Timna Park opens as extraordinary "geological window" to the visitor
and exposes incredible stone shapes.

Copper mining in Timna began more that 6000years ago, at the end
of the fifth millenium BCE.

Here in Timna Park we find the world's earliest mine, beloning to the 
period when man first learned to produce copper. And here too began
the technological revolution in the history of mankind, when metal began
to be used in daily life. 

In the fourteenth throught twetfth centuries BCE, Egyptian expeditions
established, here in this brethtaking scenery, an enormous copper mining
operation (from the days of Pharaon Seti I through Ramses V). Partners
to this Egyptian activity were the residenst of nothern Arabia,
the Midianites. 
The ancient Egyptians used mules to carry the copper loaves to the only
natural port on the Gulf of Eilat, located at the "Coral Island", Gezirat
Faran. In the estimation of researches, this island was also the early
site of the port which was renovated and built by King Solomon in
"Ezion-Geber, which is beside Eloth, on the shore of the Red Sea, in
the Land of Edom" (Kings I).
In the first and second centuries CE, mining was done by the Romans
and after the Arabian conquests, by the Arabs.

The various sites in Timna Park were excavated and exposed over the last
thirty years by the Arava expeditions headed by Prof. Beno Rothenberg.