Editing Tel Hazor (section)

===Early Bronze Age===
The first settlement excavated in Tel Hazor is dated to the Early Bronze Age II and III periods, existing at around the 28th and 24th centuries BCE. It was part of a system of settlements around the [[Hula Valley]], including [[Abel-beth-maachah|Abel Beth Maachah]], [[Dan (ancient city)|Dan]] and [[Kedesh]]. The settlement was exposed in limited areas where a few houses were discovered. Based on these finds, Early Bronze Age Hazor was not a significant settlement. With that said, it seems that a large monumental structure dated to the following Middle Bronze Age period was already erected in the Early Bronze Age, sometime after the 27th century BCE. If this is true it implies that already in its beginnings, Hazor was a well-planned settlement that served as an urban center. It also shows one of the earliest examples of [[basalt]] slabs used as foundations to walls ([[orthostates]]) in the [[Southern Levant]], only preceded by a temple from [[Tel Megiddo]]. The transition to the Early Bronze Age III period is characterized by the movement of people from rural areas within the valley to major urban sites such as Hazor, Dan and Abel Beth Maachah. Thus the establishment of a possible palace in Hazor, as well as in Dan, attest to this phenomenon.<ref name=":0" />

A large part of Hazor's pottery from that time belongs to the [[Khirbet Kerak]] type. A [[Petrography|petrographic]] study of these vessels has shown that they were made with local clays and that Hazor played a key role in distributing them across the country. The study also showed that other types of pottery were made of a different source of local clay. This use of two different local clays for two different families of vessels might indicate a technical decision or otherwise the presence of two or more workshops. One theory suggests that the manufacturers of the Khirbet Kerak tools, which were introduced to the settlement, chose or were forced to use a different source of clay, not controlled by the other workshops. Noteworthy is the discovery of 15 [[cylinder seal]] impressions on pottery from this period, added to another found some 2 kilometers south. This assemblage is one of the largest in the southern Levant and the fact it was found in such a small excavation area further supports the reconstruction of Hazor as an important city during this period.<ref name=":0">Sharon Zuckerman (June 2013), [https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5615/neareastarch.76.2.0068#metadata_info_tab_contents Hazor in the Early Bronze Age], [[Near Eastern Archaeology (journal)|''Near Eastern Archaeology'']], Vol 76, No. 2, pp. 68–73</ref>