Image Details

A rectangular ashlar well at Tel Dor, on the northern coast of modern Israel. Pottery remains inside indicated the well was in use until the mid-11th century B.C.E. Tel Dor was settled in the 13th or 12th century B.C.E. by a Sea People called the Sikika, or Sikala.

The well was located in an area of the city’s fortifications that was connected by ashlar platforms to a harbor. There, a quay (the area in a harbor used for mooring ships) was also made of ashlars.

Like ashlar architecture in general, the predecessors of rectangular ashlar wells and ashlar quays in Canaan can be traced back to the Aegean. Wells similar to the one shown here have been found at a 13th-century B.C.E. site at Cyprus and an even earlier site on Crete.