This documentary details the history of the ancient city of Jericho that dates to 10,000 BC, which is the first known city to be surrounded by walls, the first evidence of a habituating group that is larger than a single clan, and the first evidence of large-scale communal labor.


Following are points from the video:

— The city of Jericho pre-dates writing and pottery by many millennia, it was likely the first place for animals to be domesticated, and agriculture was being experimented with as well.

— The city dates only a few centuries after the end of the last Ice Age, being in the “Neolithic Revolution” where people first adopted farming, domesticated animals, and lived communally. 

— The “Tower of Jericho” is explained, which is the largest structure to be built until many thousands of years later.

— The culture of that region at the time is known as “Natufian,” dating from 13,000 - 7,500 BC.

— Jericho has always had an abundant supply of underground fresh water that made the region very habitable, even to this day.

— Pre-Pottery “A” Jericho was abandoned between 7,300 - 7000 BC, and it is not known what caused its end; however a new city was then built on top of the old one only a few hundred years later, which lasted until 5,800 BC, which was a new culture that took over the entire region. 

— It is not known if the new culture was the result of an invasion or not, but we know more about them than their predecessors. 

— The new culture are the adherents of the “skull cult,” which is the earliest known example of ancestor worship, where they saved the skulls of their ancestors and covered them with plaster.  The new group had a settlement of about 2,000 people, being protected by a substantial new wall. 

— The round houses of the previous culture were replaced with rectangular dwellings with plastered walls that sometimes had multiple floors. 

— At about 6,000 BC the region became abandoned, not to be significantly re-populated for a thousand years. 

— Copper metallurgy was introduced at 4,000 BC, which changed the societies significantly.  The “Copper Age” is also known as the “Chalcolithic Age,” it lasted from 4,000 BC to 3,300 BC, and at this time the area around Jericho became more densely populated once again. 

— The “Bronze Age” started at around 3,100 BC, and Jericho became much more heavily occupied at this time, apparently maintaining an army of some sort.  At this time writing began in Mesopotamia and Egypt. 

— At 2,600 BC, Jericho had a booming population, and at 2350 BC an impressive palace complex was built. 

— At 2,300 BC, city life collapsed, possibly due to warring neighbors. 

— At 2,000—1,550 BC the city was re-populated once more, being more successful than it ever had been, with a lot of archeological evidence existing from this time period.  The city had large defensive walls and fortifications around itself with rectangular towers at this time, which are likely the ones that are spoken about in the Bible.  Jericho was almost certainly colonized and remotely administered by Egypt at this time, since Egypt controlled that entire region for a thousand years, and Canaanites likely lived in the city. 

— Between 1,700 and 1,550 BC the city reached its greatest heights of wealth due to changing its allegiances whenever necessary to ensure its survival.  Jericho also had a chariot-riding ruling class at this time. 

— In 1,550 BC the city was destroyed and it no longer served as an urban center for a century or longer.

— Jericho was then at one point or another controlled by just about every power that controlled that region up until the present day.