Ancient Jericho/Tell es-Sultan

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Exploring the Ancient History of Tell es-Sultan (Ancient Jericho)

Tell es-Sultan, also known as Tel Jericho or Ancient Jericho, is a significant archaeological site and a UNESCO World Heritage Site located in the Jordan Valley, northwest of present-day Jericho in Palestine. This ancient settlement, encompassing the prehistoric deposits of human activity, offers a unique glimpse into the evolution of human civilization.

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UNESCO Description of the World Heritage Site

Ancient Jerico/Tell es-Sultan is located northwest of present-day Jericho in the Jordan Valley in Palestine, the property is an oval-shaped Tell, or mound, that contains the prehistorical deposits of human activity, and includes the adjacent perennial spring of ‘Ain es-Sultan. By the 9th to 8th millennium BC, Neolithic Ancient Jericho/Tell es-Sultan was already a sizeable permanent settlement, as expressed by surviving monumental architectural attributes such as a wall with a ditch and a tower. It reflects the developments of the period, which include the shifting of humanity to a sedentary communal lifestyle and the related transition to new subsistence economies, as well as changes in social organisation and the development of religious practices, testified by skulls and statues found. The Early Bronze Age archaeological material on the site provides insights into urban planning, while vestiges from the Middle Bronze Age reveal the presence of a large Canaanite city-state, equipped with an urban centre and technologically innovative rampart fortifications, occupied by a socially complex population.

UNESCO Justification of the World Heritage Site

Criterion (iii): Ancient Jericho/Tell es-Sultan testifies in an exceptional way to developments that took place across the Near East in the Neolithic, characterised by the shifting of humanity to a new sedentary lifestyle and the related transition to new subsistence strategies. It demonstrates how people learned to live in larger, more permanent settlements and develop new social and ritual methods of communal living. Monumental features of the property, the presence of shared structures, and the evidence of post-mortem treatment of skulls provide important insights into changes in social organisation, and into the degree of skill, planning, and labour that this social organisation required. The deep stratigraphy preserved on the tell has the potential to answer many questions related to development and change of societies in the Neolithic period.

Criterion (iv): Ancient Jericho/Tell es-Sultan is an outstanding example of a permanent settlement with a long history that testifies to the transition of the people of the Levant from hunter-gatherers to a sedentary lifestyle in the Neolithic, and provides evidence of the rise of early Levantine urban culture in the Early Bronze Age. With its monumental architectural features and shared structures dating from the 9th to 8th millennium BC, the property exemplifies in an exceptional way the process of Neolithisation of the Fertile Crescent, a significant stage in human history. It further allows developments in building traditions to be observed in both the private and public spheres in the Neolithic and the Bronze Age, its Middle Bronze Age ramparts in particular showing evidence of innovative construction techniques.

Encyclopedia Record: Tell es-Sultan

Tell es-Sultan, also known as Tel Jericho or Ancient Jericho, is an archaeological site and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Palestine, in the city of Jericho, consisting of the remains of the oldest fortified city in the world.

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