Reconstructing Phoenician Iron Production at Tel Akko, Israel

Summary

Recent excavations (2010 – 2016) at the Mediterranean port city of Tel Akko, directed by A.E. Killebrew and M. Artzy, have uncovered abnormally large quantities of iron slag and remnants of iron working spanning the 6th – 4th centuries BCE. This mid-first millennium smithy, which smelted iron on an industrial scale, is the only known iron working facility in the Levant dating to the Persian period, providing an unparalleled opportunity to explore iron production at a Phoenician maritime center. This poster presents the preliminary results of iron ore provenience studies utilizing osmium isotope analysis of iron slags and spatial distribution of slags at Tel Akko using geographic information systems (GIS) to address questions relating to sources of the ore, the reconstruction of the Phoenician iron industry at Tel Akko, and its larger economic role in the Achaemenid Empire.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 16802