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‘Atiqot 100 (2020)
ISBN 2948-040X
Remains from Middle Bronze Age II and the Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Crusader, Late Ottoman and
British Mandate Periods on Rabbi Yehuda Me-Raguza Street, Yafo (Jaffa)
(pp. 17–52)
Yoav Arbel and Lior Rauchberger
Keywords: burial, cemetery, Hasmonean conquest, agriculture, artillery
Eight excavation areas (A–G, J) were exposed, revealing seven strata dating from Middle Bronze Age II to the days of the British Mandate. The earliest find is an MB IIA infant jar burial—a significant find outside the boundaries of Tel Yafo. Burial graves from the Hellenistic, Roman and Crusader periods confirm that this street marked Yafo’s eastern limits in those times. The Hellenistic presence, probably under Ptolemaic rule, included scattered dwellings and farms with associated pottery dating from the late fourth to the second century BCE. The finds from the Byzantine period include a structure and pottery, reflecting a significant economic, agricultural and demographic development in Yafo during the sixth century CE. In the late Ottoman period, the area was exploited for agriculture, as is evidenced by the exposure of water channels and a well house. This area may have played a role in one of Yafo’s more obscure warfare episodes, possibly during the Egyptian occupation of 1840–1932, as indicated by the finding of eight cannon balls.