Abel-keramim

Abel-keramim ("meadow of the vineyards") marked the southern terminus of Jephthah's rout of the Ammonites. Judges 11:33 records the geographic sweep: "he smote them from Aroer, even till thou come to Minnith, even twenty cities, and unto the plain of the vineyards." The landmarks — Aroer in the north, Minnith in the middle, Abel-keramim at the south — describe a 30 km sweep through the Ammonite heartland with twenty walled towns smashed along the way. The site lay in cultivated vineyard country on the southern Ammonite border, perhaps east of modern Amman where ancient terracing for vine cultivation is still archaeologically visible.