A mass burial of young children found at Tel Azekah, also known as Tell Zakariya, a site situated halfway between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, has finally been published by The Lautenschläger Azekah Expedition (Tel Aviv University-Heidelberg University), which has been active at the site since 2012.

According to a press release in the Expedition’s official social media pages, the haunting find which was revealed between 2012 and 2014 during the exploration of a cistern, have been published in Palestine Exploration Quarterly, in a study titled «A mass grave of young children and infants from the Persian period in Tel Azekah and its importance for the understanding of burial practices of unweaned infants”.

As reported in the posts, the study, authored by Oded Lipschits, Annika Hauser, Noa Shatil, Manfred Oeming, Omer Sergi, Liora Freud, Gadi Solomon, Tal Nemet, Hila May, and Sabine Kleiman, presents the excavation and analysis of a unique burial context uncovered at the site. In particular:

“Inside a reused cistern, archaeologists discovered the remains of at least 68 individuals, almost all of them infants and very young children. Osteological analysis shows that the vast majority were under the age of five, and most under the age of two. This is an exceptionally rare find, both in its scale and in the clarity of its archaeological context.

One of the most important contributions of this study is its interpretation of the burial. The evidence does not point to a single catastrophic event, disease, or violence. Instead, it suggests a repeated and socially accepted practice. Infants who had not yet been weaned were not granted individual burials, but were laid to rest together in a designated space.

The associated finds, including simple pottery vessels, beads, and modest jewellery, further support this interpretation. These were not elaborate or high status burials, but rather quiet, repeated acts reflecting everyday realities and social norms.

This discovery offers a rare glimpse into how ancient societies understood infancy, personhood, and belonging. It suggests that full social identity may have been tied to key life stages, such as weaning, a meaningful transition marking the child’s integration into the community.

Beyond its immediate findings, the study contributes to a broader and still understudied field, burial practices of infants and young children in the Persian period of the southern Levant (5th c. BCE)”.

For the record, the area of Tel Zakariya was identified as the biblical Azekah in the mid-19th century and has since passed as such in the archaeological record. Excavations have shown that it was first settled around 3,500 years ago, flourishing as a Canaanite town during the Levantine Bronze Age before being abandoned toward its end (c. 1200 BCE). The site was later resettled during Iron Age II (1000–586 BCE), and formed part of the Kingdom of Judah, until its destruction by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. Its subsequent Persian-period phase—when the latest haunting find dates to—is particularly significant, as it reflects the return of Judeans to the region.

In Greece, the best-known example of a site exclusively hosting child burials is the infantile cemetery on the island of Astypalaia, Dodecanese, which is contemporary with the find at Tel Azekah.