Tel Eton

Tel Eton is an archaeological site measuring 60 dunams, located in the Telam Valley, near Nahal Adoraim in the southeast of the Judean Lowlands, near Moshav Shekef. The tell's current name comes from the nearby village that was inhabited between the Byzantine period to the Arab period, Kharbat Eyton.

In a survey conducted on the tell, signs of settlement were discovered from the Early Bronze Age to the Persian and Hellenistic periods, in the 3rd-4th centuries. The survey brought up a few findings from later periods, which probably do not reflect a permanent settlement in the Tel. During the Byzantine period, the tell became agricultural land, and during this period large earthworks were carried out in the site and many terraces were built, which give the mound its current shape.

Research history
The site is marked on the map of the PEF Survey of Palestine as "Khirbat Aitun" (Kh. Aitun). Near the tell appears on the map an innocent-looking inscription about caves and pits in the area. In fact, the area contains many hundreds of burial caves.

The Tel and its surroundings remained unexcavated for many decades, until after the Six-Day War, widespread grave robbing began around the site. Following this, the Israel Antiquities Authority, in collaboration with Tel Aviv University and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, carried out rescue excavations in the necropolis of the tell, in which burial caves were discovered from the Late Bronze Age to the Roman period (a period that is not represented in the tell itself).

In the summer of 1976, robbery excavations were conducted on the Tel. As a result, the members of the Tel Lachish excavation team came to Tel Eton, and conducted rescue excavations for two weeks, in the center of the Tel. The limited excavation brought up mainly findings from the 8th-9th centuries BCE - Iron Age 2.

Starting in 2006, a delegation from the Department of Land of Israel Studies and Archeology at Bar-Ilan University led by Avraham Faust excavated the site.

The history of the Tel
The information about the Tel in its beginnings is limited, as the excavations have not yet deepened beyond the Late Bronze Age, but the results of the survey show a small settlement in the Early Bronze Age, which declined in the Intermediate Bronze Age, revived in the Middle Bronze Age and grew to become a significant city in the Late Bronze Age. The settlement, which lies on the seam between the Judean and Philistine areas of control, continued its life during the Iron Age as a fortified city. The main finds in the Tel belong to the Iron Age II, when a main city existed on the Tel and was one of the largest in the Kingdom of Judah.

At the top of the Tel, a spacious house of the Four-room house (also known as an "Israelite house") type was discovered, built of bricks and fieldstones and Ashlar. The house, which is particularly large, covers an area of 250 square meters (and apart from the courtyard, there was probably also a second floor), and contains a rich find, especially an archaeobotanical find: olive seeds, grapes, lentils, grains and cloves of garlic. The beginning of the building is dated according to the organic find to the end of the 11th century or the beginning of the 10th century BCE. The building was destroyed at the end of the 8th century, perhaps during Sennacherib's campaign in 701.

In the later period of the settlement on the tell, a large citadel was built in the place where the "Governor's House" used to stand, with particularly thick walls. The walls survived only to the height of one course so that the outline of the citadel can be seen, but it cannot be dated. Based on the findings elsewhere on the hill, the excavators speculate that this citadel was built in the Persian period, or at the beginning of the Hellenistic period.

The burial caves
The remains of an ancient cemetery considered one of the largest in the Land of Israel, were uncovered around Tel Iton. The cemetery was used continuously from the Late Bronze Age to the Iron Age II (8th century BC). About 400 burial caves were uncovered there; The earliest of them date to the Intermediate Bronze Age (16th-15th century BC), while the latest dates to the Iron Age II. The original cemetery was west of the mound, and in the 8th and 7th centuries BC it began to spread to other areas around The mound.

First, the investigation of the Tel Eton cemetery in a rescue excavation conducted in 1968 following reports of antiquities being looted. Later, a number of rescue excavations and archaeological surveys were conducted at the site.

Identification
The Palestine Exploration Fund identified Tel Eton with the city of Itam, which belonged to the tribe of Shimon, and later this identification was supported by Yohanan Aharoni. Martin Noth identified the tell with the city of "Aglon" which is mentioned several times in the Book of Joshua, and is described as being between the cities of Lachish and Hebron. Nut's identification was also accepted by Anson Rainey and is considered the accepted identification of the Tel. Gershon Galil identified Libnah at Tel Eton, an identification denied by Nadav Na'aman, who states that the site was not inhabited in the seventh century, which does not correspond to Hamotal the daughter of Jeremiah, who was the wife of King Josiah of Libnah. Zechariah Kalai hesitantly raised the idea that Tel Eton is Moresheth-Gath.