TEL AKKO TOTAL ARCHAEOLOGY PROJECT (TATAP): 2010 – 2019
For over five millennia, Akko served as a major urban and maritime center located onthe Mediterranean’s Levantine coast. The tell, situated east of the modern city of Akko, dominated the Plain of Akko and was inhabited from the Early Bronze Age into the Hellenistic period (ca. 3000 – 100 BCE). By the middle of the Hellenistic period, however, settlement had shifted from the mound towards the natural Bay of Akko, under what is now the UNESCO World Heritage site of Old Acre and the adjacent modern city. Today, Tel Akko is a municipal park.
The first series of excavations under the direction of Moshe Dothan (1973 – 1989), which remain largely unpublished, uncovered an impressive Canaanite city fortified by massive ramparts and a Phoenician town that served as an important regional industrial center.
Renewed excavations on Tel Akko commenced in 2010 under the co-direction of Ann E. Killebrew (Pennsylvania State University) and Michal Artzy (University of Haifa). The 2010 – 2019 project incorporates an integrated, ‘total archaeology’ approach to the region’s heritage, past and present. The goals included:
- An intensive survey of the mound and documentation of previous unpublished excavations conducted by Dothan.
- The investigation of Bronze and Iron Age Akko and its role as the major Canaanite and Phoenician urban center in the Plain of Akko.
- Investigating the development of Akko/Ptolemais and the impact of Neo-Assyrian, Persian and Hellenistic empires during the first millennium BCE..
- The development of new documentation technologies
- Establishment of a state-of-the-art field school to train future archaeologists, which incorporated excavation, survey, GIS, on-site conservation, underwater archaeology, and community outreach.
TOTAL ARCHAEOLOGY
To realize the project’s short and long-term research goals, we use a holistic approach to the past that we’ve termed “Total Archaeology”. It integrates archaeological survey, systematic excavation, a robust conservation plan, a public outreach program and the incorporation of the largely unpublished results from earlier expeditions to address a practical research agenda, all of which has necessitated the development of a cutting edge multi-dimensional recording system.
PUBLICATIONS
Click here to see Publications from the 2010 – 2019 Seasons
OUR TEAM
Click here to see the Academic Team, Specialists and Staff
PAST AND PRESENT SPONSORING INSTITUTIONS
Tel Akko Total Archaeology has been supported and sponsored by a dedicated group of leading universities and organizations. Many thanks to all who have given their time and resources to the project over the years.
BLOGS
The Little Phoenician Juglet
What could be more wonderful than finding an almost perfect little juglet that has been buried for thousands of years, the very first week of my dig in Akko! Yes, I carefully dug out of the side of the wall within my square this beautiful little jug with only a small chip along the lip opening. Otherwise it was so perfect, filled with dirt and debris. It was like a little animal caught, but looking up at me with longing eyes saying, “free me, free me!” It was such a thrill to find it all intact, since so much of […]
Community Archaeology, Outreach, and the Old City
Community Archaeology, Outreach, and the Old City By Elena Sesma (Anthropology, UMass Amherst) and Evan Taylor (Anthropology, UMass Amherst) Community archaeology is a spectrum of engagement and collaboration with local people who live at, in, and around a research site. Here at the Tel Akko project, the community archaeology and outreach program brings together local teens and field school students to work towards understanding contemporary life, heritage, and material culture in this unique place. Over two weeks, we learned the importance of conservation in a coastal city built in vulnerable sandstone through workshops with local conservator and stone mason Saleem […]
Studying conservation in old Akko
Studying conservation in old Akko One of the benefits to students here in Akko, is the many opportunities to learn something completely different – something they would never normally have access to at home. Stonemasonry, as it is used in the restoration of an ancient city like Akko, is one such thing. Saleem Amer has his own studio or Madrassa in the old city where our students and many others including local youth come to learn and to have a go. Saleem uses nothing but old fashioned tools and materials, shunning modern mechanised equipment and detesting concrete. He is one [...]
Crops of Tel Akko
In this post I am going to run through some of the most common domesticated plant species that we find in the archaeological record at Tel Akko. These taxa give us a good sense of the economic plants used at Tel Akko, particularly for food. The two most prolific crops at Tel Akko, from all the historical periods excavated thus far, are olive (Olea europaea) and grape (Vitis vinifera). Fun fact: The grape pips we recover occasionally show up mineralized, rather than charred. This means people ate these seeds, which then calcified as they passed through the human gut (Green […]
The Eye of Horus watching over Tel Akko
A tiny find representing the Eye of Horus turned up on the Tel. It may be an amulet, possibly a funerary one. The Eye of Horus is an ancient Egyptian symbol of protection, royal power and good health. The eye is personified in the goddess Wadjet.
Cows’ Ankles and Urchin Spines: A Day of Zooarchaeology at Tel Akko
My alarm went off at 4:15 am today. Work starts early at Tel Akko, and I like to run in the morning to wake myself up and collect my thoughts. When I open the lab at 5:30 am, I’m feeling alert and ready to meet the past. And it’s a good thing, too, because my tables are covered with piles of fragmented animal bones. It looks more like a mess than information. I’m the zooarchaeologist at Tel Akko this year, and it’s my job to identify, record, and interpret the animal remains recovered by the excavations. Animal remains are an […]
