Taanach
תַּעְנַךְ
Where was biblical Taanach? At Tel Taanach, by the village of Ti'innik, about 35 km southeast of Haifa. I mark it certain.
The kings of Canaan made their stand here against Deborah and Barak, and the stars and the flooding Kishon fought against them. "They fought at Taanach, by Megiddo's waters," Deborah sang, and they carried off no spoil.
By Aaron Shaffier, licensed Israel tour guide and mapmaker · About the mapmaker
- Site today
- Tel Taanach, by the village of Ti'innik
- How sure
- Certain The name, the sources and the finds all agree.
- Other names
- Ta'anakh, Taanak, Ti'innik, Tell Ti'innik, Tell Ta'annek, Thanaach
- Location
- 32.5237° N, 35.2160° E (Google Maps)
How we know where it was
The name survives almost unchanged. The Arab village of Ti'innik sits on the slopes of the mound, which covers about 12 acres and rises some 40 meters above the Jezreel Valley.
The Bible keeps pairing Taanach with Megiddo, and the pairing is geography. The tel stands about 8 km from Megiddo along the same edge of the valley. Taanach guarded one of the passes from the valley up into the hill country. With chariots and a fortress on the pass, its Canaanites held off Manasseh for generations.
Egyptian records list it too. In Pharaoh Shishak's list it appears just before Shunem and Beit She'an. Excavators found Canaanite cuneiform tablets, letters to and from the local ruler. They also found a clay cult stand from the 10th century BCE, decorated with a goddess, lions, a sacred tree and a young bull.
Later Taanach was given to the Levites. Under Solomon it was part of the fifth district, together with Megiddo and Beit She'an.
Visiting today
Tel Taanach is an unreconstructed mound beside the village of Ti'innik, at the northern edge of Shomron. The old excavation trenches are visible, but there are no visitor facilities.
Read it in the Bible
Verse numbers follow the Hebrew Bible. In a handful of chapters English Bibles count one verse off.
See Taanach on the interactive map →
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Get the print + free ebookNearby places
- Megiddo 8 km north
- Jezreel 11 km east
- The Spring in Jezreel 12 km east
- Harosheth Haggoyim 12 km west
- Dothan 13 km south
- The Spring of Harod 14 km east