Shechem
Shechem the location of Jacob's well lay in a narrow shoulder of land in the narrow valley between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal approximately 65 km north of Jerusalem. The Roman and Arab city of Nablus lies 2 km to the west. Josephus (Jewish Antiquities]] book 4, 8.44), writing about AD 90, placed the city between Mts. Gerizim and Ebal and other ancient writers knew it was on the outskirts of "Neapolis"/Nablus, but its archaeological site was only stumbled upon in 1903 by a German party of archaeologists led by Dr. Hermann Thiersh, at a site known as Tell Balatah beside the traditional site associated with the tomb of Joseph (Joshua 24:32) and near JacobÃÂÃÂs Well, where Jesus met the woman of Samaria (Gospel of John 4:5-6).Shechem had been a Canaanite settlement, mentioned on an Egyptian stele of a noble at the court of Senusret III (ca 1880 - 1840 BCE). Shechem first appwears in the Tanakh in Genesis 12:6-8 which records how Abraham reached the "great tree of Moreh" at Shechem and offered sacrifice nearby. Later Joseph's bones were brough out of Egypt and reburied at Shechem.