החתום של מצרים'Kāru לזיהוי ה

One of the notable deeds of Sargon II of Assyria, on his campaign to Philistia in 716 B.C., was to organize the commercial activities of the region between Gaza and el-Arish, including the creation of a commercial centre, as mentioned in one of his inscriptions: '... I opened the sealed Kāru of Egypt. Assyrians and Egyptians I mingled together and made them trade with one another.' It must be assumed that the Assyrian army and administration were present at or near this place, but its site has not been identified, mainly due to lack of Assyrian finds south of Tell Jemmeh. Several suggestions have been raised, but none of them is based on archaeological data. The present author holds that such evidence exists at Tell Abu Salima, near Sheikh Zuweid (grid ref. 0646/0708); this site, wrongly identified by Petrie as Anthedon, contains the remains of a fortress defended by an offset-inset wall reinforced by a stepped glacis on its outer face. (A reconstructed plan of this fortress is presented.) Within the fortress, in stratum G, Petrie laid bare a courtyard and several rooms of mud-brick, observing that one of the rooms (GR) was paved with burnt brick, with a staircase. Petrie identified this as a Babylonian shrine. A study of the plan and details of this room, and a comparison with similar structures in Mesopotamia and northern Syria lead us to conclude that Petrie's dating was incorrect althought his identification as a shrine was correct. The author considers the room to have been an Assyrian shrine, of the 8th/7th century B.C. which served the fortress which, in turn, controlled the adjacent 'Kāru' (i.e. commercial centre)