them against the steep incline of the slope. On the inner side of the city walls were several levels with private dwellings adjoining these walls; their floors were strewn with pottery vessels, found together with cooking and baking ovens. On the northwestern slopes of the mound a large palace from the Middle Bronze Age has been found.
Under the courtyard of the Turkish fort which still stands on the mound, remains of an imposing Canaanite public building were found. It was destroyed by an intense conflagration in the Late Bronze Age in about 1, 200 B.C. The stone walls of this building are four and a half feet thick and preserved to a height of six and a half feet. A stone staircase led to a second story, built of sun-dried mud bricks. The debris of these bricks, baked to a bright orange color by
The lower of the two dark layers visible at the corner of this excavation square is the destruction layer of a Canaanite public building dating to about 1,200 B. C.
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the conflagration, covered the ruins of the burnt building. Fragmentary clay tablets, inscribed in cuneiform script, were found in this burnt-brick debris. A number of fragments bear inscriptions in Sumerian, Akkadian, and Canaanite and are part of a revolving prism which served as a dictionary, apparently used by officials dealing with the local peasantry. Each side bears words such as “water,” “oil” and “wine,” with their equivalents on the same line of the adjoining sides. Since cuneiform tablets are exceedingly rare among the archaeological finds of Israel, the discovery of such documents attests to the importance of Aphek in the Late Bronze Age as a center of power situated at the crossroads of an international highway.
One of the discoveries is of great interest to Bible students — a Philistine stronghold built on the ruins of the earlier Canaanite public building. Possibly this was the headquarters for the Philistine army when they gathered at Aphek in 1 Samuel 4:1 and 29:1.
Architectural remains from the period of the Israelite Monarchy have been brought to light. These buildings, unearthed on the northwestern slopes of the tell, were destroyed by fire, burying beneath their rubble rich concentrations of complete vessels — storage jars for water and oil, cooking pots, jugs, juglets, chalices, and also some entirely unique vessels.
Houses of the period of the Israelite monarchy.
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Remains of the New Testament city of Antipatris have also been excavated. At the center of the mound a street bordered by a row of shops appeared to be a commercial quarter. Along the paved street, a series of shops with a common wall housed circular clay bins for the storage of merchandise. Outside, similar bins lined the store fronts for the display of merchandise on the street. A coin of the “second year” of the first Jewish war against the Romans dates the destruction of Antipatris to A.D. 67 by Vespasian.
In the southern area of the tell part of a 26-foot wide main street, paved with large flat stones laid diagonally, was revealed. Between the pavement and the bordering houses were large cauldrons, apparently used by artisans in full view of the people in the street. It is thought that these were for boiling soap. Antipatris was known as a production center for “nether,” a substance used as soap by the ancients.
Cauldrons from the New Testament period, possibly used for boiling soap.
Northwest of the commercial area the excavation of a patrician house of the Late Roman Period (third century A.D.) has been completed. The floors of this house were paved in multicolored mosaic patterns, in 12 different geometrical designs; in one of the
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mosaics there is a mythological scene, and another depicts a battle between man and beast. A network of channels to collect rain water for domestic purposes led to plastered cisterns underneath the floors of this house. Some 350 coins, dating from the reign of Antiochus and up to the Middle Ages have been found so far in this area. Some splendid capitals of columns from this area testify to the existence of important public buildings in Antipatris during this period.
(Israel Exploration Journal, Vol.22, (1972), pp. 238-239; Vol. 23 (1973), pp. 245-246; Vol. 24 (1974), P. 261; Washington Post, August 19, 1973; Tel Aviv University news release dated August 21, 1974; Excavations at Aphek-Antipatris by M. Kochavi, Tel Aviv University Institute of Archaeology, 1974; Jerusalem Post Weekly, August 5, 1975.)
Bible and Spade 5:4 (Autumn 1976)