In August 2014, a five-day salvage excavation took place east of Highway 2, and c. 1.5 km east of Tel Dor (Permit No. A-7190; map ref. 193991–4005/725132–48; Fig. 1), prior to the installation of a cellular antenna. The excavation, on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, and funded by the Partner Communications Company, was directed by A.S. Sa‘id (photography), with the assistance of Y. Amrani (administration), R. Mishayev (surveying and drafting), P. Gendelman (pottery) and M. Shuiskaya (pottery drawing).
Two excavation squares (A1, A2; Fig. 2) were opened in the colluvium soil in the fields of the settlements Naḥsholim and ‘En Ayala, east of the kurkar ridge on which Highway 2 is built. In Sq A1, excavated down to bedrock, no ancient remains were found. In Sq A2, remains of a structure from the Roman period were exposed. The ancient remains lay close to the surface and were consequently seriously damaged by modern-day agricultural activity. Northwest of the excavation, at Horbat Hadarim, settlement remains including installations, tombs and a quarry, as well as sherds from the Hellenistic to the Early Islamic periods, were documented in the Map of Dor Survey (Olami, Sender and Oren 2005: Site 93).
In Sq A2, two walls (W11, W12) forming the northeastern corner of a structure were unearthed (Figs. 3, 4); the walls extended beyond the excavation square. The walls, preserved for two courses, were carelessly built of two rows of ashlars in secondary use, and of various-sized worked stones, interspersed with soil and small-stone fill. The careless construction is evident in the corner of the two walls, which is not at a right angle. Collapsed stones from the walls lay next to the walls. A patch of small fieldstones (L105), abutting the western end of W11 from the south, was possibly a floor or working surface; it was not excavated. No additional remains of flooring were exposed in the square, that was dug down to bedrock (L104).
A few pottery sherds were found in the soil accumulations between and below the fallen stones (L102, L103). The sherds were mainly of a bowl (Fig. 5:1), a cooking pot (Fig. 5:2) and a bag-shaped jar (Fig. 5:3); the pottery is dated to the third–fourth centuries CE.
The careless construction of the walls suggests that the structure was probably not a permanent dwelling, but rather a structure related to agricultural activity that took place at the settlement margins in the Late Roman period. It seems to have been a small building that did not extend over a large area, since no additional remains were found in adjacent Sq A1, or in the vicinity of the excavation, which exhibited bedrock surfaces, with no evidence of walls or rock-cut foundation channels.
Olami Y., Sender S. and Oren E. 2005. Map of Dor (30) (Archaeological Survey of Israel). Jerusalem.