Location. Just where ancient Ezion-geber stood cannot be determined with certainty. Most scholars accept Tell el-Kheleifeh (ʽEzyon Gever), some 500 m (1,600 ft) from the Gulf of ʽAqaba and over 3 km (2 mi) NW of the modern city of ʽAqaba, as the most likely possibility. Excavations there have uncovered five major periods of occupation, the oldest conjectured to date back to Solomon’s time.

Storage depot. The excavators at Tell el-Kheleifeh found the remains of a massive city gate and also a structure that was confidently declared to have been the center of a large copper-mining and smelting industry; they attributed its operation to King Solomon. More recently it was acknowledged that this identification was incorrect, and although some copper smelting was evidently done in that area, archaeologists now hold that the building was undoubtedly a storage depot. Such a fortified depot would be convenient at this point where important sea and land trade routes intersected, to house the gold, precious stones, and algum wood from Ophir till their being transported by caravans to their point of destination. (1Ki 9:26; 10:11, 12) For further details on this site, see ARCHAEOLOGY (Palestine and Syria).