Tel Moza

Please note that there will not be an excavation season in the summer of 2024. The date for the next season has not yet been determined.

For those interested in receiving updates, please feel free to send an email to: mozaexcavations@gmail.com

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About Tel Moza

In the spring of 2019 Tel Aviv University began the first (non-salvage/academic) excavation project at the site, directed by Shua Kisilevitz (IAA and TAU) and Professor Oded Lipschits (TAU). The aim of the Moza Excavations Project is to fully unearth the Iron IIA Temple Complex and determine its relationship with the surrounding elements at the site.

For more information contact: mozaexcavations@gmail.com

The Moza Region, View to the SW (Photo S

Tel Moza: The Site

Tel Moza is located approximately 7 km northwest of ancient Jerusalem (the City of David) situated towards the bottom of a slope on a saddle encompassed by springs and expansive agricultural lands, and dominating the gateway to Jerusalem along the ancient road leading from the lowlands (Coastal Plain and Shephelah) into the central hill country. The Soreq and Moza/Arza valleys converge at the base of the slope and form a wide basin known for its fertile soil and seasonal water flow. Indeed, settlement accompanied by cultivation of crops has prevailed in this region since the Neolithic Period (9000 years ago)!

Previous Research and Identification of the Site with Biblical Mozah

Many surveys and excavations had been conducted in the area previously, with large scale salvage excavations carried out by the Israel Antiquities Authority in preparation for the construction of a section of the new road to Jerusalem in 1993, 2002, 2003 (directed by Zvi Greenhut and Alon De Groot and assisted by Hamudi Khalaily and Anna Eirikh) and in 2012–2013 (directed by Anna Eirikh, Hamudi Khalaily, Shua Kisilevitz and Zvi Greenhut). The site was identified as an archaeological tell that had been occupied intermittently from the Pre-Pottery Neolithic period (8th-7th millennia BCE) to the 20th century. The abundance of remains and finds dating to the Iron Age II (10th to 6th centuries BCE) found during these excavations, confirmed the identification of the site with biblical Moẓah, mentioned for the first time in the Book of Joshua as a city in the territory of the tribe of Benjamin:

25 Gibeon, Ramah, Beeroth, 26 Mizpah, Kephirah, Mozah, 27 Rekem, Irpeel, Taralah, 28 Zelah, Haeleph, the Jebusite city (that is, Jerusalem), Gibeah and Kiriath—fourteen towns and their villages. (Joshua 18)

The finds indicate that Moẓa was settled continuously during the Iron Age II (10th to 6th centuries BCE) and the site was labaled "a royal granary specializing in grain storage, which supplied its products first and foremost to Jerusalem" (Greenhut and De Groot 2009: 223) due to the dozens of silos and two storage buildings found in it.

The Temple

A large complex consisting of a large building and a courtyard laid out in an east to west orientation. The complex was built into the slope, and its massive northern wall, measuring 2 m in width, acts as a retaining wall against the slope. The building was exposed to a length of 20 m and a width of 13 m. The construction of the complex is dated to the Iron IIA (late 10th early 9th centuries BCE), and it exhibits the typical North-Syrian architectural plan employed in monumental temples as early as the third millennium BCE and comparable to the North Syrian Iron Age temples at Tel Tayinat and Ain Dara and to the temple of Solomon in Jerusalem as it is described in the biblical texts (1 Kings:1, 6–7; 2 Chronicles 3).

The temple courtyard contained ample cultic remains that attest to its function as the focal point of public cultic activity in the complex, including an altar, an offering table, a pit filled with bones and ash, and an assemblage of cult vessels and artifacts comprising four figurines (two anthropomorphic and two zoomorphic), a large stand with plastic decoration, and a small pomegranate-shaped pendant. The unique figurines and cult stand employ morphology, typology and religious imagery typical throughout the ancient Near East since the second (and perhaps third) millennium BCE.

At least four phases, spanning the Iron II (late 10th/early 9th to late 7th/early 6th centuries BCE) were discerned in the temple courtyard, and the study of these phases is a key factor in the Moẓa Excavations Project.

The temple

Year Round Team