page_title: Abel-beth-maachah
section_title: Area F
hierarchical_section_title: Abel-beth-maachah / Current exploration / Middle Bronze II / Area F
caption_attribution_description: English: View of the tower, with its northeastern corner of large boulders and the layers of small stones, looking southwest.
context_page_description: Tel Abel Beth Maacah, Arabic name: Tell Abil el-Qameḥ, is a large archaeological site consisting of a mound with a small upper northern section and a large lower southern one, connected by a saddle. It is located on the northern border of present-day Israel, about 2 km south of the town of Metulla and about 6.5 km west of Tel Dan. Since at least the early 13th century CE the mound was the location of the Arab village of Abil el-Qameh, also spelled al-Qamh etc., whose residents were forced to flee in 1948.
  The survey and excavations conducted so far have shown that the site had been inhabited during the Bronze and Iron Ages, as well as the Persian, Hellenistic, Byzantine, Early Islamic, Crusader, Mamluk and Ottoman periods. However, the lower mound was not occupied after the Iron Age I, when occupation seems to have concentrated on the upper mound.
  The site was fortified by walls and a rampart in the Middle Bronze Age II. These fortifications were reused in the Late Bronze Age in the south of the mound, but went out of commission in the Iron Age I. A silver hoard in a jug, dating to the end of the Late Bronze Age, is one of the earliest such hoards found in the country.
context_section_description: A large structure was revealed just under topsoil. Its southern end continues down the slope and its western end was cut by later activity. This feature is composed of an outer 'lining' of very large, roughly worked stones in its northeastern corner and northern wall, which enclosed layers of small-medium roughly rounded stones.
  Adjoining the eastern face of the stones is a rampart, partly capped by stones and composed of layers of chalky white material and dark brown soil, of which only the top has so far been excavated. The stone structure and rampart are part of a fortification placed on the southern end of the site, overlooking the Huleh Valley and the main north-south road that passed alongside it on the west.
  
  The exact date of the tower and rampart cannot yet be determined, as no floors associated with them have been revealed to date. Against the northern face of the fortification are elements dating to the Late Bronze Age I-II, so that it the fortification should most likely be dated to the Middle Bronze II, though a more precise chronology cannot be fixed yet.
caption: View of the tower, with its northeastern corner of large boulders and the layers of small stones, looking southwest
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