Where Is It?

HEMIS / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO

1. Knossos Palace, Crete
2. Pharaoh’s Island, Egypt
3. Mont-Saint-Michel, France
4. Tyre Citadel, Lebanon
5. Santorini, Greece

Answer: (2) Pharaoh’s Island, Egypt

Pharaoh’s Island is a small island just off the eastern coast of the Sinai Peninsula at the northern tip of the Gulf of Aqaba, about 7 miles south of modern Eilat, Israel. Consisting of solid granite, it is generally barren. It measures a mere 380 yards in length and is currently uninhabited. Yet in antiquity, some scholars theorize, it may have served as King Solomon’s Red Sea port.^a Both 1 Kings 9:26–28 and 2 Chronicles 8:17–18 tell of Solomon building a fleet of ships in a Red Sea port called Ezion-Geber. Allegedly, he did so with the assistance of Hiram, the Phoenician king of Tyre. Although possible, this identification has not been confirmed, and other scholars identify Ezion-Geber with Tell el-Kheleifeh, a site on the mainland between Eilat and Aqaba, Jordan.

Although the oldest pottery found on the island dates to the Iron Age I (c. 1200–1000 BCE), the site’s monumental citadel was built either by the Crusaders in the 1160s CE or by Saladin and his Ayyubid successors in the late 12th or 13th century. Strategically positioned, the site controlled traffic coming into the Gulf of Aqaba from most of the surrounding regions. It lost its importance in the 14th century, when Aqaba’s Mamluk governor relocated into the city, diverting trade and pilgrimage traffic through Eilat.