Gordon Franz, Courtesy Gabriel Barkay

Excavated by Ruth Amiran half a century ago, the ring wall consists of 17 sections, each five meters long (about 16 feet, or 10 Biblical cubits). Amiran also found a platform with the burnt remains of a pyre. She believed (though not wholeheartedly) that Jerusalem’s mounds were tombs even though no burials were found within them. Three decades later, when a neighborhood community center was slated for expansion, author Barkay excavated mound 4 (shown here), which adjoined the center.